On Friday, August 28, it was announced that actor Chadwick Boseman had passed away after a 4 year-long battle with colon cancer.
Boseman was best known for bringing the Marvel character Black Panther to life on the silver screen in 2018. This movie resonated deeply among the African-American community, showing a positive superhero role model for today’s generation.
During a sit down Interview in 2018 on the Sunday Sitdown with Willie Geist, Boseman explained that when readying himself for the role of King T’Challa in Black Panther, he researched the different cultures in Africa and integrated them into the culture that is Wakanda.
Those working on this movie, along with himself, saw this as an opportunity to pull from all the things they loved from the continent of Africa. Given that Wakanda was technologically advanced in addition to having a culturally rich ancient background, then it’s possible those ideas dispersed and went throughout the continent.
However before he graced the screens as King T’Challa, Boseman brought other influential role models from the African-American community to life. In 2013, he starred as Jackie Robinson in “42”, which gave viewers an insight into the life and career of the famed baseball player. Next in 2014, he once again outdid himself playing the role of the talented singer James Brown in “Get on Up”. The next great man he portrayed was in 2017. Boseman became Thurgood Marshall in “Marshall”, in which the movie followed one of the career-defining cases for the respected former American Supreme Court Justice.
Though many know him for his on-screen career, Boseman was also active off-screen with issues that are currently causing strife in today’s society. He expressed the sentiments on public platforms to get his message out there.
According to an article by E! News, during an acceptance speech in 2019 for Outstanding Performance by a Cast in a Motion Picture for “Black Panther” at the Screen Guild Awards, Boseman said, “To be young, gifted and Black, we all know what it’s like to be told that there is not a place for you to be featured. We knew that we had something special that we wanted to give to the world. That we could be full human beings in the roles we were playing. That we could create a world that exemplified a world that we wanted to see.”
Boseman left behind a great legacy and will be a real-life superhero for everyone to look up to for years to come.
The unedited interview with Chadwick Boseman on Sunday Sitdown with Willie Geist is available for free on Spotify.
