Mike Colter interview on Luke Cage: 'I can’t imagine anything that could be more right for the time'

The actor talks The Defenders, Terence Crutcher, and being Marvel's first leading black superhero

Mike Colter as Luke Cage (Netflix)

It’s a sunny afternoon in September and Netflix has booked the entire second floor of a Parisian hotel to facilitate rolling press junkets taking place to promote their latest Marvel series, Luke Cage. Lavish doesn’t do the event justice. And around every corner? Posters featuring the show’s lead protagonist played by the charming Mike Colter.

“I’m still in denial,” the actor says, relaxing into a white sofa, a PR person hovering somewhere behind. “Somehow, people see my face but they still don’t know.” He tells an anecdote concerning a man sitting next to him on a plane, watching Colter on the TV screen yet failing to identify him. “I said to myself, ‘He can’t tell black people apart'. He’s thinking I’m just another bald, headed black guy. It just didn’t dawn on him. I was so appreciative of that, actually.”

Occasions in which people fail to identify the 40-year-old will no doubt decrease after the release of Luke Cage, Netflix’s third superhero show. This isn’t the first time Colter has played Cage; earlier in the year, the character appeared in Jessica Jones, a different Marvel show set in the same cinematic universe. Since then, the character has moved from Hell’s Kitchen to Harlem, his powers continuing to be more a burden than a gift.

“That’s one of his more appealing qualities,” Colter says. “For a character struggling with his own abilities, not knowing what to do with them, not knowing his limitations or being able to create a space for himself in the world, those are struggles that make for good tension. If you’re not going to use your powers to pay your bills… It’s hand to mouth with Luke. He’s a blue-collar guy, he’s from the streets. Sure, he’s got potential, but right now he has to make ends meet.”

These are aspects of Cage’s magnetic persona, brought to life by the sizeable actor. Notably, Colter is also the first black person to lead a Marvel property, beating Black Panther actor Chadwick Boseman to the punch by almost two years. While many have questioned why the comic-book powerhouse took so long to release a show featuring a non-white superhero as the lead, it’s something that doesn’t particularly bother Colter.

“I try to avoid that discussion because it doesn’t matter whether a superhero is white or black. What makes Luke Cage unique isn’t him being black. Yes, he is black, but he has other things. You can’t change the narrative, he is one of the first black superheroes who has his own TV series and is bulletproof right now. You have to embrace it and take it as a positive because it is a point of conversation.”

That conversation – concerning diversity and shootings in the US – has never been more poignant; our conversation is taking place the day after Terence Crutcher was shot dead by police.

“You just don’t know how to process it,” Colter says of the incident. “You have to ask, ‘What do you have to do to not get shot?’ There’s no easy answer. There’s no book to figure out how not to become a victim of police brutality. It’s flat-out murder. You don’t know how to process the things that are happening because no one is being brought to justice. It’s a paid vacation for the person who pulled the trigger.

“The city officials are civil servants and we all pay our taxes and expect to have people who are drawing their wages from our pockets. They are expected to be there to protect us, to protect and serve. And yet people are still not making it home because they live in fear of what somebody does. I just don’t know how to process it. It’s timely. It’s hard to articulate what the series will mean for a lot of people, I just hope it’s a small bit of relief because nothing’s really changing.”

Earlier on in the day, I sat down with Mahershala Ali – the villain Cottonmouth in Luke Cage – who also spoke candidly about race, particularly diversity on screen. Notably, he spoke about the impact social media was having on the political debate. While Colter doesn’t use social media, asking the actor whether he has felt the impact of Twitter evokes a passionate response.

“To hit the nail on the head, if we were to time this, we couldn’t have timed it any better,” he says, having sat up slightly. “It’s as right for the time as anything has ever been. I can’t imagine anything else that could be more right for the time.

“Nobody wants to have this agenda being a political show. You’re trying to entertain people using a comic book. This is not a Black Lives Matter story, but it kind of still is. Whether you like it or not, you have to let the public decide. You can have all the intentions you want and try and guide the narrative, but the narrative is irrelevant because it's how the public digests it that will be indicative of what the series will ultimately be.”

The hovering PR person intrudes that there is one question remaining. As any Marvel fan would, I briefly move the conversation towards the forthcoming team-up series The Defenders and whether filming has begun.

“We are going to film it,” he responds. Has he read any of the scripts? “They give us the scripts last minute, it’s unbelievable,” he laughs heartily, having likely been asked multiple times throughout the day for details without being able to reveal anything. One more attempt: it must be exciting going back into that universe? “It’s going to be interesting because new faces are working on the show. It will be interesting to see how the new showrunners approach it.” Thankfully, Luke Cage is more than enough for us to consume for now.

‘Luke Cage’ is streaming now