Jonathan Majors, the latest 'big-bad' of the Marvel Universe, has a starring role in new movie Creed III that draws on his real-life exposure to men who spent their best years behind bars.
Majors plays Damian "Diamond Dame" Anderson, a former boxing prodigy forced to watch from prison as his childhood friend Adonis "Donnie" Creed (Michael B. Jordan) lives their shared dream of becoming a world champion.
Dame is proud of his friend, but resentful too, and on release from prison comes seeking what he believes he is owed.
Donnie's idyllic life — professional accolades, wealth and a happy home with wife Bianca (Tessa Thompson) and daughter Amara (Mila Davis-Kent) — is thrown into disarray as he wrestles with a misguided sense of obligation to the past.
"I have the opportunity to come in and antagonise the hero — what he stands for, what he's going through and also to antagonise and disrupt that entire world that they've built," Majors told ABC News, explaining his character.
"I've never been incarcerated. I've never experienced that. But I have been isolated. I have been put into detention and all these things as an adolescent.
"But really, it's an homage to the brothers that I grew up with that they get locked up [and] my stepfather who raised me, who was locked up.
"I pulled from that experience and understanding how he was viewed in the neighbourhood.
"And what I knew of who he was in the house and the complexity of that – how someone can be seen as one thing and be quite the other."
Majors, who made his debut in the 2017 miniseries When We Rise, has another movie currently in cinemas — Ant-Man and The Wasp: Quantumania — which develops his major Marvel role as Kang the Conqueror. It is a villain expected to keep him in front of audiences for some time.
But he is starkly revealed as Dame, a man in peak physical condition, though emotionally troubled.
"Dame is an underdog with a big bark and a bigger bite who didn't really get the opportunity to show himself," he said.
"This pent-up dreamer is how I viewed him.
"He's stuck, he's stagnated but he's got all these dreams and all these hopes inside of him and unlike some folks he's actually got the tools to do it. He just needs the time.
"And that's something I relate to as well.
"When you get your shot, you try to knock it out. I've tried to do that with this acting thing and Dame definitely is doing that in the film."
Rounding out the cast is Wood Harris (The Wire) and the iconic actor Phylicia Rashad as Donnie's mother Mary-Anne.
The story is by Keenan Coogler, Ryan Coogler (director of Black Panther) and Zach Baylin. Jordan makes his directorial debut with this film and is a producer also.
Promoting the film, Jordan said he wants people to walk away feeling better than when they walked in.
"I've been living with this character for eight years," he said.
"So, to be able to finally step behind the camera and continue to elevate and evolve this story, is something that I'm eternally grateful for."
Majors said it was a privilege to work so closely with the esteemed cast and crew.
"It felt like being at home," he said.
"It felt like working at a family reunion."
Creed III is in cinemas now.
