Actor/comedian/writer/musician Donald Glover is a tough man to pigeon-hole. First of all, he’s spent his entire life not quite fitting into any category. Secondly, c’mon, he’s an ACTOR, COMEDIAN, WRITER AND MUSICIAN! And third, and possibly of greatest importance. . .What the hell is a pigeon hole?

In one of history’s biggest understatements . . . It’s a busy time to be Donald Glover. Let’s use this week as an example: Tonight, you can watch Donald Glover the actor as Troy, the emotionally-evolving ex-star football player on NBC’s “Community” (Thursdays, 8pm). Or, if you’re in Los Angeles, you can pop over to the NuArt Theatre for one of the final few screenings of “Mystery Team”, the feature debut from DERRICK Comedy, featuring Donald the actor, writer, and musician. Then on Friday (March 19) at 11pm you can catch the premiere of Donald the comedian’s “Comedy Central Presents” on, you guessed it, Comedy Central. On Saturday you will likely find Donald the musician, aka Childish Gambino, in his home recording studio putting the finishing touches on the rap album “Culdesac”, his follow-up to the Mixtape series and surprise sensation “I Am Just A Rapper”. On Sunday, God willing, he’ll rest. (Until Sunday night when he performs with the improv group Shitty Jobs at UCB-LA.)

All this from a guy who claims he doesn’t know how to multi-task!

While success is coming on strong, it is not entirely new for Glover, who got his “big break” as a staff writer on NBC’s “30 Rock” after spending his college years (NYU) dominating the internet with the previously-mentioned DERRICK Comedy. Poop or Chocolate’s Ben Axelrad got the fast-paced, fast-rising man-of-many-hats to slow down long enough to discuss where he’s been, where he’s at, and where he’s going. And also, all those hats.

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Let’s start with some Childish Gambino questions since everyone prefers talking about their hobbies over work. Your “I Am Just A Rapper” (IAJAR) mixtapes have received widespread positive feedback for their synthesis of original rap music and preexisting indie rock songs. What inspired the idea?

First of all, I was surprised nobody had ever done this before. Indie kids love Jay-Z and The Clipse and Kid Cudi and stuff like that. And I feel like there are a million black kids who listen to indie music, but I know, for me, I was afraid to say I do. Rap is such a club culture now. Electronica and rap have kind of merged into each other because you’ve got this music that’s totally instrumental and syncopated and guys can rap over this loop that people can dance to in the club. And I like that music, but I think it was a problem for a lot of indie kids. They would say, like, “Oh, that MIA song is such a rip from The Clash,” so okay, let’s make one that’s totally The Clash. Let’s make one that has original guitars and drums and stuff that you’re used to hearing in indie music, rap over it and see how you feel. But I also didn’t want to make songs where the drums come in like boom-boom-chk, boom-boom-chk, like Korn or Limp Bizkit, and it’s the obvious “rock-rap” song. I listen to St. Vincent and stuff like that and some songs have no drums at all and the organ is the percussion. Or some songs will be like tom-tom-tom and no snare. Or maybe there’s a clap; or the tambourine is the snare. And there hadn’t been that exploration in rap yet. That’s what got me excited. There had never been a song where it was just a flute coming in like flute-flute-flute, and that becomes the percussion and you rap over it. It’s really cool.

Childish Gambino – Both Hands (Black Rainbow)

The IAJAR Mixtapes are definitely your most open and revealing albums to date. Were you conscious of that as you made them?

Somewhat, yeah. I realized I was hiding behind things on the earlier albums, whether it be bravado and swagger or choosing an arbitrary thing like pink hoodies to be my “thing.” So on “IAJAR” I decided I would be my “thing.” I’d just do it straight and rap about things I care about. I like clothes; I’ll sing about clothes. People think I’m a weirdo; I’ll call myself a weirdo. And not to sound like the plot to “The Blind Side”, but the more I was me the better it went. And the more I was me the more I wouldn’t blend into the crowd. This culture niche that I am a part of is starving for hip-hop that is cool, but also self-aware. And when you’re open and let people see all of you the best stuff comes out. Like that John Mayer Playboy thing, I don’t think that was him. He was trying to sound witty and smart and cool. And the thing is, if you’re witty and smart and cool you’ll come off as witty and smart and cool just talking about whatever. But more than anything, the more truthful you are the more people tend to like you. Unless you’re a horrible person. And even that’s charming sometimes, because they usually don’t try to hide it. I don’t get it when people try to sound cool. The best shit comes out when you sound geekiest. Thus “I Am Just A Rapper”.

