Fans were stunned during last weekend’s Academy Awards ceremony when the Best Actor prize went to Anthony Hopkins for his devastating turn in The Father, when all signs were pointing to Chadwick Boseman scoring a posthumous victory for his phenomenal final performance in Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.
The late star had been sweeping the board all throughout awards season, and the fact that the Oscars telecast was changed so that Best Actor would be the last prize of the night had many people thinking it was a foregone conclusion. However, once Joaquin Phoenix read out Hopkins’ name, the broadcast was forced to end on a surprising and incredibly rushed note after the 83 year-old wasn’t present either in person or virtually, with the time difference meaning it was roughly 4 am for the veteran Welsh screen legend, so he’d have long since been tucked up in bed.
There was a huge backlash, too, with the Academy facing accusations of exploiting Boseman’s death after they banked on him winning only to see it blow up in their faces, but Michael B. Jordan doesn’t think his Black Panther co-star needs an Oscar to validate his legacy, as he revealed in a new interview.
“This is how I honestly and truly really feel about it; There’s, like, there’s no award that can validate his legacy. There’s no win that can take anything away from the lives around the world that he impacted. So you gotta look at the things that we can control and the things that the gifts and the blessings that he left us and that’s this incredible body of work and what he represents for as a person and as the biggest one we could really ask for.”
Based on everything Chadwick Boseman‘s friends, colleagues and former collaborators have said about him in the months following his tragic and untimely passing, you get the impression that awards season glory was never too high on his list of priorities, and Jordan is completely right in saying that a trophy won’t take anything away from the impact he made on those around him before being taken far too soon.
Tell us, though, do you agree with the actor’s comments here? Let us know down below.
