Michael B. Jordan opened up about seeking therapy to help “decompress” after portraying Erik Killmonger in the 2018 Marvel hit Black Panther.
The Sinners actor recently appeared on CBS Sunday Morning, where he revealed around the fifteen-minute mark that the intensity of playing Killmonger lingered with him even after filming ended.
“Went to therapy, talked about it, found a way to kind of just decompress,” Jordan shared. “And I think at that point, I was still learning that I needed to decompress from a character. You know, there’s no blueprint to this.”
In the Ryan Coogler-directed film, Killmonger served as the main antagonist to the title character, King T’Challa, portrayed by the late Chadwick Boseman. A former Navy SEAL, Killmonger traveled to the fictional African nation of Wakanda seeking revenge for his father’s death and aiming to seize the throne from King T’Challa.
“Acting is a solo journey a lot of times. Auditioning by yourself, practicing by yourself,” Jordan continued. “There’s a lot of preparation and the experience, the journey. So learning as I went, I [realized] that, ‘Oh man, I still got a little something on me I need to get off.’ Talking is really important.”
The actor said the conversation eventually “spiraled into a bigger discussion” about therapy being “necessary” for others, particularly men.
“That’s something that I’m not ashamed of at all and very, very proud of, and it’s definitely helped me throughout the years and even to this day in trying to be a good communicator and a well-rounded person inside and out,” he added.
Elsewhere, Jordan explained that he tapped into Killmonger’s “anger” and “frustration” to fully embody the role, a process that left him feeling “isolated” from his family, whom he “didn’t really speak” to while preparing for the film. He also shared that he wished he’d had “more time” with Boseman, who passed away in August 2020 after a private battle with cancer.