Childish Gambino – Bitch, Look At Me Now (Two Weeks)

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You don’t want rap to be your profession, but you put more than a hobbyist’s effort into these albums. What purpose does making music serve for you?

It’s a flavor of life. Everything I enjoy, be it music or fashion or food, these are things that aren’t really necessary. Food is necessary, but, like, cuisine isn’t. If you were fed Grape Nuts everyday they’d be horrible, but you wouldn’t die. But all the things you like, those are the flavors of your life. For me, trying this thing with that, wearing this and doing that, combining different music; those are just ways for me to explore myself. My raps are really like therapy for me. They’re ways for me to vent. And I would love to have the time to be able to do it like Lil’ Wayne and just wake up, eat some gummi bears, drink some syrup and start rapping. But there are just so many other things I want to do. When we went on tour with Mystery Team people used to tell me how much they liked the music and they would always ask when I was gonna do rap for real. And it’s like, well, are you gonna like it any more if I do it “for real”? What does that even mean? It’s this weird thing where people feel like it’s not legit unless there’s some ploy to get them to spend money. It’s like, “If it’s good why is it free?”

Briefly tell us what we can expect from your next album, Culdesac.

Culdesac will be an album you can play at any party. I hated it when we’d go to college parties and depending on what party you went to it was either all rap music and dancing or, like, Animal Collective and everybody standing around. So Culdesac will be a dance record where you can also sit down and listen to and really appreciate the lyrics.

Where did your comedic voice come from?

I kind of credit Tina Fey for that, but also for making me realize who I am and why I am important comedically. In high school she was the talented, funny, weird girl who people probably didn’t treat so awesome, and now that’s she’s successful and still funny and super talented, she plays with those ideas all the time. And I know she feels self-conscious about that stuff, but she still lays it all out there. Because that’s what’s really funny. And once you realize that, you’re home-free, because you can really play with who you are and why that’s funny. And in doing so, learn a lot about yourself. Tina showed me that.

It’s easy to focus on how cool it is to have landed a writing gig on “30 Rock” straight out of college, but it must’ve been very intimidating also. How scared were you?

I was terrified. I kept having these dreams that I wasn’t supposed to be there; like they’d come in one day and be like, “You’re not Donald. Where’s Donald?” I really wanted the job, but I didn’t see why they hired me. I felt like I was funny, until I got that job. I’m not funny, these people are funny. Why am I here? I’m too young, I’m too stupid. I felt…dumb. And I was really fucked up about that. Sometimes I’d walk home and just start crying. But Tina had faith in me. I mean, if she wanted to fire me she could have, in a heartbeat, on inexperience alone, and nobody would’ve batted an eyelash. But she didn’t. And I kept being in there. And eventually I came to realize what they relied on me for that no one else could give. So I started pitching my jokes. It’s funny, because people always think, “Oh, the Tracy (Morgan) jokes.” But that also goes with people not knowing how a TV show is written. People think Robert Carlock writes all of Alec’s lines and Tina writes all of her lines, but that’s not it. It’s a group effort and it’s all about finding out what perspective you have to offer the group.

You were cast on “Community” shortly after leaving “30 Rock”, but you actually quit “30 Rock” to pursue stand-up comedy. My question: Are you nuts?

It’s crazy to me now to think I quit “30 Rock” to do stand-up. Thank God I got “Community”. But I quit “30 Rock” because I fell in love with stand-up so hard and so fast. It was like, why didn’t I do this before? I get to write and perform and say whatever I want. It was really helping me to figure out a lot of stuff about comedy, but also about the way I feel about the world. Like, I’m fucked up about race stuff and I can use stand-up to dig into that and figure out how I really feel about different things. Because you’ve learned the right thing to say and the right way to feel, but all my best jokes come from me feeling a certain way, but also feeling like it’s wrong to feel that way. And if you dig deep into the stuff that scares you, you’ll realize there’s nothing to fear, it usually comes from something you’ve learned. And figuring that stuff out is the good stuff. That’s the yolk. But I don’t think a lot of people wanna do that. Most people are like, “This scares me so I’m gonna kill it.”

