Angela Rye Speaks Out About Split With Common, Rapper Remains Silent

angela rye common

Common and Angela Rye went public with their romance in the fall. (Photo by Greg Doherty/Patrick McMullan via Getty Image)

Just days after CNN political commentator Angela Rye sided with her man Common’s gun control remarks at the Oscars, she has confirmed her romance with the rapper is no more.

“We have and will always be friends,” she told Page Six Thursday, March 8. “He is an amazing human being, and I’m a much better person because he’s a part of my life. May we all keep loving and living.”

Common hasn’t given a public comment on the split, but he had nothing but sweet things to say about his one-time love months after they went public over the summer.

“There’s a definite connection with Angela Rye,” Common told SiriusXM’s “Bevelations” in October. “She’s a wonderful woman. I will just say, I am dating. I’m happy right now — and she is an incredible human being.”

The couple, who were together for almost one year, had been regularly photographed together on red carpets. They included the Creative Arts Emmys in September and most recently, the premiere of Common’s Showtime series, “The Chi” in January.

However, that was one of the last times the pair would be pictured together. Page Six sources told the paper Rye didn’t go to the Oscars with her now-ex and she was absent at the Toast to the Arts event Common hosted in West Hollywood days earlier.

Yet the same day Rye — who TMZ reported got anonymous threats upon going public with Common — confirmed they had called it quits, her Vanity Fair profile was published online. In it, she gushed about the Chicago MC.

“From meeting Common I’ve definitely become a better human being,” Rye said. “And for that I’m grateful.”

Still independent.

We hope this story was worth your time. For over 14 years, Atlanta Black Star has stayed Black-owned and independently run. We didn't get here by waiting on ad budgets that were never built to prioritize us. Our readers did that.

Corporate support for Black media has always been thin. Outlets like ours get roughly 1% of the $170 billion spent on U.S. advertising each year, and that margin is shrinking further as advertisers walk back the DEI-linked commitments they made in 2020. That's the backdrop. It's not why we're asking.

The wider picture isn't any steadier. Newspaper ad revenue has fallen more than 80% since 2005, and local newsrooms are closing at a rate of roughly two a week nationwide. When outlets go under, it's rarely the ones built to center a Black perspective from the ground up that get to stick around.

We know a request for support isn't why you came here. But without readers choosing to fund this work directly, the depth of reporting we can do at home and abroad shrinks along with everyone else's. If you're not in a position to give, that doesn't change how much we value you as a reader.

If you are able to, a recurring contribution does more for us than a single one-time gift, because it lets us plan the next investigation instead of just the next invoice. It takes about 30 seconds, no long form, no account. Thank you for continuing to support independent journalism and freedom of the press.

Back to top