The 10 Best Rappers Turned Actors

Who are the 10 top hip-hop artists who've flowed onto the big screen with ease?

"Thought I was wack cause I wanted to act," Will Smith rhymes in his hit song Don't Say Nothin' off his Big Willie Style album, surmising, "Now every brother and his mother that rap be trying to do that."

Touchè.

Some have tried, some have failed -- but with reports of Will Smith making over $20 million per movie, it's no wonder that hip-hop artists are looking to follow hard in his tall footsteps.

That's why we've got "Mr. Getting Jiggy Wit It" posted up at the top spot on our new list of the 10 best rappers who've dipped their skills into the realm of acting and come out okay on the other side:

#1 - Will Smith
Folks may have called him "soft" -- as in "Microsoft," Will would say -- for his acting role in Six Degrees of Separation, but all these years and accolades later, folks are envying the career of the rapper-turned-successful actor.

#2 - Queen Latifah
"Oohhh, ladies first, ladies first," as the Queen sang in her hit song of the same name when her 1989 "All Hail the Queen" dropped, and the "Ladies First" single -- with its smooth-rapping, royal regalia, kente-cloth hat-wearing female emcee in the video making the hip-hop audience at large take notice.

"Get sketched out in chalk 'cause I don't wanna talk," flowed Queen Latifah back then in U.N.I.T.Y. -- a song that became the female anthem of leave-me-aloneness-I said-I-don't-want-to-give-you-my-digits.

Now, some 21 years later, Movie Fone has a list of the rapper-turned-actress' accomplishments, highlighted with an Oscar nomination in 2002 for Chicago.

#3 - Eminem
"I am whatever you say I am," said Marshall Mathers, and we're calling Slim Shady one of the best rappers turned thespians out there.

His semi-autobiographical movie 8 Mile, based on Eminem's life growing up in the rough-and-tumble titled area, portrayed the on-screen version of Eminem fighting for respect as a white rapper -- and ultimately getting it.

Eminem's song "Lose Yourself," featured prominently in the film, garnered the hip hop artist an Oscar statue.

#4 - Mos Def
Born Dante Terrell Smith-Bey, the rapper known as Mos Def -- short for "most definitely" -- most definitely kicked his acting CV up several notches by starring as Chuck Berry in the 2008 film Cadillac Records with Beyonce.

Mos Def has a plethora of award nominations, for both his acting roles -- like in Something the Lord Made -- to Grammy nods for his rap work.

#5 - 50 Cent
"If he'd released 'In Da Club' and made not another peep," says Spinner about rapper 50 Cent, "the once and future Curtis Jackson would have been eligible" for their "Artists of the 2000s" list.

While Spinner cites his 20 million album sales, 50 Cent gets a nod here for showing his vulnerable side in lead roles in movies like Get Rich or Die Tryin'.

#6- Tupac
Though his life was cut painfully short, Tupac's cadence and flow lives on.

And so do his acting scenes, in famous movies like Poetic Justice, wherein Tupac "gets the girl" played by Janet Jackson in the film.

#7 - Ice Cube
He may have come "Straight Outta Compton" as a hard-ass N$#ga With Attitude, but Ice Cube survived his gansta rap days to go on and star in much-loved big screen fare like Friday and Boyz in The Hood, making the switch to lighter family fare such as Are We There Yet? and Are We Done Yet? that has won O'Shea Jackson a whole new group of fans that weren't even born when he was telling police he could "go toe to toe in the middle of a cell" with them.

#8 - T.I.
"The old me's dead and gone, dead and gone," T.I. sang in one of his latest hits.

And fans of Clifford Joseph Harris, Jr. -- who starred as Tip in 2006's ATL movie -- are more than happy that the rapper is out of jail now and on the road to recovery.

#9 - Mark Wahlberg
Known to the world as "Marky Mark and the Funky Bunch" back in the early '90s, Mark Wahlberg is much more well-known as a stellar actor these days, with roles from Fear to the modern-day The Departed highlighting his resume.

#10 - Eve
From a precarious past to a rap career where she deemed herself "the illest pit bull in a skirt," Eve has parlayed her paw-print tattooed self from rapper to an every woman kind of actress, having enjoyed her own sitcom and appeared on other hit shows like Glee and the movie Whip It.

Well, those are our top 10 picks for the best rappers turned actors, leaving off some of the honorable mentions who may make it onto future lists.

In the meantime, who are your favorite hip hop artists who've made a smooth move to celluloid?