Athlete-Turned-Actor Yahya Abdul-Mateen II's Insane Gun Training for Netflix’s Man on Fire

I heard you had a little injury on set.

Yeah, yeah, man.

I threw a hook when I should have threw it straight.

It made contact, but it also made it into the trailer.

Oh.

Stand by.

Going out to, uh, you know, tear and tactical, and they threw me right in.

I just wanted to be able to do it on my own without them having to call in a stunt double, you know, I was pretty adamant on.

Getting it good enough for them to use my take .

Just like that.

The physical training is important with this, you know, you wanna be able to plant a character like Creasy who who has this military expertise.

It's important to be able to be confident even though Creasy is going through some uh instability, we wanna be able to tell the story that his gun work, his physical gifts are all second nature.

The body has to be ready to tell the story that the mind is telling.

So you have to be able to be confident enough in your routine, be confident enough in the in the reps that you put in to get out of your mind and let the body do what the body wants to do the same way in sports, you know, that's what it feels like to be, uh, in the pocket or in the zone.

Stand by.

No.

It was really fast.

For the last like 25-30 years, I shot action shooting competitions and then about 12 years ago or so, Chad Staalski, the director of John Wick, saw my style of shooting, brought me into that franchise, and then it's just that opened the door when they saw Keanu running this course.

Yeah, I worked on The Matrix with, with, uh, Keanu.

He's good.

He can actually do all the stuff that you see him doing in John Wick.

God be kidding.

uh uh.

He set the bar really, really high.

So when I see actor come here on the first day prepping for the movie, it's a little off, everything's off, right?

But then as the training progresses, it becomes like in tune with an actor and it really helps performance.

I know you have a 50 minute acting warm up.

How much of being an athlete informs that warm up, man, you know, I always have to give myself the time to get my body and my mind ready, you know, the warm up is really to connect the voice to the mind, to the body, to the intention, so at some point you develop the skill to be able to go and perform without the warm up.

But that's an emergency.

It's just like a sports, you know, uh, the emotion is a muscle, the mind is a muscle, the voice, the, the, the entire instrument, you, you know, you gotta get it ready to go out to, to, uh, to, uh, perform.

That's definitely a carryover from, you know, things that I learned in sports.

So wait, yeah, yeah, you're an athlete?

Yeah, I played basketball, but like my, my sport was track and field.

Yeah, it was, it was a short lived.

I ran for 2 years, I actually got into it on accident.

I'm a 2 ft, you know, jumper for, for basketball.

So I said I'm OK I'm gonna go and learn how to learn how to do the hurdles so that I can improve my jumping off one leg and the first thing I learned is that you don't jump over hurdles you hurdle the hurdles, you know what I mean?

so uh that didn't help at all but uh it doesn't really mesh well with the architecture, you know what I mean so I made a choice.

I was pretty good at it so you know I turned I turned something into into something bigger and um.

Yeah, those was those was good times.

Go.

Dang, that was maybe the best 10 my God, I was impressed.

From the minute he stepped in here, he was like, you can tell in his eyes, there was like a lot of commitment.

He was so serious and he knew it was a sport.

He was like an athlete, preparing for the fight.

Shoot away, stand by.

Perfect run.

Yes, come on, yes, smile.

No, I don't know.

He knows, even though he hasn't done this really before, he knows what, what, what mistake he made to perfect it the next time.

Actors come in and not be all perfect all the time, come in, you get it wrong, you get it wrong, you get it wrong, and still getting it wrong and people looking at what still getting it wrong, but you do all that so that when it comes to the day.

You can get it right, you know, one time, 2 times, and be, be confidential.

People, people should see that is that all of this stuff is a learning process.

That's why, that's why y'all do what it is that y'all do, and that's why we have to come and get training.

Betty, standby, go.

He wanted to go next level and just and especially taking the gun apart and putting it back together, he really, really put the time in on that.

You're to point your fingers are hurting, you're blistered, you're doing all these things, but he's kept pushing past all that and just did awesome.

Let's try it again.

Yeah, the trigger part gets.

It's just the thumb and the other finger on the other side.

If you did it, when would you pull the trigger?

I would pull it right to kick the mag out.

So you would go there boom, then you pull the trigger.

It, it was a, a script note about, you know, taking apart the gun and putting it back together, but it fits like Creasy's Creasy's trying to put himself back together.

