Michael B. Jordan got a lot of praise for his work as a director on Creed III, but while that sort of success certainly meant new opportunities, it also meant a lot of expectations. The actor admitted that his work directing the upcoming remake of The Thomas Crown Affair is not something for which he was entirely prepared.
Michael B. Jordan is currently doing the awards season runner for Sinners, for which he was nominated for Best Actor, but he’s also trying to wrap up a remake of The Thomas Crown Affair, which he both directs and stars in. Speaking with Vanity Fair, Jordan said the experience has been a lot different because he’s working shorter days, which means trying to cram more work into that time. He explained…
There’s a lot of ‘technical director’ shit, honestly. I shot 10-hour days in London versus shooting 12 to 14 hours in Atlanta. That’s a huge difference of how many shots I’m trying to get, how many scenes I can do in a day. And I had to adjust to not having a really inherited cast.
While Creed III was Michael B. Jordan’s first feature film as director, it was the third film in the franchise, and a lot of the cast on both sides of the camera had been there for the other two movies. Jordan admitted there was a learning curve there that required a lot more of him directing The Thomas Crown Affair. He continued…
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With Creed, I’ve worked with everybody for years. I got a whole new cast that I’m dealing with for Crown. These are people that probably know me more as an actor than a director. There is a mental shift that you need from your cast to understand this process because it’s not the normal process. There’s a lot of conversations around how to split my time and be everywhere that I need to be for everyone—that was a big mountain to climb. And I think I did it well.
Jordan is far from the first person to act in a movie that he’s directing, and many have spoken about the difficulties that come with trying to do both jobs at the same time. Doing that with people who knew him well with Creed was likely significantly easier than it was with a cast of actors and a crew that he didn’t know as well.
Expectations are certainly high for the third version of The Thomas Crown Affair on screen, and much like the experience of filming was different for Michael B. Jordan, it will be a whole new experience for audiences to see his work as a director for a second time. We’re just about a year away from it all as the new film is set to be released on March 5, 2027.