Entering the film industry in 2003 with the biopic Baadasssss!, produced, directed and acted in by his father Mario Van Peebles, Mandela Van Peebles is an American rapper and film and television actor. Coming from a family of actors and filmmakers, Mandela Van Peebles is the grandson of director-actor Melvin Van Peebles and the son of Mario Van Peebles. Mandela has acted in movies and TV shows like the reality show Mario's Green House (2009), the coming-of-age comedy We the Party (2012), the Alex Haley 1976 novel adaptation Roots (2016), and Mario Van Peebles' war-drama USS Indianapolis: Men of Courage (2016).

In 2018 was seen alongside Tobin Bell, Matt Passmore, Callum Keith Rennie, Laura Vandervoort, Cle Bennett, and Hannah Emily Anderson in director-duo Michael and Peter Spierig's, horror-mystery, Jigsaw. The movie is the eighth installment in the Saw franchise.