Noah and Logan Miller: Here’s what Sinners director had to say about the real life twins who inspired Michael B. Jordan’s double role

With Ryan Coogler directing Sinners into the equation, we have to say there is a lot of trouble in a movie when an actor is given double trouble. 2025 has got a second dose of it after The Monkey, where a drum-beating toy monkey (changed from a cymbal-banging toy from the original Stephen King story) has made the life of Hal and Bill Shelburn (Theo James) a living hell.

Coogler's film is kind of the same, not story-wise, though, but evil forces have made the lives of Stack and Smoke (Michael B. Jordan) a living hell too, where vampires have a hell of a night, blood is everywhere, and that's a treat for them.

In every story, no matter how original, there are elements inspired by somewhere, and the twins here in Sinners were a product of the same. When Coogler spoke to People recently, he shared this inspiration, which is a real-life pair whom he is friends with, Noah and Logan Miller, who are also a couple of filmmakers.

The Sinners twins' real-life inspiration has a habit not everyone can pull off in their waking lives

There is no bigger addiction than mobile phones today—no one can defy that fact. But Coogler shared something about Noah and Logan Miller that one will find pretty hard to pull off today. They both use the same phone—if one is using it, the other won't be doing that. That's already scary—what if one has to use it for an hour? Anyway, here's what the Sinners director told People Magazine:

"They gave us a lot of perspective on what it's like to be an identical twin and that bond that they have. Since I've known these guys, they've shared one cell phone. So you'd call and you don't know which one was going to answer the phone but you knew the other one was always going to be right there."

If Sinners were a modern-day horror flick, we are pretty sure Coogler would have included this particular habit of twins sharing a phone, too. Sadly, during the 1930s—the time period in which the film is set—rotary dials were still becoming a common household item

More twins who have come before Smoke and Stack and fascinated the fans

Legend has it, Tom Hardy portrayed the Krays, Reggie Kray and Ron Kray, in 2015. Now, sure, Stack and Smoke are two ragtag twins who killed those vampires, but the 60s Krays were someone no one would want to mess with, especially the crazy brother Ron, or he would have bitten off their ears.

Brian Helgeland, who directed Legend, didn't need a consultation from real twins, but he sure sat down with a former associate of the Krays, Freddie Foreman. Helgeland told one fun, more like a classy gangster, incident that happened during this meeting. He said:

"I had drinks with him in his local haunt. When we finished he got up to go and they feted him at the bar. I said to him, 'what about the bill?' and he replied, 'we don't pay.'"

We don't know who will outshine the Krays, but we saw a similar pair, emperors Geta and Caracalla, in Gladiator II, played by Joseph Quinn and Fred Hechinger, respectively. We respect the Krays—for at least Reggie didn't kill his crazy brother. Maybe their Mum taught them well, as she tells Reg in one of the Legend-ary scenes: