Michael B. Jordan and Chadwick Boseman’s paths crossed long before Black Panther. Both men had brief stints on the long-running soap All My Children, although Boseman’s was way shorter. According to The Wrap’s Oscar issue, Boseman was brought onto the soap as Reggie Montgomery, a teen adopted by Susan Lucci’s Erica Kane. Boseman objected to how the character was written, as a stereotypical thug. “I remember going home and thinking, ‘Do I say something to them about this? Do I just do it?’ And I couldn’t just do it. I had to voice my opinions and put my stamp on it,” he said.
Boseman voiced his opinions, and was promptly fired for being to difficult, but by the time Jordan got the role, some of the more stereotypical edges had been sanded off the part. “They said, ‘You are too much trouble,’ but they took my suggestions, or some of them,” said Boseman. “And for me, honestly, that’s what this is about.” Jordan expressed his gratitude for what Boseman had done: “I’m younger than Chad, and I was coming into All My Children fresh off The Wire — wide open, still learning. I was playing this role not knowing that a lot of the things I was going through were because of what he’d already done for me.”
