Two observations about the four main characters in One Night in Miami:

Two observations about the four main characters in One Night in Miami:

We can look at Cassius Clay, Jim Brown, Sam Cooke, and Malcolm X as being Protagonists. Each has an arc. Each has an subplot storyline. At points in the narrative, each takes a "turn" as being the story's focal point.

-- Clay has to decide about his conversion to Islam and whether to support Malcolm X's plan to start his own group, separating from the House of Islam.

-- Brown has to decide whether to continue playing football professionally in the NFL or pursue an acting career.

-- Cooke has to decide if he will continue writing, recording, and performing the same type of music which has made him rich and famous, or - inspired by Bob Dylan's "Blowin' in the Wind" - write songs which have more depth and social relevance?

-- Of the four, we may consider Malcolm X to be the "lead" Protagonist in that he is the one who brings the four together that night in Miami. He's the one who challenges each of the others to stand up for the cause of Black rights. He's the one with a secret agenda: Convince Clay to lend his symbolic support to Malcolm X's plan to start a new Islamic movement in America.

Four Protagonists... with a nod toward Malcolm X as being the "lead" one.

Second observation: Over the course of the movie, each of the four don "masks" in an attempt to achieve their goal in that moment or respond to events which are happening right then.

Note: By "mask," I mean any character has the capability to take on any of the primary character archetypes -- protagonist, nemesis, attractor, mentor, trickster -- in any scene or in any relationship.

In this regard, let's consider one of the characters: Malcolm X. He wears a co-protagonist mask much of the time, especially during the first 40 pages of the script. Once he gets on his soapbox or attempts to execute his various agendas, that's when the other masks come out.

He wears a nemesis mask with Cooke, confronting his friend about Cooke's career choices which do not - in Malcolm X's eyes - contribute to the cause of Black power.

He wears a mentor mask with Brown in painting a portrait of Brown and other Black athletes being seen as nothing more than a "monkey dancing for an organ grinder."

He wears *all* of the masks with Clay -- sometimes a friend (attractor), sometimes an adviser (mentor), working a secret plan to woo Clay (trickster), and ultimately creating conflict and opposition with Clay once Clay discovers what Malcolm X's plan is.

It stands to reason these two dynamics have their roots in that the source material for the movie is a stage play: The limitations of four major characters would almost seem to require each character be their own Protagonist; and that in order to explore multiple interrelational dynamics, they would each have the ability to don "masks."

This allows the characters to express their unique worldviews and explore complex themes - to be discussed in Part 4.