Air: Michael Jordan Wanted Viola Davis to Play His Mom

Besides showing up as Batman in The Flash, Ben Affleck is moving back to the realm of biopics, and his upcoming movie Air will tell the origin of Nike’s Air Jordans—arguably one of the most popular shoe lines today.

Talking to Variety, Affleck revealed that he did have a talk with Jordan before making the film, and the NBA superstar had a few demands.  “I had a chance to sit down with Michael Jordan, because I just wasn’t going to make this movie without asking him, ‘What matters to you?’ Interestingly, and tellingly, he had a few things that mattered,” said Affleck, “I said, ‘Who would you like to play your mom?’ He said, ‘Well, it has to be Viola Davis.”

Jordan’s mother Deloris Jordan was apparently essential when it came to him signing on with Nike, and having someone like Davis in the role probably tells the audience that it’s a very serious one. Affleck continues:

“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… 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.”

Besides the part of his mother, Jordan was also said to have said that then Nike VP Howard White to be in the film, which was filled in by the casting of Chris Tucker. Affleck himself plays Nike co-founder Phil Knight, but the main protagonist of the film is Matt Damon’s Sonny Voccaro, the Nike employee who convinced Jordan to sign on to Nike in the first place.

The movie looks pretty interesting, and I am eager to see another team-up of Affleck and Damon. Catch Air when it comes to theaters on April 5.