Come for the celebrities, stay for the cause

Enthusiastic support for presidential candidate Sen. Barack Obama brought several hundred Richmond-area students to Hyperlink Café for a rally Thursday. Some celebrity appearances didn’t hurt, either.The rally, sponsored by the Campaign for Change, featured appearances by Marlon Wayans, Tatyana Ali and Jurnee Smollett.

The actors stressed the importance of Virginia college students registering to vote and encouraging their friends to head to the polls.

“Roll deep,” said Ali, of “Fresh Prince of Bel Air” fame.

Wayans, star of 2004’s “White Chicks,” agreed. “Go down to the polls like you’re going to a Jay-Z concert,” he said.

Josh Kadrich, a biology and environmental studies major, is the chapter coordinator for the VCU Students for Barack Obama.

“I organized (the rally) with the Campaign for Change here in Richmond because . it’s a good way of getting students fired up,” Kadrich said.

Kadrich said the event was advertised through facebook.com, mass e-mails and 1,500 flyers posted throughout campus.

“And then of course word of mouth,” Kadrich said. “When you have Marlon Wayans coming to VCU, it’s going to get around.”

Word of mouth is how Joshua Boone, a theater performance major, and Stephen Cuthbertson, an exercise science major, found out about the rally.

“To be quite honest, (I came) because I heard some television and movie stars were here,” Boone said. “Besides that, I am in support of Obama.”

Boone said he was “happy” Wayans, Ali and Smollett made appearances at the rally.

“I’m glad they’re here,” Boone said. “It’s a good thing they’re doing.”

Despite the extensive promotion described by Kadrich, the number of students present at the rally disappointed Boone and Cuthbertson.

“The turnout is not as big as we expected, but it also was not as advertised as we expected,” Cuthbertson said.

Neither Cuthbertson nor Boone saw any advertising for the rally.

According to Kadrich, 329 people attended the rally and about 250 were VCU students.

“We expected several hundred people, and that’s what we got,” Kadrich said.

VCU Students for Barack Obama is planning several large events in the near future, Kadrich said. He said the organization has taken major strides with getting students to vote.

“I can’t say that we can take all the credit for all the new registrations,” Kadrich said. “But I think that we’ll see a doubling or maybe even a tripling of students registering to vote.”

Ali shared Kadrich’s excitement. “The movement has been infectious,” she said.