Photograph courtesy of National Geographic
National Geographic’s award-winning anthology series Genius, which chronicles some of the most innovative and impactful figures in our collective history, took a bold swing in its fourth season. While previous seasons told the story of just one person—Albert Einstein, Pablo Picasso, and Aretha Franklin respectively—the most recent season, Genius: MLK/X, parallels and contrasts the life journeys of two iconic Black leaders. Underground Railroad standout Aaron Pierre portrays Malcolm X, while the ever-impressive Kelvin Harrison, Jr., a New Orleans native who most recently starred in Chevalier and Cyrano, plays Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
When Woman King and Love & Basketball director Gina Prince-Bythewood and her equally multihyphenate husband Reggie Bythewood, creator/showrunner of Apple TV+ teen basketball series Swagger, were approached about featuring Dr. King for Genius, they suggested the series tackle them both figures. This was inspired by Dr. King and Malcolm X’s only documented meeting on March 26, 1964 at the U.S. Capitol as the Senate debated the Civil Rights Act of 1964. Two works based on this moment helped fuel the series: Jeff Stetson’s play The Meeting and historian Peniel E. Joseph’s in-depth 2020 book The Sword and the Shield: The Revolutionary Lives of Malcolm X and Martin Luther King Jr. Stetson was an executive producer on MLK/X, while Joseph was part of the series’s academic “think tank” and even helped pen a couple of the eight episodes.
Steering the ship fell into the hands of showrunners Raphael Jackson Jr. and Damione Macedon, whose previous producing credits include the Starz series Power. Atlanta magazine caught up with the duo to discuss all-things MLK/X, now available to binge in its entirety on both Hulu and Disney+. This interview has been edited for length and clarity.
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