Michael B. Jordan took home the trophy for best male performance in a leading role at the Actor Awards on Sunday night, a surprise victory over fellow nominees Timothée Chalamet and Leonardo DiCaprio.
Jordan’s win was announced by Viola Davis, who couldn’t contain her excitement. The Sinners actor hugged his co-star Delroy Lindo and his mom before taking the stage.
“I wasn’t expecting this at all,” Jordan said. “I’m so honored and privileged to be nominated in categories with people, actors and humans that I love. And I love their work and what you contribute to our craft. This ride has been unbelievable. So thank you for welcoming me in and making me feel seen. Ya’ll know how I feel about y’all.”
Jordan recounted desperately wanting to join SAG-AFTRA, the actors union, when he was starting out. “I thought it was this club I wanted to be in so bad,” he said, adding, “I remember watching all the other actors that I looked up to being a part of that club, being a part of SAG-AFTRA, being a part of this community. And I was like, ‘Man, I want to be that one day.’”
He remembered seeing his fellow actors “on stage with the awards and nice suits being in fancy places like that.” “That’s what I always wanted,” Jordan said. “That kid from North Jersey is standing here right now.”
The actor thanked his mom for “driving me back and forth to New York when we didn’t have enough money to go through the Holland Tunnel, when we were looking for gas money, parking spaces, when I went up there for my auditions.”
Jordan also thanked filmmaker and screenwriter Ryan Coogler, with whom he has regularly collaborated over the years, and his co-stars in Sinners.
“I want to thank you, Ryan Coogler, for giving me the opportunity to show what I can do, and to be fearless and to create a safe space for us to find the truth,” Jordan said. “Thank you for allowing me to do my best work. Just being in this room right now with all these people who have seen me grow up in front of the camera and in these rooms I feel the love and support that you’ve always given me and encouraged me to do my best, so I just want to say thank you.
He concluded, “Yeah man, it’s pretty cool.”
Jordan earned a second trophy later in the evening when Sinners won outstanding performance by a cast. Lindo took the lead on accepting that award, which marks the second time one of Coogler’s films has won after Black Panther‘s cast was honored in 2019.
“Every single day we brought ourselves, we brought our hearts, we brought our souls, we brought our spirits to this endeavor,” Lindo said. “To be recognized by you all, thank you does not even begin to encompass the gratitude that we feel.”
Sinners‘ triumph comes only a week after Jordan and Lindo became entangled in controversy at the 2026 BAFTA Awards. The duo presented the award for Best Special Visual Effects during the London-based ceremony and were subject to a racial slur shouted by John Davidson, an activist and longtime educator on Tourette’s syndrome, whose life story was turned into the BAFTA-nominated biopic I Swear. Davidson’s Tourette’s causes involuntary tics, and he was heard cursing throughout the show, however the BBC failed to censor the N-word during its broadcast, causing further harm.
Davidson has since addressed the incident and said he privately apologizes to Jordan and Lindo. On Saturday, Lindo responded to the situation for the first time publicly at the NAACP Image Awards. “We appreciate all the support and the love that we have been shown in the aftermath of what happened last weekend,” Lindo said. “It means a lot to us.”
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