Michael B. Jordan Credits ‘All My Children’ With Opening Doors After Replacing Chadwick Boseman
What To Know
- Michael B. Jordan credits his early role on the soap opera All My Children with opening many doors in his acting career.
- He replaced Chadwick Boseman in the role of Reggie Porter Montgomery.
- Casting director Judy Blye Wilson noted that Jordan was better suited for the role due to his age and praised his talent.
Michael B. Jordan is perhaps unequivocally one of the most talented and sought-after actors working today, consistently elevating every project he touches with his intensity, charisma, and unmistakable screen presence. Best known for his roles in Ryan Coogler productions such as Creed, Fruitvale Station, Black Panther, and Sinners, Jordan brings a level of emotional depth and physical commitment that sets him apart, making each performance feel both grounded and electrifying.
And he credits much of his career to ABC’s All My Children.
ABC
On Thursday, November 20, the actor was honored at the 39th American Cinematheque Awards. While at the ceremony, Jordon reflected on his career, including the roles that unlocked the most opportunities, particularly his time on the now-canceled All My Children, in which he played Reggie Porter Montgomery from 2003 to 2006.
“I never knew how many casting directors and executives in Hollywood would tell me, ‘Oh man, my wife really loves you.’ Or like, ‘Oh, she watches you all the time on the stories. … Come in for this and read for that,’ ” he told People.
‘All My Children’ actor Michael B. Jordan in 2006. (Matthew Peyton/Getty Images)
“It opened up so many doors in the most unexpected places for me, and that was… I think looking back at it, that was something that definitely caught me off guard. I didn’t expect that one. So that and The Wire were the two projects that really opened up a lot of doors for me in that sense,” said Jordan.
It was on the soap that Jordan first made acquaintances with his Black Panther costar Chadwick Boseman, but not necessarily under the best of circumstances: He was replacing Boseman in the role of Reggie, who was fired from the show for “creative differences.”
Veteran casting director Judy Blye Wilson remembered working with Jordan on All My Children when he replaced Boseman, and shared her experiences with TV Insider.
“Chad Boseman had just come out of Juilliard,” Wilson relays. “I was looking for a very special character that was going to have quite a heavy-duty storyline. The boy was supposed to be 15 or 16 years old, and Chad was really already into his 20s. So, a little stretch was made, but he was really too old.”
“Chad was brilliant, but he didn’t realize that you don’t just walk into the writers on daytime — or anything else for that matter — because he hadn’t worked at all; he’d just been in school. So, he went into the writers and started telling them, ‘This is very stereotypical, and I think it would be very much better if you would do it X, Y, and Z.’ And they had been rolling around in their minds anyway that he was looking a little bit older than they wanted, so he was let go, which is shocking and mind-boggling because his performance was so fantastic.”
Michael B. Jordan in 2006 (Clarence Elie-Rivera/Getty Images)
Ultimately, Michael B. Jordan took over the role. “Michael was 15, and he lived in New Jersey, and his mommy brought him over every single day,” she says. “He was better cast in the role in the sense of age, and he turned out to be pretty spectacular.”
“Michael B. Jordan is simply a wonderful human. There’s an old story of them appearing on a talk show together after they both became famous, and Chad said, ‘Hey, you’re the guy that stole my role on All My Children.’ But they were very close friends.”
— Additional reporting by Stephanie Sloane at the bottom
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