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Anthony Mackiegraduated Juilliard, earned a SAG Award nomination and plays a Marvel superhero. But he admits that one setback in his life caused him to put his acting career on hold: not receiving an Oscar nomination for 2008’sThe Hurt Locker, which got nine other nods from the Academy.
“That little f—er matters,” Mackie, 40, said toldMen’s Healthin the July/August issue of the Oscar nomination. “We try to protect ourselves and say, ‘I’m doing the work for the work.’ But when that happened withHurt Locker, it hurt. I had to take a year off of work.”
During that year — which also included Mackie becoming a dad for the first time and losing his father — the actor turned his efforts to restoring a 1964 Mustang convertible. “I sat in my garage and I built a car,” Mackie said. “It was very, very therapeutic.”
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Mackie eventually dove back into work and joined theMarvel Universeas Falcon, thanks to one to-the-point email he sent to the studio asking for any role they’d give him.
“My line was ‘Yo, I’m the black dude fromThe Hurt Locker. I would love to work with you guys,’” he revealed.
Anthony Mackie at Sergeant JT Sanborn inThe Hurt Locker.Summit Entertainment
It worked, and Mackie has gone on to appear inAnt-Man, the last twoCaptain Americafilms and the three latestAvengersblockbusters.
“Growing up, I’d always loved Falcon, because he was a comic bookhero who was blackwho didn’t have ‘Black’ in the title,” the New Orleans native said. “He stood on his morals. He stood on who he was.”
source: people.com
