Today, Hollywood honored the late actor Chadwick Boseman with the 2,828th star on the Walk of Fame.
“Chadwick’s a star deserving of a star on the Walk of Fame, but he was also our most incredible jewel,” said director Ryan Coogler in his speech. “He reflected light and refracted it. And when he did, he showed the greatness of our people and the universe of our shared humanity.”
Boseman, who died at age 43 from colon cancer, was known best for his leading role as T’Challa in the blockbuster franchise “Black Panther,” and for playing iconic Black figures like Jackie Robinson in “42,” James Brown in “Get On Up,” or the fictional artist Levee Green in “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom,” for which he received a posthumous Academy Award nomination, a Golden Globe, Critics’ Choice and Screen Actors Guild Award.
The CEO of the Walk of Fame, Steve Nissan, announced that not only would Boseman receive the honor of a star, but Hollywood would also commemorate the day as “Chadwick Boseman Day.”
The event included speeches from Coogler, who worked with Boseman on “Black Panther,” and Viola Davis, with whom he co-starred in “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.” Both tearfully spoke about how much they admired their friend and collaborator.
“He understood the cap of success, but the true power and significance of transcendence,” Davis said.
She recalled memories of Boseman’s djembe drum, which she said he brought everywhere and even played on set, the sounds of which were an example of how he “channeled the divine.”
“You were a conduit, a source of connectiveness that every single human being who is on this earth is searching for,” she added.
Coogler brought a memento, a copper bracelet that Boseman gave to him after they had wrapped filming “Black Panther.” He spoke about how Boseman gave him many nonphysical “gifts,” including the opportunity of “being close to greatness.”
“You realize how much you don’t measure up, but you also realize how much a human body is capable of,” he said. “And his generosity extended to the fact that even when he knew his days were limited and his moments were numbered, he still gave it to the art form.”
Simone Ledward Boseman, the wife of Boseman, received a certificate of recognition from the city of Los Angeles on his behalf. She shared some words from her husband to the audience, called “Chadwick Boseman’s Instructions for Creative Work.”
“Write the vision and make it plain. Keep that word fastened in your journal, shut it in your bolted drawer, until the appointed time,” she said. “Let the ideas, the visions that God gives you, fester inside of you. Let the word that He has put inside of you bubble over, do not speak it to another until the time appointed by God.”
She continued, “The secrecy of the vision is the second stone laid in the building process. It is the project’s fortress. For a word spoken too early on the ears of men is a bulldozer and a stumbling block. Forget the self that entered the process, and be made into a new creature through the work.”
