Entertainment

Hip to be ‘square’

Method Man

Method Man

SQUARING OFF: Rappers like Method Man compete on VH1’s “Hip Hop Squares.” (
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The game is old, but remixing what already exists into something fresh and exciting is the very basis of hip-hop.

Tonight at 11 on MTV2, “Hip Hop Squares” hijacks the “Hollywood Squares” format and gives it to hip-hop artists and personalities like Fat Joe, Nick Cannon, DJ Khaled, and reality TV stars Drita D’Avanzo and Vinny Guadagnino.

On this version of “Squares,” drinks are served.

“You can take any show, really, and make it hip-hop,” says Peter Rosenberg, the popular Hot 97 radio personality and host of “Hip Hop Squares.” “And it pretty much becomes more entertaining.”

The idea, he says, is to take some of the scary out of hip-hop and showcase the comedy. “You rarely see a lot of rappers in a place where they’re not taking themselves seriously, and they’re laughing and smiling,” Rosenberg says.

For the stars on the show, it is a rare chance to connect to a wider audience.

“This is the first time in my career where I saw my name that I said, ‘Man, I made it,’ ” says Bronx rapper Fat Joe. The show “just pushed it one step further for hip-hop to be solidified as American culture.”

Almost a quarter century after MTV introduced hip-hop to the larger culture via “Yo! MTV Raps,” the rules have changed, and rappers like Drake and Childish Gambino look and sound more like “Cosby” kids than the gangster rappers of a few years ago.

“Over the years, I think we have put ourselves in a box and made ourselves one-dimensional,” says Sway Calloway, the face of MTV News and the network’s unofficial ambassador of hip-hop, who will appear in three episodes.

“We’re not always mad — sometimes we want to have a good time,” he says. “We can laugh, be corny and have fun.”

Twenty-two episodes were taped at Brooklyn’s Steiner Studios in April.

Word of the show traveled fast.

“We were already getting phone calls in the middle of shooting!” says Elena Diaz, the MTV executive in charge of music and talent.