Menacing role for actor
Michael B. Jordan tells why he was more than happy to embrace his inner bad boy for Black Panther.
Michael B. Jordan is loving being the bad guy for once. Best-known as the eponymous star of boxing movie Creed and Fantastic Four‘ s Johnny Storm, the 31-year-old actor plays the foreboding-sounding Erik ‘‘Killmonger’’ Stevens in Marvel’s latest blockbuster Black Panther.
Speaking to Stuff from Korea early last week, the Californiaborn, New Jersey-raised actor says he jumped at the chance to take on a more menacing role.
‘‘I guess they say that bad guys have more fun,’’ he laughs.
‘‘I think that’s partially because they have less boundaries. Being the good guy means sometimes you have to be morally correct and make the right decision all the time. It certainly feels more fun when you get a chance to have to think much about the repercussions of your actions, or be a little more reckless.’’
Based on the comic-book character first created in 1966 and introduced into the Marvel Cinematic Universe in 2016’s Captain America: Civil War, Black Panther sees Jordan’s Killmonger battling Chadwick Boseman’s eponymous hero for control of the fictional African kingdom of Wakanda and its much soughtafter mineral – vibranium.
‘‘Killmonger is unlike any kind of character I’ve played or seen onscreen before. He’s different and it was great to get a chance I dive into the darker side of life.’’
Black Panther also offered a chance for Jordan to reteam with his Creed and Fruitvale Station director Ryan Coogler.
‘‘Honestly, I feel extremely blessed to have met my director and built this kind of bond with him so early in our careers,’’ he says of his fellow 31-year-old.
‘‘He’s family at this point. We did our first movie together [ Fruitvale] – actually a lot of first times together.
‘‘Our shorthand and our communication is there and I think if we were to have grown up together, we would have been best friends.
‘‘I think our families our very similar and we grew up in similar places – North New Jersey and Oakland, California.’’
When asked what are Coogler’s best qualities as a director, Jordan quickly rattles off a bunch.
‘‘He has amazing leadership skills and he is unapologetically who he is 24/7.
‘‘He keeps it real and he has a style about building stories and creating characters that are so captivating. I could go on and on talking about Ryan, he’s a very special person in my life.’’
But was their relationship put to the test by Coogler’s insistence that Killmonger sport dreadlocks? Definitely not, says Jordan.
‘‘I used to have ‘locks’ when I was in high school, so it wasn’t something completely foreign to me.’’
He says it took him a year-anda-half to grow out his hair and that the pair collaborated [along with Jordan’s own barber and the movie’s two key hair stylists] on a look ‘‘that millennials would embrace and want to wear in their day-to-day’’.
Rumours abound from the Black Panther set that Jordan definitely threw himself into his character, arriving late and preferring not to mix with the other cast members.
‘‘I’m so curious as to where that first came from, who was the first person to say, ‘yeah, Mike kept to himself’,’’ he muses.
‘‘I must have done that more than I thought.
‘‘I think, naturally, I did kind of stay in my own little circle, did my own thing.
‘‘Killmonger had never been to Wakanda before [the events of the movie] and doesn’t know any of the other characters, so I wanted to reflect that.
‘‘He has been on his own his whole life and I wanted to know what that felt like, embrace that feeling of loneliness, and let that come through the character.
‘‘For me, this is the most ‘method’ I’ve been. I can tell you it’s not an easy thing to do, especially when you’ve got to take your work home with you – as we actors sometimes do.’’
For the physical side of the role, Jordan re-enlisted trainer Corey Calliet who helped whip him into shape for both Creed and Fantastic Four, although their focus was a little different this time.
‘‘For Creed, I wanted to be a fighter, so I had to look like a fighter.
‘‘That’s how I trained, that’s how I lived. For this guy, he’s more of a Swiss Army Knife – he’s got a little bit of everything.
‘‘He’s a tactician, he’s good at hand-to-hand combat, weapons, firearms, so we trained in a lot of different areas.
‘‘I wasn’t trying to look good on camera, I wanted to look like I could get the job done and be an on screen presence that would be intimidating – especially going up against Chadwick.’’
More than happy with the result of both the training and finished movie, Jordan has only one regret – not being able to sneak a peek at fellow Marvel movie Avengers: Infinity War when they were filming side by side in Atlanta.
‘‘Marvel have government-level security in terms of keeping things top secret, so I didn’t get a chance to visit even though I would have loved that.’’
However, he admits he did manage to ‘‘confiscate’’ as much Black Panther memorabilia as he could from the set.
‘‘I got the bobble head, action figures and the Killmonger Golden Jaguar suit.’’ screening. (M) is now