TIME 100 The most influential people in the world - PIONEERS

S.S. RAJAMOULI, MIKAELA SHIFFRIN, BELLA HADID, SAM ALTMAN, ROBIN ZENG + MORE

- Erin McMullen

DOJA CAT

A new kind of star

BY BAZ LUHRMANN

I've worked with all kinds of artists, but with a certain few you connect on a deeper level. For me, Doja Cat is one of those artists. She's at the top because she works to bring everything she does to the highest possible level. When she started to work on "Vegas" for Elvis, Elvis was relegated to a Halloween costume-he wasn't influential to the younger generation. But Doja and her producer Yeti Beats understood the importance of translating "Hound Dog" for a new audience. For them, it was an act of translating the roots of Black music.

Doja is a true child of the internet, creatively plugged into the kind of social connection that I'm generationally incapable of understanding. She is personally connected with her fans, and that allows her to understand and feed back to them. She can't be boxed in. She's a rapper, a singer, a performance artist she's the canvas on which she expresses a character or an idea. There's no "brand" to Doja Cat. You never know what she's going to do next, and that's exciting.

Luhrmann is an Oscar-nominated filmmaker

MrBeast

VIRAL CREATOR

By Mark Rober