Anthony Mackie Reveals Eminem Threw Shots At Him In ‘8 Mile’ Final Rap

It’s been more than two decades since Eminem made his big screen debut alongside an unknown Anthony Mackie in the cult classic film 8 Mile and now all these years later, the new Captain America (Mackie) is opening up about working alongside the greatest white rapper that ever lived with quite an interesting story.

In a recent interview on the Pivot podcast, Anthony Mackie recalled how Eminem took actual shots at Mackie during the film’s final rap battle between B-Rabbit (Eminem) and Papa Doc (Mackie). Talking about his small role in the film, Mackie explained that he and Eminem hung out behind the scenes to become more familiar with each other, as Eminem didn’t think it made sense that the two had beef in the film. To add a little more chemistry to their on-screen drama, he and Em got to know each other a bit more and interestingly enough, Em used some of Mackie’s actual background as the basis for his bars and put his actual real life on blast in the film.

Lines like “But I know something about you, you went to Cranbrook, that’s a private school,” and “Clarence lives at home with both parents/and Clarence parents have a real good marriage,” were based on his real life, as he went to Juilliard and really did have a good home life with both his parents. Funny how having a good childhood could be used as a negative during a rap battle (LOL).

Still, Mackie didn’t take anything personally and called Em a “brilliant” artist even though he was blindsided by the bars during filming. “That’s why I was standing there like, ‘You talkin’ about me! You not talkin’ about Clarence! This has nothing to do with the character! You’re an a*shole, Eminem!” Mackie said.

Regardless, the bars worked perfectly for the film. The only other information that was known about Papa Doc was that he was the leader of the Free World crew that was terrorizing Eminem and his crew while running the streets as if Papa Doc was that dude. Nope, he was a kid from the burbs who got a good education but was fronting like he lived the hard knock life. Typical.

Check out Anthony Mackie talk about his experience filming 8 Mile, and let us know your thoughts in the comments section below.