Peyton Reed spent countless hours planning Ant-Man and the Wasp and Marvel Studios’ headquarters in Burbank, where during pre-production he overlapped with Black Panther director Ryan Coogler, who was working on his film in the office next door.
But it wasn’t until San Diego Comic-Con 2017 that Reed met Chadwick Boseman, the leading man at the center of the film that would go on to gross $1.34 billion globally and become a cultural phenomenon. That year at Comic-Con, Reed and Boseman met in the green room, where the duo talked about topics such Reed’s childhood love of Black Panther comics, as well as Between the World and Me, the book Reed had just read that was written by Boseman’s fellow Howard University alum (and noted Black Panther writer) Ta-Nehisi Coates.
“Like everyone else, I was struck by what a serious, amazing guy he was,” Reed told SiriusXM’s Jess Cagle Monday. “I can’t imagine a better director, Ryan Coogler, and a better actor, Chadwick Boseman, combining to make that movie. Man, he is going to be missed.”
Reed is currently working on Ant-Man 3, which once again stars Paul Rudd. The director offered a small update to Cagle.
“The third Ant-Man movie is going to be a much bigger, more sprawling movie than the first two,” Reed said. “It’s going to have a very different visual template.”
Boseman died Friday of colon cancer at age 43, with the loss leading to an outpouring from the worlds of entertainment and sports.
SiriusXM’s The Jess Cagle Show airs Mondays through Fridays at 3:00 pm PT.
