While meeting with NBA legend Michael Jordan ahead of making the upcoming sports drama Air, actor and filmmaker Ben Affleck got a few requests from the basketball legend.
As he premiered the film at South by Southwest this weekend, Affleck talked about what Jordan had hoped to see in the dramatized telling of the Nike shoe deal that changed his and the company’s lives forever.
Via Variety, Affleck shared that Jordan wanted to see Howard White in the film, who is the vice president of sports marketing for the Jordan Brand. Affleck said the casting opportunity gave him a chance to work with actor Chris Tucker, who appears as White in Air.
Jordan also had a specific casting request for who would portray his mother, Deloris Jordan. The Chicago Bulls great told Affleck he wanted Oscar winner Viola Davis to play the part.
“I got the script and then had the chance again to talk to Michael. Michael Jordan, for those of you who don’t know, is one of the most intimidating, impressive men you’ll ever see in your life,” Affleck said (via Variety). “He told me about is father. And then he talked about his mother. It was the first time I saw this look cross his face. It was a look of reverence, of awe, of love, and gratitude, and innocence. He said, ‘None of this would have ever happened without my mother.’ I said, ‘Who would you like to play your mom?’ He said, ‘Well, it has to be Viola Davis.”
Jordan got his wish, as Davis indeed appears in the film as his mother. Affleck had a very apt comparison as to what it meant to cast Davis in the project.
“That’s like saying, ‘Can I play basketball on your court?’ ‘Yeah, if you get Michael Jordan.’ “Viola Davis is the best actor I’ve ever seen,” Affleck continued. “This is a hard business. It’s hard to know if you’re successful. It’s hard to know if you’ve accomplished something. But honest to God, I always felt that if i was a director one day, and I had Viola Davis in a movie, that would really be something. That would mean the world to me. And it does.”
Affleck co-stars in Air as Nike co-founder Phil Knight, while his longtime collaborator and friend Matt Damon plays Sonny Vaccaro, who spearheaded the effort at Nike to bring Jordan aboard for a shoe line.
The film opens on April 5 nationwide.
