NEW YORK CITY — Michael B. Jordan and Lonnie Ali, the wife of Muhammad Ali, believe they have the complete package in actor Jaalen Best to play the late boxing legend in the upcoming Prime Video TV series "The Greatest."
That's crucial because the three-time heavyweight champion Ali, who died in 2016, had the complete "package," Lonnie Ali said at the Amazon 2026 Upfront at the Beacon Theatre on May 11.
"We knew from the start that whoever plays Ali has got to be Ali," said Lonnie Ali, standing on the arm of executive producer Jordan onstage. "He has to have the courage and the conviction, the heart. He's got to have the looks. All of it. Muhammad was pretty." The actor chosen to play him, she added, "had to have 'the package' as they say. Because (Ali) did. He did."
Whether the joke was intended or not, the audience laughed about how the boxing legend was the greatest in more ways than they might have imagined. But the first-ever authorized project about Ali’s life is a serious affair. Lonnie Ali, the boxer's wife and co-founder of the Ali Center, is an executive producer and consultant on the project due out later this year. She pointed out it's been 30 years since her late husband stepped out on another stage at the 1996 Olympics to light the torch even as he faced Parkinson's disease.
