With One Night in Miami hitting Amazon Video, viewers are revisiting a night from history in which Malcolm X, Cassius Clay, Sam Cooke and Jim Brown celebrated Clay becoming a heavyweight champion while also conversing about serious topics. A quartet of talented actors was tasked with portraying prominent figures from history, including Aldis Hodge (Leverage, Hidden Figures). The man who played Brown has since provided insight into this role.
Before the film’s release in mid-January, Hodge spoke to the Denton Record-Chronicle about portraying the NFL legend. He explained that Brown displayed a visible composure while conducting interviews, even when facing “staunch racists.” Hodge expressed appreciation for this composure but also talked about the reasoning behind it.
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“What most people don’t get about his composure is that he has two challenges,” Hodge said. “He has to, one, convince people there to be willing to listen to him because they are automatically predisposed to turn their ears off. Once they are willing to listen to him, he has to then convince them through his actions that he’s reasonable enough for them to consider that he may be right.”
While three of the film’s main characters passed away after the fateful evening in Miami, Brown is still alive. He left the NFL and became an actor, starring in The Running Man, The Dirty Dozen and Original Gangsters, among others. However, Hodge did not reach out to the former NFL star before portraying him in One Night in Miami.
“At the end of the day, it was really a creative decision to sort of work within what I saw of him to be because I wanted to present what I felt was a celebration of who I found him to be,” Hodge said. The 34-year-old actor also told Variety that he has not spoken to Brown about the performance. “I hope I did OK. I haven’t spoken to him personally about it, but I heard through the grapevine that he saw it and he was happy with it.”
Available on Amazon Video, One Night in Miami dramatizes the hours following Cassius Clay’s upset victory over Sonny Liston. The film stars Eli Goree as Clay, Hodge as Brown, Kingsley Ben-Adir as Malcolm X and Leslie Odom Jr. as Cooke. Regina King serves as the film director, which is based on a play by Kemp Powers.
In the film, the quartet celebrates Clay’s victory over Sonny Liston in a heavyweight boxing match. The men went to the Hampton House Motel, a popular establishment among black visitors to Jim Crow–era Miami. While the specific conversation details remain unknown, they reportedly focused on the Civil Rights movement and their respective roles.
