On the fourth anniversary of his tragic death, Chadwick Boseman has been commemorated by his Black Panther co-star, Lupita Nyong’o. The actress, who portrayed Boseman’s onscreen love interest, Nakia, in the first installment of the Marvel film, took to Instagram to reflect on the grief she’s still enduring, years after the King T’Challa actor passed away after a battle with colon cancer.
“Grief never ends,” the actress wrote alongside a black-and-white image of Boseman and another of her by his side, “grief is not a sign of weakness, nor a lack of faith. It’s the price of love.”
The Us star concluded the message by writing “Remembering Chadwick Boseman. Forever.” Nyong’o wasn’t the only co-star of Boseman’s to reflect on his legacy yesterday, with Viola Davis also sharing a touching tribute on the fourth anniversary of his death. Davis, who worked with Boseman on 2014’s Get on Up as well as his final film, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, said on Instagram that her late co-star “live[s] on in me.”
“Authenticity, passion and love were all woven in one extraordinary human…..CHADWICK BOSEMAN,” the How To Get Away With Murder star added. “Your flame will never be extinguished.” Elsewhere, Guardians of the Galaxy director James Gunn, who almost cast Boseman in the role of Drax, also shared an anniversary tribute to the actor on social media.
Nyong’o, Davis and Gunn were among the celebrities who first reacted to news of Boseman’s passing in 2020. At the time, Nyong’o said she missed Boseman’s “laughter and silence in equal measure,” while Davis wrote “Man you are missed!”.
Jamie Foxx, Jane Lynch, and Kerry Washington also paid tribute to Boseman in 2020, alongside his Marvel family castmates Brie Larson, Chris Evans, Mark Ruffalo, Don Cheadle, and Zoë Saldana. Boseman kept his years-long battle with colon cancer out of the public eye, though it was reported after his death that he filmed projects like Black Panther during and between surgeries and chemotherapy.
Boseman has been commemorated in various ways in the years since his passing. Last year, he was paid tribute with Rihanna’s performance of “Lift Me Up” at the Academy Awards, and was given a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame. Elsewhere, footage of the late actor appeared in Wakanda Forever, the Black Panther sequel that premiered in 2022.
“He believed he was ordained to get that role,” Black Panther director Ryan Coogler said in 2022. “He would be like, ‘Yeah, I had [T’Challa] on vision journals and I wanted to do this role.”