“One of the gifts in acting is that I'm required to embrace the lives of other men,” Mahershala Ali says. As an actor, Ali has done so with such exceptional believability that he's earned both a Golden Globe and an Oscar. For Black History Month 2019, he's created a special playlist comprising songs that have helped him understand his characters. “It's always a Black man challenging me to tell his story with empathy absent of judgment,” he says. “These songs have inspired qualities in several characters during my exploration of the diverse and beautifully complex Black identity.”