Use your thumb too a little bit better, yeah, so as you can see, kids.

It's really hard.

Let me take a breath.

I like to do everything slow first.

Right, because my high school coach said, if you can't do it slow.

How the hell can you do it fast?

He, he made me say hell.

It's like Creasy is a man who's rebuilding himself.

You know, He's broken And he's not ready to be out there.

It's like a player who came off of a very bad injury.

Like a catastrophic injury.

And now he's back on the court.

But it's, it's the playoffs, right?

So he, he's actually not ready to be out there but it's the playoffs, you know, and he's been the star and now now because of his injury everybody's doubting him it's fun to watch this character or to play this character who's just not ready.

To be in those circumstances and nevertheless that's exactly where he is and then we have to watch him try to survive that's what I really like about about playing this character.

I don't rush.

The most important thing for me right now, right now that I'm, that I'm working on, boom, it's that.

That's the first movement, you know what I mean.

So I'm just building step by step by step by step by step.

Ready to try 30 seconds.

Oh yeah, sure, I could do it in 30 seconds, then I could do it in 25.

I could do it in 25, then I could do it in 20.

Shooter ready.

Oh OK.

Perfect.

As long as I be 30, 1514, you got it.

1, 1211, 10, 987654321.

So, I'll be 30, right?

Peter ready, stand by.

Holy shit, that was 12:38.

No, no, look at the thumb.

Look at the thumb because I haven't moved my thumb.

You, you beat your previous the.

That's the tango.

I understand in high school you, you know, track basketball you matched up with a literal beast.

Yeah, I, I haven't, haven't told anybody this, but it was one day out in Mexico City and I'm in between shots so I go to sleep .

And my security guard tapped me.

And he said, I, I wake up, he said, there's somebody here to see you, and I looked.

And Marshaw is like just standing right there and it just messed my mind up because what are you doing here?

you know what are you doing here on my set?

I actually thought that he was gonna be in the show.

Whatever he does, you do just just in here.

Yeah, Marshawn physically he was always different strong aggressive gifted.

He was, he was always one of the dudes who was like physically different than everybody else.

If it wasn't faster, it was stronger, and uh, yeah, I think everybody always knew he was, he was one of the ones to, you know, to look out for, and he one of those football players on the basketball court, you know what I mean?

Everybody who played basketball know what that means.

Basketball is my favorite sport, you know, um, I grew up outside.

Outside kid playing basketball on a street sign.

And that just got demolished from me just dunking on the street sign boom boom boom boom and man we I I bent that street sign until it was like you know until it was hanging off.

I know you have architecture background.

Anything stand out for you from like an architecture aspect when you walk into a dome?

You know they do a great job of here making it feel uh like intimate as large as it is because the sections aren't you know aren't uh broken up it feels like everybody's on top of each other, you know, almost like a college style atmosphere so it's gonna be loud I know it's gonna be rocking and they put a lot of new technology into the building too, uh, so it's, it's a pretty smart design.

And uh sitting courtside watching you know one of the greatest players of all time shoot threes and get the best seats in the house.

I'm always fascinated because these dudes are so physically gifted the skill level is just so high, but they make it look easy look like you can get out there and do it but up close and personal is is just different so I'm a fan .

I'm a fan of.

You know, a fan of the game.

I'm a fan of Steph.

I really like Kawhi's game.

His game has some of those remnants of Jordan and more specifically Kobe Bryant and things like that.

He's one of those players in the, in the game today that's, you know, that still has.

That that physical uh vocabulary in this game so I like watching him get down too.

So as much as you love sports, we haven't seen you in a straight sports project yet, correct me if I'm wrong.

Is there, is there a biopic you would love to do?

Is there a sports franchise you would love to get down with?

Yeah, it is.

You're not gonna share it with us.

I don't think I'm gonna share it.

I don't think I'm gonna.

I don't think I'm gonna share it right now.

I've been, I've been looking forward to getting, getting busy with my hands.

There's an MMA world out there that I don't think has been explored on the, on the big screen yet, and, and.

I think it'd be dope.

Wait, hold on, just for the fun of it, we have to do it.

What blind vote?

Yes, let's see.

We're always welcome.

Just cover his eyes.

Uh.

I gotta leave it flat boom.

Fingernail.

Oh that's it.

The spring wasn't it.

It's our blooper run.