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Anthony Mackie didn’t lose himself while filming the final 8 Mile rap battle against Eminem — but he did he recall things getting very personal.
“We’re doing the movie and, you know, Eminem is just such a brilliant dude,” Mackie, 46, recalled during the Tuesday, March 11, episode of “The Pivot” podcast. “We’re on set one day and he’s like, ‘Yo, it don’t make sense that we beefing.’ And I was like, ‘Right?’ And he’s like, ‘I need something on you.’”
Mackie portrayed Papa Doc in the 2002 drama, the leader of the Free World rap group who ultimately loses to Eminem’s B-Rabbit in an epic final rap showdown. During B-Rabbit’s verses, he claims Papa Doc’s real name is Clarence, he went to a private school and that his parents are still married. According to Mackie, some of the shots were toward him personally, and had “nothing to do” with his character.
“So we talk for, like, two hours, chilling. I go to the casino. The next day, we’re shooting the battle scene, and that’s why I’m standing there like, ‘You’re talking about me. You’re not talking about Clarence!” Mackie recalled, adding that his character’s frustrated facial expressions were his natural reaction to Eminem’s lyrics.
“You’re an a——, Eminem!” he joked. “I’m like, ‘I’m gonna fight this mother f———!’ I’m like, ‘Yes my parents are still married!’”
8 Mile marked both Mackie and Eminem’s feature film debuts. The Marvel star previously opened up about shooting the movie during a 2021 episode of The Rich Eisen Show, claiming that Eminem originally promised his raps would only include “character stuff.”
“There was this one day, we were sitting on the set and Eminem comes over and he’s like ‘What’s up man, I was reading a script and there is no reason for me not to like you, you are cool dude, I like you,’” Mackie recalled. “And then I said, ‘I like you too,’ and then he was like, ‘Cool, so you don’t mind if I add some stuff in the script about you?’ I was like, ‘About me or the character?’ He’s like ‘No, no just some character stuff’. I’m like, ‘Yeah no problem.’”
The actor claimed, “So before the entire 8 Mile final battle, he googles me and learns about me and all that stuff he basically makes fun of me as Papa Doc.”. And then I’m like, ‘That’s a little personal Mr. Marshall. … I grew up in a nice house, my parents were nice to me, why are you making fun of me?’”
Us Weekly has reached out to Eminem for comment.
Eight years after his portrayal of Papa Doc, Mackie took on the role of Tupac Shakur in 2009’s Notorious. The Captain America star has credited his time in Juilliard’s drama division — from which he graduated in 2001 — for his rapping skills and versatility as an actor.
“The idea of approaching a rapper from the perspective of an actor, you’re really just speaking in poems. I always said, one of the greatest rappers [who] ever lived was Shakespeare,” Mackie said during a 2021 episode of Hot Ones. “If I didn’t have my training, I wouldn’t be able to play Tupac, Martin Luther King, Papa Doc, Falcon. The training is just something that gives you an extra layer to stand on.”
