Stars Pay Tribute To Chadwick Boseman One Year After His Death

On the one-year anniversary of his death, friends and co-stars honored Chadwick Boseman

2020 was both the longest and the shortest year ever. Time seemed to drag and fly at the same time, constantly altered by the pandemic that’s now been raging for nearly two years. So it was a little surprising to realize it’s been a whole year since Chadwick Boseman died. The actor’s death seemed sudden, even though it came after a four-year battle with colon cancer that he fought secretly. To mark the first year since his passing, friends and co-stars took to social media with heartbreaking tributes.

Michael B. Jordan shared a photo of himself and Boseman together alongside a tribute to his co-star and friend.

“Not a day goes by bro,” he wrote. “Love and miss you but I know you still with us.”

Kerry Washington shared a photo of Boseman at the Oscars for her tribute.

“One year without Chadwick Boseman. Thank you for watching over us. We miss you King,” she wrote, adding a black heart and prayer hands emojis.

Viola Davis shared a shot from her movie Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, in which she co-starred with Boseman.

“This day last year you left this earth and us,” she wrote. “Man you are missed!!!”

But one of the most touching tributes came from Lupita Nyong’o, Boseman’s Black Panther co-star and close friend.

Alongside a photo of herself and Boseman laughing together, Nyong’o wrote, “I did not know that I could miss both his laughter and his silence in equal measure. I do. I do… One year after his passing, the memory of @chadwickboseman remains this alive in me.”

When Boseman died last year, Nyong’o took to social media with a heart-wrenching tribute that still sticks with fans today.

“I am aware that we are all mortal, but you come across some people in life that possess an immortal energy, that seem like they have existed before, that are exactly where they are supposed to always be – here! … that seem ageless … Chadwick was one of those people,” she wrote at the time. “Chadwick was a man who made the most of his time, and somehow also managed to take his time. I didn’t know him for long, but he had a profound effect on me in the time that I did. When we came together to make ‘Black Panther,’ I remember being struck by his quiet, powerful presence. He had no airs about him, but there was a higher frequency that he seemed to operate from. You got the sense that he was fully present and also somehow fully aware of things in the distant future. As a result, I noticed that Chadwick never seemed rushed! He commanded his time with ease.”

At the end of her tribute, Nyong’o added what may be the clearest truth about Boseman’s time on earth: “We are all changed by his work as a result, by his presence in our lives.”