OPINION: Remembering 42

 

     When the news of Chadwick Boseman’s untimely death at 43 after a four-year private battle with colon cancer broke on Aug. 29, it became apparent how many lives he had touched with his acting.

     While he is rightfully remembered for iconic performances such as T’Challa in “Black Panther,” James Brown in “Get on Up” and Thurgood Marshall in “Marshall,” to me his most resonant role was as Jackie Robinson in “42.”

     In a 2013 interview Boseman gave about initially receiving the role, he showed how thoughtful and dedicated he was to doing justice to a sports and Civil Rights icon.

     “It set in during that time that children would know Jackie Robinson from my performance,” Boseman said of the period after hearing he would play the part.

     That dedication was evident in a performance that captured Robinson’s endurance, determination, humility and grace in response to horrifically overt racism and resistance.

     Many Americans may know Robinson from no more than a short blurb in a textbook about him breaking the color barrier in Major League Baseball, but it is worth considering exactly how difficult that task was at the time. The prejudice, death threats to him and his family and seemingly relentless jeers from opponents and crowd members were powerful depictions of the adversity that is often summarized to an uncomfortable footnote in history class.

     The film “42” and a book I read as a child entitled “Jackie and Me” by Dan Gutman have been two of my greatest resources when it comes to understanding Robinson’s impact on baseball and society. Through these depictions, one can gain a greater sense of experiences that may be much different from our own.

     One of Robinson’s more famous quotes was that “A life is not important except in the impact it has on other lives.”

     Boseman’s time may have been too short, but his impact while preserving the legacies of others will live on for decades to come. His passing as Major League Baseball celebrated a belated “Jackie Robinson Day” was a reminder of how the two titans of their industries will be forever intertwined.

Special Sections

Comment Here