Theater Major Keisha Tucker '06 Returns to the Big Screen
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Theater major Keisha Tucker '06, who served as a stunt double for one of the film's main characters and appeared in key action scenes during Marvel's 2018 "Black Panther" film, has returned to the big screen.
Tucker reprised her role as one of the members of the Dora Milaje, an elite group of warriors who serve as the all-female special forces for Wakanda, in "Black Panther: Wakanda Forever," which released on Nov. 11. Previously, Tucker spoke to the university about how happy she was to play a part in the film, which was deemed culturally important.
“I didn't really realize as much as I do now how much representation matters, but I feel like everybody has their eyes more open now,” Tucker said in a 2018 interview with UMass Amherst. “It's cool to see — maybe there's a little shift going on with more cultures being represented.”
Her credentials as a stuntwoman include fan favorite television shows such as “How to Get Away with Murder” and “American Horror Story,” as well as box office hits including Marvel’s “Black Panther,” “Ant Man and the Wasp,” and “Captain Marvel”; comedian and filmmaker Jordan Peele’s “Us”; and the 2022 American psychological thriller “Don’t Worry Darling.”
In 2018, Tucker returned to the UMass Amherst campus as part of the university's homecoming celebration.
“That was definitely a big honor. I feel like I wasn’t that worthy. I just talked about what I knew and what I’ve been through," says Tucker in a recent interview with Off Colour. “[It] was really cool because I hadn’t been back there in so long and to be invited back, something I never thought [would happen], to talk about my career. It was a blessing.”
While a UMass Amherst theater major, Tucker took dance classes and performed in theater and dance productions.
"It did prepare me as far as learning different techniques in acting, like taking movement classes and voice classes and things that you wouldn’t think would help you in the theater that would help you also on film. It all really does help,” she told Off Colour. “People say that, if you’re in theater, you should do theater, it’s bigger and more exaggerated than film …. but you can translate [theater to film] very well if you’re used to real life.”
The Boston, Mass., native credits her theater major as something that “kept me on my toes" and helped her easily adapt to working in different environments and with different people.
"It helped make me the enjoyable, open minded person I am today,” Tucker says.
“Black Panter: Wakanda Forever” is in theaters now.