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Having global recognition is a huge achievement for a person. Hard work and passion are the keys to become an acknowledged successful person or in this case, an actor. Acting in movies or television is believed to be an easy job, people believe that the actors live a lavish life where they are provided with everything in front of them and they do not have to work very hard at all. That is not true! Actors have to give their 100% into every film that they do to get the attention of the audience. The audiences follow an actor only when he is good at what he does i.e. acting.
To gain attention, the actor has to work tirelessly during the days and nights to deliver their best work to get acknowledged and appreciated. Chadwick Boseman was one of those actors who loved his job giving his heart and soul into each character he played. He enjoyed playing each role and worked very hard to create a specific appearance for all the films. It is because of his undying charm and amazing acting, even not being with us, he still lives in the hearts of fans.
The dedication of Chadwick became crystal clear when he did not disclose his colon cancer and kept acting in films.
In this article, we will go through a few less-known facts about Chadwick that you should know.
Who was The Great Chadwick Boseman?
Chadwick Aaron Boseman was born in South Carolina on November 29, 1976. He was a very famous American actor. He studied direction from Howard University and became a teacher in acting initially. Later on, he worked as an actor, director, producer, and playwright in both films and television. He is known for portraying real historical figures in his movies, such as Thurgood Marshall, James Brown, and Jackie Robinson. All the roles mentioned previously got Chadwick a lot of attention making him very popular among people. His role in black panther as a superhero made him famous like none other character.
Chadwick lost the battle of life against colon cancer on August 28, 2020, which left all his fans devastated. He was diagnosed with stage 3 cancer in 2016 but being a true fighter he still gave us some memorable movies. It was claimed that movies like ‘Marshall’, ‘Da 5 bloods’ and several more movies were filmed between countless surgeries and chemotherapy.
It was the love of art and creativity that kept Chadwick on his toes while being so sick. His passion and honesty towards his work is the reason that he is loved by so many people around the globe and even when he is gone, he still will be remembered!
10 things you should know about Chadwick Boseman:
Chadwick Boseman was a private person who did not like sharing the matters of his personal life on media. He was not very active in giving interviews and even if he did give interviews, he would talk about his films or writing. He believed that his work should be the reason to attract the attention of the audience. So, even though Chadwick is a well-known actor, there still might be a few things about his life that you do not know. So, let’s discuss a few lesser-known facts from the life of the late great Chadwick Boseman:
1. Took a DNA test to discover his ancestors
Boseman was very interested in his family and friends. He was the happiest when he was around them and very curious in knowing about his roots. He wanted to discover more details about his ancestors. Though he lived in South Carolina in the United States of America he still wanted to know the place where his parents came from. His parents were African American nationals. Boseman decided to get his DNA test to know his specific origin. The test revealed that his ancestors were from West Africa. In the DNA test, he also got all details of ethnic groups in his ancestry. Boseman came to know that his forefathers were from the Mende and Limba people of Sierra Leone, the Jola people from Guinea-Bissau, and the Yoruba people of Nigeria.
After the DNA test Chadwick thought that he discovered himself and got to know himself better because he was well aware of his ancestors now. Without getting this test done he would have never imagined that his ancestors were from Sierra Leone or Nigeria.
2. He belonged to a huge family
Chadwick mostly played the role of an African man in his movies but he was born and raised in American and he was proud of it. He was also very proud of his family and cherished all of his memories about his family and friends. In one of his interviews, Chadwick discussed that when his grandmother died she left behind 115 grandkids and great-grandkids. This shows that he had a huge family with many many cousins. His huge family is lucky enough to know their roots due to the DNA test Chadwick took to discover their ancestors.
He has two brothers including Kevin Boseman and Derrick Boseman. Chadwick was a great friend to his brothers who were always there for them and vice versa. In an interview, his brother said that he was a friend who tried his best and his best was incredible. His brothers miss him a lot now that he is gone. The late actor did not have any children though.
3. Denzel Washington paid for his education:
Chadwick wanted to attend a summer course at the British American Drama Academy in London but he did not have enough money to go for it. One of his teachers and mentors who is an actress by the name of Phylicia Rashad was the one who helped him and in addition some other students, to raise funds for their course.
Many people contributed to funding the money for those students, one of them being Denzel Washington who is an American actor, director, and producer. Chadwick revealed this secret in 2018, saying that he was holding this secret during his whole career. He also said that if Denzel would have not paid for his course, he would not have been a part of Black Panther.
Washington also jokingly said: ‘Wakanda Forever, but where is my money?’
4. He was interested in sports
Chadwick did not like to share a lot about his personal life because he wanted people to know him through his professional life as an actor, so that his personal life should not be the reason to grab people’s attention. Yet, he still used to share a few facts about himself here and there. In one of those moments, he shared that he was always an athlete since his childhood. He was great in all sports during his school.
During his high school, Chadwick was a part of Little League Baseball but his real passion was to play basketball and it eventually overtook his previous passion for baseball. His personal experience with baseball helped him portray such a real version of the baseball legend Jackie Robinson in his movie ‘42’. With the training of merely a few months, Chadwick was ready to successfully play the role of Jackie Robinson.
5. He was very conscious about his physique
There is no doubt that Chadwick was a phenomenal actor with a huge fan base because of his talent. He also had a huge number of fans due to his incredible physique. He was very particular about it, he used to work out regularly to maintain his physical fitness. In all his films his body was perfectly toned which drew the attention of many male and female fans.
