(AllHipHop News) Actor Michael B. Jordan spent a lot of time alone, listening to speeches by political revolutionaries, as he prepared to portray the villain in the new “Black Panther” movie.
The “Creed” star tackles the role of Erik ‘Killmonger’ Stevens in the action blockbuster, in which his exiled character becomes a black-ops soldier for the U.S. and returns to the fictional African nation of Wakanda to overthrow Chadwick Boseman’s King T’Challa, aka Black Panther.
Michael, who had long been a fan of the Marvel comics the film is based on, decided to isolate himself in the lead up to filming so he could channel the pain and loneliness felt by Killmonger when it was time to shoot.
“I know Erik was very sad, he had a lot of passion, a lot of rage,” he told breakfast show Good Morning America. “He was lonely, so for me, I spent a lot of time by myself, (listening to) a lot of music, a lot of speeches, a lot of historical figures in the past, revolutionaries that I kinda tried to embody the essence (of onscreen)… I just wanted that feeling around me when I was portraying this character.”
The actor also had to prepare for the physical aspect of the job, bulking up with the help of his longtime trainer Corey Calliet – the same fitness expert who whipped Jordan into shape to play the titular boxer in “Creed.”
The 31-year-old packed on at least 15 pounds (6.8 kilograms) of muscle for “Black Panther,” but insists the preparation was easier to handle than what he went through for 2015’s Creed.
“‘Creed’ was tougher because just looking like a fighter… they sacrifice so much, just trying to make weight, and that whole process, was very strenuous,” he shared. “Erik, I wanted to make look physically intimidating. I wanted to be bigger, being the antagonist, ‘villain’; I wanted to look kinda massive onscreen.”
Jordan’s dedication to both the dramatic and physical sides of the role has already paid off – the highly-anticipated movie is poised to break box office records when it is released this week, after becoming the most-tweeted-about film of 2018 so far.
Twitter users worldwide have posted more than five million messages about “Black Panther” on the social media platform, racing ahead of tweets about “Star Wars: The Last Jedi” and “Maze Runner: The Death Cure.”
