Before she was Empire ’s Cookie Lyon or a Golden Globe winner for The Curious Case of Benjamin Button , Taraji P. Henson was Shug. Pregnant with Djay’s child, Shug is the "bottom b*tch" (a title the film uses with brutal honesty) who gets tired of the pimp life. She is the moral center of the film; she is the one who calls Djay out on his delusions, yet she is also the first one to pick up a microphone and sing backup for his demo.
At the center of the chaos is Terrence Howard, delivering what is arguably the performance of his career. He plays Djay (often called "D-Jay"), a struggling, small-time pimp who has a mid-life crisis epiphany that his ticket out of the gutter is rap music. cast of hustle and flow
: Henson plays one of DJay's sex workers who is pregnant and becomes his primary source of emotional support and vocal inspiration. Before she was Empire ’s Cookie Lyon or
Taryn Manning played Nola, the white "worker" in DJay’s crew who provides the capital for his dream. Manning played the role with a tragic fragility, showing the harsh reality of the streets without exploitation. She is the moral center of the film;
Terrence Howard led the Hustle & Flow cast as DJay, a hardened Memphis hustler experiencing a midlife crisis who decides to pursue a rapping career. Howard’s performance was hailed as a tour de force, earning him his first and only Academy Award nomination for Best Actor.