This movie is so important for everyone to see.
And it has done so well.
And it's a true story.
Tell everybody what it's about.
It's about the life story of Bryan Stevenson.
He wrote this book, Just Mercy, a few years ago.
It pretty much is his biopic, you know.
He's a defense attorney, moved down to Alabama.
Started the EJI, the Equal Justice Initiative.
And the movie kind of takes place
from him fresh out of law school,
taking on this case of Walter McMillian,
who was wrongly convicted of murder about 32 years ago.
And I play his defense attorney that gets him off of death row.
Walter McMillian is played by Jamie Foxx,
an incredible performance by him.
Yeah.
And it's his life's work to take on the criminal justice system.
He's made it his life's work.
He's dedicated his entire life to fighting this cause.
And it's so timely, you know.
It takes place 30 years ago, but he could have been yesterday.
Yeah.
That's what's sad about it.
And that's what made me really want to get behind this project
and put it on the biggest platform possible,
to get as many people to see this thing.
Because it's a human thing at this point.
You know, it's the humanity element of it all.
The kind of the reputation and the stigma that's
been put on black and brown people in this world,
especially in this country, is unfair.
And you know, they say slavery ended, but it just evolved.
It just evolved over time.
And we have to change the narrative.
Yeah.
I mean, I loved the movie.
But I urge people to watch this movie.
I mean, it is a must see.
All right, we're going to meet the man that you
play in the movie after this.
He's incredible.
We'll be right back.
We're back with Michael B. Jordan.
And joining us is the man that Michael plays in Just Mercy.
This is lawyer Bryan Stevenson, everybody.
[CHEERING]
So we were talking about you before you came out here.
You have been working for 30 years
to try to get people out of prison
that are wrongly accused.
You have helped over 140 people.
I just have to read this, first of all.
I'm sure you never thought a movie was going
to be made about your life, or that Michael B.
Jordan would be playing you.
We'll get to that in a second, because that's
got to be wonderful to hear that he's playing you.
In the '70s, there were 300,000 people in jail.
Now, there are 2.2 million in jail.
One in three black babies will end up in jail.
Black defendants are 11 times more
likely to get the death penalty than white ones.
It's infuriating.
It is.
And that's what drew me into this work.
I mean, I feel like we're in a crisis.
We have the highest rate of incarceration in the world.
6 million people on probation and parole.
There's 70 million Americans that
have criminal arrests, which means that they're often
disfavored when they try to get jobs or try to get loans.
132 million people in this country
have family members in our jails and prisons.
And it would be one thing if it was necessary.
But we put people in jails and prisons for silly things.
I'm representing people who are serving life sentences
for writing a bad check of $50, or simple possession
of marijuana-- life without parole.
So we have this over incarceration
and this excessive punishment problem.
And that's what drew me into this work.
And it's one of the reasons why I
feel like it's so urgent that people learn and know
more about what's happening.
Absolutely.
You talk about people of color being presumed dangerous.
And this story is crazy.
Yeah.
It's happened to me.
I went into a courtroom, just a couple of years ago.
I'd just argued a case at the US Supreme Court.
And I was there in this courtroom in the Midwest
to do a hearing.
And when I walked in, I had my suit and tie on.
I was sitting at the defense counsel's table.
And the judge walked in.
And when he saw me, he started screaming at me.
He said, hey, hey, hey.
You get back out there in the hallway.
I don't want any defendant sitting in my courtroom
without their lawyer.
And I had to explain to him, I said, no, no, judge.
I am the lawyer.
My name is Bryan Stevenson.
And he started laughing, and the prosecutor started laughing.
And I made myself laugh because I didn't
want to disadvantage my client.
The client came in.
We did the hearing.
But after it, I was thinking, what
is it when this judge saw a middle-aged black man in a suit
and tie, it didn't even occur to him, that's a lawyer.
And that kind of thinking is what's
behind all of the frustration when police shoot
unarmed black and brown people.
It's behind the frustration that so many people
have when their loved ones are carted off to prison for things
they didn't do.
And that's part of what we're trying
to get at through this story.
Well, you know, number one, that he even said that to you.
But then he laughs afterwards instead of being embarrassed
and saying, oh my God.
I'm so sorry.
And it's incredible.
Well, you know, we haven't done in this country what
other countries have done, which is
to try to engage in a reckoning in a truth and reconciliation
process.
In South Africa, outside of their Constitutional Court,
there are symbols and emblems designed
to make sure that no one forgets the injustice of apartheid.
But in this country, we haven't talked about slavery.
We haven't talked about the native genocide.
We don't talk about lynching.
We haven't created the kind of memorialization symbols
that are designed to make sure we are truthful and honest
about this history.
You start talking about race, and people get nervous.
And that has to change.
And that's why I'm hoping that we will have an era of truth
and justice in this country.
And we shouldn't fear it, because I just
think there's something better waiting for us in America.
I do.
[APPLAUSE]
Yeah, we have to address it.
Before we go to break, I have to ask you,
when you found out Michael B. Jordan was playing you,
what was that day?
It was pretty exciting.
First of all, he is so talented and he is so gifted.
But he is also deeply committed to these issues.
And when I met him, that gave me so much confidence about this.
And I had to tell everybody, now,
Michael B. Jordan is playing me.
But it's the young me.
So don't think I'm that vain.
And he was so committed to doing things right.
He worked super hard.
There's a choreography to being in the court.
He got all of that down.
He was really focused, and he wanted
to do everything authentic.
And I said, that's so great, Michael.
I appreciate that.
The one area where we don't have to be authentic,
you can keep the Black Panther Creed body when play me.
I don't need you to go on a lawyer diet.
[LAUGHTER]
And it's been a great honor to see him on the screen.
He does an amazing job.
But an even bigger honor to get to know him
and appreciate his extraordinary talent and his beautiful heart.
Yeah, he is.
He has a beautiful heart.
Yes, he does.
All right.
Well, I want to thank you for all the work you do, obviously.
And I know the organization you founded is called the Equal
Justice Initiative.
It's run strictly on donations.
And our friends at Green Dot Bank
want to help support your organization.
They're going to donate $50,000.
Wow.
[CHEERING]
Nice.
Thank you.
Wow.
Thank you.
Just Mercy is in theaters everywhere Friday.
We'll be right back.