Angela Bassett reveals she unknowingly met Chadwick Boseman when he was in college

Any young student dreaming of being an actor one day would give their left arm to work with the great Angela Bassett. She’s been in the industry for 35 years and starred in such mega hits as What’s Love Got To Do With It, Waiting To Exhale, How Stella Got Her Groove Back, and Boyz n the Hood. It turns out, many years ago, one young thespian with stars in his eyes met Angela before he was famous, and his wish eventually came true. As Angela revealed Wednesday night on The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon (weeknights at 11:30 p.m. ET on CTV), the young hopeful was actually the late, great Chadwick Boseman.

“A number of years ago, I was so honoured to receive an honourary doctorate from Howard University. And so I’d go there, a great time, a great experience, whatever. And you know, life goes on, you go back to doing your work,” she explained to Jimmy via video-chat. “And you know, I get this movie Black Panther. I’m sitting next to Chadwick every morning, we shared the same makeup trailer, the same hair trailer.”

“So we spend hours and hours, prepping the day, getting ready,” she continued. “I’m watching him call South Africa to get his dialect right. So the night of the premiere – glorious premiere, pinnacle of just everything, cherry on top – we’re getting ready to leave […] Let me go say hello. I find him and give him an embrace. It’s just been incredible...”

“And he whispers in my ear, ‘When you got your honourary degree, I was the student that escorted you throughout that day.’ And I was just so blown away! I couldn’t believe that he held that back from me while we were shooting, the entire time.”

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Jimmy (and the rest of us) were clearly shocked and moved by the story – just one of many uplifting and inspiring stories that have been shared about the late Black Panther star who passed away last year at the age of 43 after a secret four-year battle with colon cancer. Huge names like Denzel Washington, Viola Davis, Robert Downey Jr, Don Cheadle, Lupita Nyong’o, and many others have all publicly paid tribute to their fallen friend since his passing.

Angela previously posted about this rare and unique connection with Chadwick on her Instagram but this was her first time sharing it on a late night TV talk show and speaking about it publicly.

Angela went on to share with Jimmy that she meets many young actors who tell her they have dreams of working with her one day, but it took a special person like Chadwick for that dream to actually come true.

We'll never be tired of hearing sweet Chadwick Boseman stories. 

Watch The Tonight Show starring Jimmy Fallon weeknights at 11:30 p.m. ET on CTV.

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