Much of your perspective stems from your childhood experience of never fitting in no matter where you found yourself. Talk a little about always feeling like an outsider. Did standing out fuel a need to be outstanding?

I just wanted to be normal, this is just the only way I’ve ever known how to be. People always want to put you in a category and they just never knew what to do with me. The black kids would say I was Northern, because I grew up in Atlanta but my family isn’t from the South, so I didn’t have an accent. And then I went to an all-white school and was the only black kid, so the white kids called me an Oreo – a black person that wants to be white. They just wanted a label so bad. And not in an evil way; most of the time people aren’t evil; they just wanted to make sense of me. I defied their map for all black people because I didn’t have a certain flavor or talk a certain way. But I was obviously black, so what was my label? And I didn’t know either. I still don’t. But what I do know is that I got to see the world from a lot of different sides, and every comedian I’ve ever looked up to would turn that into comedy gold.

Who are the comedians you look up to as examples of that?

Tina Fey, of course. And then people like Chris Rock and Richard Pryor. Chris Rock is this amazingly smart, creative person who got to see two sides of the world because he was going to a white school and getting picked on but also couldn’t be himself in his own neighborhood. But he wasn’t just some kid; he was Chris Rock, so now he’s got this voice. Same thing with Richard Pryor. He grew up in a whorehouse, lost his virginity when he was in single digits…

That’s awesome…and, of course, awful.

Yeah. I guess for a dude it’s never gonna be totally awful. You can’t really get raped unless it’s by a dude. If a girl forces sex on you it’s like, yeah, it was awful…but I had sex! I wasn’t in the mood…but I was hard. But anyway, Richard Pryor grew up in destitute poverty, his dad was a pimp who died when he was very young; but on-stage he turned it into his own thing that nobody else was talking about. He was a real down dude but on his first stand-up album he was like, “Yeah, every dude’s sucked a dick. I’ve sucked a dick.” And you didn’t hear many dudes talking about that being the funniest part, but to me that’s the best stuff: The real, real shit. What makes things interesting is that dichotomy; the collision of love and fear. Because that’s what makes a person a person. And it takes someone with a real take to show us that stuff.

It seems like an oversimplification to describe your creative endeavors as a combination of black and white culture. How would you describe them?

I guess you could say it’s like black and white culture combined but that just seems so separate. A white dude who likes the Wu Tang Clan and “The Wire” likes “black stuff.” But if a black guy likes those things he just likes stuff. Isn’t it all just stuff? When I was a kid I believed the world was made of all these different things that are not as simple as “black and white.” But then I heard this teacher say that it’s a binary universe; it comes down to 1’s and 0’s, which is how computers run, and you make decisions only as far as you either do something or you don’t do it. 1’s and 0’s, yes and no, black and white. I believe in both ideas. It’s this thing where from far away a wave of up and down looks like a straight line. Hopefully the things I create seem like something new when really they’re just wavy decisions made on both sides, with consistency.

Are  you purposeful about going after well-rounded parts and avoiding the “urban” typecast?

Definitely. Troy (Glover’s character on “Community”) wasn’t written as any particular race, it really came down to just who they liked in casting. I definitely don’t want to make a “black show” where I have to “urban” it up so we can reach that demographic. It’s always either “Good Times” or “The Cosby Show”. And I liked those shows for what they were, when they were, but people keep wanting to make those shows and I don’t want to watch them. All those Tyler Perry things don’t resonate with me because there’s no world like that where everybody’s black. Maybe if it took place in Africa, but then you’d have caste systems and all sorts of weird politics that people don’t agree on. Most of the time, if you’re a minority, you’re a minority everywhere you go. And I’m okay with that. It’s the way the world is. One of the strengths of “Community” is that it’s a racially diverse show that acknowledges race without dwelling on it. The idea that there should be black shows and white shows, black movies and white movies, that just doesn’t interest me.