Having a physically toned and perfect body is not an easy task, Chadwick had to work hard to maintain it. He was a perfectionist who wanted to be in the character completely and he worked very hard on his looks for each movie. He worked out the most during the times he was training for the Black Panther role and used to work out for up to 5 hours a day.
In addition to being a fitness freak and working out for a long time, Chadwick also had a skill to do splits. It was confirmed when he did splits during his move ‘Get on up’ while playing James Brown. Initially that was a coincidence but Chadwick always had something unique and special to each and every role he played which is why he was being a natural on screens and therefore people fell in love with his acting.
6. Didn’t audition for the role of Black Panther
Boseman is best known for his role as Black Panther. He got maximum international fame from this superhero movie in which he worked for Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU). But to this awesome movie, he was not called for an audition to test whether he is fit for this movie or not. Keeping in mind his previous remarkable performances he was selected for the movie without any audition. He was offered this role on a phone call. The president of Marvel Universe called him on the phone and offered the role of Black Panther. Without giving a second thought, Boseman took the best decision of his life by accepting this offer and this role of Black Panther makes him a worldwide famous actor.
7. Only Black God in the ‘Gods of Egypt’
In the movie ‘Gods of Egypt,’ Chadwick was the only black God while all other Gods including Nikolaj Coster-Waldau, Gerard Butler, Geoffrey Rush, and Bryan Brown were all white. The movie was severely criticized by the viewers for being racists and showing most of the Gods as white. Chadwick agreed to this point of view and he took the role by saying in that way there was at least one black God in the film. Chadwick was also not happy with the way filmmakers portrayed the Gods being white only but he still played his part in the movie well and his performance was appreciated.
Due to the casting issues, the film was a commercial flop worldwide as it made only $150 million while the budget of the film was $140 million. It was a lesson for all the filmmakers to select a more diverse group of people depending on the very movie.
8. He wanted to play Jimi Hendrix
Chadwick is known for his portrayal of real-life famous people in their biographic movies. He played Jackie Robinson, James Brown, and Thurgood Marshall but he wanted to play the role of Jimi Hendrix who was an American musician. He believed that Hendrix was talented and inspirational.
He thought the story of Hendrix would be a motivation for people. But there was no film planned for this role so his dream could never be fulfilled.
9. Trained in Martial arts
Many people do not know that Chadwick Boseman was trained in Martial arts. As discussed earlier, he was very interested in sports and physical fitness which makes it obvious that he was also very interested in Martial arts and took professional training for it. His training was of great help for his role in Black Panther because he was already well prepared for his action-based scenes.
However, he and other members of the cast did go to a boot camp to become fully prepared for their roles. All the stunts that you see in the movie ‘Black Panther’ were done by the cast members rather than the stunt professional. It is very difficult to have the guts to do such scenes for a film but the cast was trained to perfection to create the most natural scenes for the audiences.
10. Award-winning actor
Chadwick was nominated and won many awards during his whole career. He was nominated for the first time in 2016 for the role of best supporting actor, he did not win that award though. In 2018 he was nominated for seven awards for his role in Black Panther, out of which he won four awards.
He won two MTV awards for Best Actor in a movie and best hero. He also won the People’s choice male movie star of 2018. He was very proud of himself that he was able to achieve so much respect from people based on his incredible acting.
Estimated net worth of $12 million
At the time of his death, his net worth was estimated to be $12 Million, including the money he earned from Black Panther, Infinity Wars, Endgame, and other projects he worked on for Marvel movies.
How did Chadwick die?
In 2016, he was diagnosed with Stage 3 Colon Cancer which was very shocking news for him. No one knew about his illness as he never disclosed the information. Just after a lapse of four years, it got from stage 3 to stage 4 and things got worse. He never had any words about his cancer diagnosis or treatment with anyone other than his closest family members. And even the family members were not knowing the exact severity of the illness. It is pertinent to mention here that even during his rigorous chemotherapy sessions and multiple surgeries he continued to work and completed projects of many movies like Da 5 Bloods, Marshall, Ma Rainey, and few others.
On 28 August 2020, Chadwick Boseman died in his home after fighting Colon Cancer for four years. Purposely not mentioning anything to anyone, he left millions of his fans around the world in a big shock as no one was knowing that their favorite hero was fighting ruthless cancer.
Final words:
Chadwick Boseman was a passionate actor who always loved his work and enjoyed his acting tenure to the fullest. His patience is an example for the people around the globe, he kept working hard for his films even when he was severely ill. When he was diagnosed with cancer, he did not think for one second that his life had been shattered and he therefore cannot achieve his dreams. He went through countless surgeries but his spirits remained high. He was not afraid to be dead in a few years. He lived his life and fulfilled his dreams despite all the hardships. He was a true inspiration for people who are healthy and still sit and keep procrastinating. The life of the late great Chadwick Boseman contains many lessons for everyone around the world. He did keen research in finding out his true ancestors, showing you should always feel proud of your roots. He never stopped working hard in all conditions in his life without any excuses even when being severely sick! With hard work, everyone in this world can achieve the maximum level he or she urges for. The superhero Black Panther and therefore Mr. Chadwick Boseman will be remembered forever by his fans around the world.
