At the Oscars this evening, Sinners star Michael B. Jordan will be cheered on by his close-knit family.
Michael, 39, was born in Santa Ana, California, but grew up in Newark, New Jersey. He has an older sister, Jamila, and a younger brother, Khalid, and has spoken about the impact his parents have had on him and his siblings. “My mom and dad sacrificed so much to provide for my sister, brother and me,” Michael told People in 2020. “I’m just grateful. Honestly, it’s like they all have had such an impact on me and who I am and how I approach each day. Without that, a lot of things about me just wouldn’t be the same. So it all comes back to that foundation. I’m really thankful for that.”
Here, get to know Michael B. Jordan’s parents, Donna Jordan and Michael A. Jordan:
Michael B. Jordan’s mom, Donna Jordan
Donna with her son at the 32nd Annual Actor Awards.Rodin Eckenroth – Getty Images
Donna is from Newark, and studied painting at Newark Arts High. When Michael was growing up, his mom worked as a social worker at his junior high school, Chad Science Academy, founded by the Black Youth Organization in the 1960s. “We helicoptered them,” Donna of told Vanity Fair about her three children. “They were not out of our grasp at all. We orchestrated everything.”
“They were always having sleepovers and having people come over and cooking,” Michael added. “My house was the house. You would get a great meal and play basketball outside or video games or watch a movie.”
She suffers from lupus, a chronic autoimmune disease.
Michael B. Jordan’s dad, Michael A. “Tony” Jordan
L-R: Michael A. Jordan, Jamila Jordan-Theus, Michael B. Jordan, Donna Jordan and Khalid Jordan.Dia Dipasupil – Getty Images
Michael B. Jordan’s father Michael A. Jordan goes by Tony; he is from South Central Los Angeles, one of six children raised by a single mom, Dolores Jordan. In 1974, Tony joined the Marines and got involved in the Pan-African movement.
Tony’s family is from Hope, Arkansas and Shreveport, Louisiana. “You see them as old, your grandmother’s been old your entire life, but now you understand how they grew up,” he said in an interview about Sinners, which filmed in Louisiana. “Going down there to make this movie, I guess the thing that clicked was like, she was 20 once, and it was like we made a movie about my grandparents, and my great-grandparents, and my cousins, and what it was like for them, the circumstances of living in survival on a day-to-day basis.” He added, “I got an education through this process; the movie unlocked a bunch of things I took for granted or hadn’t dived that deeply into.”
Donna and Tony met when she moved to California to pursue art; Tony was working at a cousin’s barbecue place in Compton. They married in 1984.
When Michael B. was growing up, Tony worked nights as a supervisor at John F. Kennedy Airport in New York, and then started a catering business. He was a big reader, Michael B. recalls. “Whenever I would go by the dining room, he’d always be reading,” he says. “My dad was very adamant about educating himself and giving us a sense of identity and to understand where we come from, and it’s not everything that’s taught in the history books, in the schoolbooks.”
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