Having worked on-camera with DERRICK and behind the scenes at “30 Rock”, was the transition to “Community” smooth and easy?

I thought I was comfortable when “Community” started but I have quickly seen that I was not. It was definitely a different feeling than when I was doing DERRICK stuff, ’cause these aren’t your buddies and you don’t have a million takes. You’re fucking with other people’s money, essentially. I look back and realize I was nervous. And I know the character so well now that it’s easy for me to see how I didn’t know the character so well back then. It was definitely an adjustment, but I’m a good adapter.

Being afforded the time to develop a character organically seems like one of the more fun parts of television acting. Has that been true for you on “Community”?

Definitely. It’s so interesting the way I’m growing into that character and he’s growing into me. Not in a douchey, actory way, just in the sense that it’s become much easier to make choices as him. I was reading some messageboards and a few people were saying they don’t like Troy because he’s more expressive and less like a traditional jock, and I was actually very happy with that. I didn’t want him to be just some jock. He started as that but I think he’s moving past it. You really see now that he’s a strange guy who, a lot like me, didn’t know who he was growing up. He didn’t think for himself because he was always wanting to fit in, which is also very much me, and now, for the first time, he’s realizing he can be weird and people won’t judge him. You see it especially through the friendship with Abed; this much weirder guy who probably has Asperger’s, who everybody judges, but who doesn’t judge anybody. And it might be because he probably has Asperger’s, but he doesn’t care and he doesn’t judge Troy. And I think Troy’s getting very comfortable with that. And so am I.

While you’ve been working on Community the rest of DERRICK has been touring in support of “Mystery Team”. Has it been difficult for you having to stay behind so frequently?

It’s been hard on both ends because we’re all doing different things and going in different directions. There was a DERRICK thing one week that I was planning on going to, but I had to go to Fashion Week instead because there were so many opportunities there that were so much a part of what I want to do. And they were cool about it, but I felt really bad. But I had to go. And I feel like that’s just gonna happen more and more as I do more things that represent me. Because I love DERRICK, but I don’t want to be known as the black guy from DERRICK. And I don’t think any of the others want to be the long-hair from DERRICK or the girl from DERRICK or whatever. We wouldn’t be here without each other, but you’ve always gotta be pushing forward. DERRICK has been and hopefully always will be a safe place to do and try new things. We made a promise to the fans that we’d make more sketches and we meant it, so we will. But it’s hard to find time to work together while also getting your vision out there.

Talk a little about your vision. Ultimately, what do you want out of all this?

Lately it’s been like I have a calling. I’ve always felt like the stuff that happened to me when I was a kid happened for a reason. And I’ve always felt like I had something to say and that what I’m doing is important. And I don’t let anything get in the way of that. If I really want to do something I can do it, and I’ve always felt that way. Never wavered from that. Lorne Michaels once said something to me that really stuck, and I’ve never seen it not be true. He said truly talented people are only faithful to their talent. Which might explain why he has people sign contracts for like seven years. Because if you’re really going after something, if you really have a goal, the only thing that’s gonna stop you is you. What I love about Kanye West is his willingness to be like “Fuck it. I’m gonna do it and I’ll deal with it later.” To take that leap. Because people who are real innovators; your Kanyes, your Michael Jordans, your Steve Martins, your Salvador Dalis, your Jim Hensons; nobody’s gonna tell them they’re too anything. Except for them. And since I have this unique perspective of having seen the world from all these opposing viewpoints, and I also happen to be creative, I feel like it’s my responsibility to expose the dichotomies that exist so there can be dialogue and understanding. I feel like that’s my calling. So what do I want? I want everything. Not because I’m greedy, but so I have all the tools to reach as many people as possible.

Thanks, Donald. That was great.

Donald’s “Comedy Central Presents” is available at the iTunes store.

You can pre-order “Mystery Team” on DVD now in advance of its release May 25, 2010.

Visit the Childish Gambino website to download all of his albums.

For more information on Donald Glover visit his website.