Sorry to Bother You, or, Stick to the Script

I’m very late to Boots Riley’s first movie Sorry to Bother You, but for what it’s worth, I’ve been intending to watch it for years. I missed it in theaters, but bought a copy as soon as I started hearing all the buzz around it and getting recommendations from friends and family. I was never in the mood to watch it because I thought I knew exactly what it was going to be: a feel-bad comedy. Funny and inventive, but also with the kind of edge that’d leave me feeling helpless and/or guilty afterwards. I think at the time, I was living in a gentrified part of Oakland and working for a tech company in San Francisco, so I expected I’d spend the movie laughing nervously that I was at least part of the problem. The movie is set in a just-barely-alternate-reality version of Oakland, and it stars LaKeith Stanfield as Cassius “Cash” Green, an unemployed guy who’s feeling broke, directionless, and worried that his life and legacy aren’t going to amount to anything. He gets a job as a…