Michael B. Jordan and Chanté Adams inA Journal for Jordan(2021).Photo: David Lee/Columbia Pictures
Michael B. Jordanput himself through boot camp to play a soldier in the new movieA Journal for Jordan.
“You know me, I physically love going through a transformation,” the actor, 34, tells PEOPLE in this week’s issue.
Jordan portrays late First Sergeant Charles Monroe King in theDenzel Washington-directed film based on Dana Canedy’s 2009 bestselling memoirA Journal for Jordan: A Story of Love and Honor.
King died in a roadside bombing in October 2006, after only one visit with Jordan in August of that year. But King left behind a journal filled with life lessons and details about his own experiences for his son.
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Washington, 66, wanted Jordan and his costarChantéAdams, who plays author Canedy, to do everything they could do to embody their real-life counterparts.
“Denzel’s all about prep and doing your homework,” Jordan says. “We both were like, what else could we do? It was a lot of fun to build me up into Charles.”
That process included training at California’s Fort Irwin with drill sergeants and platoon and commander soldiers.
“It’s all the things that Charles would’ve done at some point during his career,” theformer Sexiest Man Alivesays. “It was intense, but homework is fun.”
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The real Jordan, now 15, got to join the actor for a part of the training process on the base. Canedy calls the experience “one of the most special times in Jordan’s entire life because it was a military base where his father had been a leader and had been stationed.”
The formerNew York Timeseditor adds that the military even made young Jordan an honorary drill Sergeant during that time. “The fact that he got to share that with Mike was wonderful,” Canedy says.
TheBlack Pantherstar loved watching Jordan interact with his father’s peers.
Adams, 27, spent time with the teen, too, and “now Jordan calls me auntie!” she says. “It’s so cute! Meeting him and seeing how amazing he is put fuel into the fire that we all had in making this project.”
Washington first met Jordan when the boy was just 3 and considers him “a little bit of my child,” the Oscar winner says.
The director also feels like he nailed it with finding two actors to portray Jordan’s parents.
“They were right for each other,” Washington says of stars Adams and Jordan. “Chemistry’s chemistry and if you don’t have it, boy you don’t want to be there on Day 1 and go, ‘Oh shoot. I picked the wrong person.’ But they have it. There’s not much acting going on up there, which is a good thing, in my humble opinion.”
Adams agrees, saying, “Mike and I have really great chemistry.”
“We were able to mesh very well on set. What really aided in that was Denzel having a three-week rehearsal process, prior to even filming,” she adds. “So we were in a room for three, four, five hours a day, just going over the script and breaking down scenes and really getting into the root of Charles and Dana.”
Jordan wanted to convey Charles as “a loving, strong, very talented person,” he says. “He loved the simple things in life. He was happy with things that he had and he loved his family. He would do anything for them. And he loved his country. Charles is a patriot. He loved to serve. So That’s definitely something I want people to take away.”
Adams wants viewers to walk away feeling like they, too, can find a love like Canedy and King’s. “Dana and Charles’s love story is so special because it’s that fairytale love story,” she says. “It ends in a little bit of tragedy, but then it’s rebirth with Jordan. Everyone wants that type of love.”
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Washington hopesA Journal for Jordan"will make you reflect," he says, “but will make you appreciate what you have when you have it.”
A Journal for Jordanis in theaters now.
source: people.com
