Derrick and Chadwick Boseman: A brotherhood that stood the test of time

Derrick and Chadwick Boseman: A brotherhood that stood the test of time

Trey Stewart, Editor

When asked to describe his youngest brother’s life in one word, Derrick Boseman needed a moment to think. He took a deep breath, his gaze fogging over, mind beginning to churn.

On his desk sat a picture of his late younger sibling, a man he refers to simply as “Chad.”

The photo’s solid white background contrasted with Chad’s black turtleneck, but it went perfectly with the soft smile running across his face.

Derrick Boseman loved Chad, from his first day of life until the day he could no longer fight off the colon cancer he was diagnosed with in 2016.

Chad spent the back half of his life training in the martial arts, earning his fifth-degree black belt in jiu-jitsu. Although he’d eventually lost the battle to his disease, Chad’s warrior spirit radiated throughout the four years he spent giving it hell.

His martial arts experience helped him stand out in his profession. An actor, Chad never needed stunt doubles to film fight scenes. And there were plenty of those scenes required of him.

Because while Derrick Boseman knew him as a brother, as a best friend, as “Chad,” the rest of the world knew him by a different name.

Chadwick.

Chadwick Boseman – Derrick’s youngest sibling – led a life breaking molds and pushing past limits. One of the most beloved icons in cinema history, Chadwick Boseman took the planet by storm and his culture by heart.

Protagonist roles in films such as 42 and Black Panther sent him soaring to towering heights. His graceful portrayal of African-American icons — figures like Jackie Robinson, James Brown and King T’Challa — turned the Anderson, S.C. native into one of the most widely-adored celebrities on Earth.

Derrick Boseman’s t-shirt, plastered with his little brother’s iconic stills in full Wakandan attire, served as proof.

To limit Chadwick Boseman’s impact to one adjective seemed futile, like attempting to define Mona Lisa’s glamor by a single physical feature.

But Derrick Boseman dug deep into his wounded heart, assuring his answer was the most all-encompassing one he could give. After about 15 seconds of silent pondering, he took a deep breath and answered.

“Faithful.”

Boseman, the 54-year old pastor of New Covenant Outreach Ministries in Murfreesboro, T.N., elaborated on his word choice through the most appropriate method possible: a Biblical parable.

“In the parable of the talents, a talent is a piece of money,” explained Pastor Boseman. “It’s stewardship. For two of the servants, the phrase was ‘Well done, thy good and faithful servant.’ I’d say that [Chadwick] was faithful over what he was given. He used it wisely.”

Chadwick Boseman was born on Nov. 29, 1976, when Derrick had already started blossoming into a young man. By that time, Derrick Boseman says, he was beyond ready to become a big brother.

Being 10 years old when Chadwick entered the world, Boseman still remembers days spent wiping his baby brother’s bottom.

“When you’re 10 or 11 years older than a sibling, by the time you’re 12 or 13, you’re responsible enough to be left at home, to take care of things. So I was his babysitter. I wiped his butt, literally.”

Derrick and Chadwick Boseman remained close while they grew, and when Derrick left home at age 18, he made a point to venture home often and spend time with his family.

Even while riding the turning tides of life, he sought out a role as Chadwick’s mentor.

“I came back and forth [to Anderson, S.C.] a lot over the course of six or seven years,” Derrick Boseman said. “When I would come home, I loved to see Chad. When I called home, we would always talk.”

The two brothers played basketball in their driveway whenever they saw each other. After years of falling short, Chadwick finally managed to beat his older brother at age 16. They bonded over the North Carolina Tar Heels, the team their father, Leroy, raised them to root for.

The pair often found themselves discussing life — fleeting and temporary — and how little time they had to blaze their paths.

“We were more serious than anything else,” said Derrick Boseman. “No time to waste, so to speak. James 4:14 lets us know that ‘life is but a vapor.’ Chad’s life played that out.”

The most valuable treasure Boseman was able to pass on to his youngest brother, he says, was the gift of knowledge. As Chadwick came into his own, Derrick — then in his mid-twenties — cared deeply for how he saw the world.

Derrick Boseman attended T.L. Hanna High School in Anderson, the same school Chadwick was preparing to enroll in. The education he’d received growing up, he says, was “slanted” and designed to “keep African-Americans in a certain mental state.” But when Derrick graduated, he opened his eyes to the world around him.

And he understood his responsibility to help his brother do the same.

“As my mental state broke, I broke his mental state. I took that on as my job, just instilling within him concepts about religion, life in general.”

Derrick Boseman longed for his younger brother to open his eyes, to sharpen his juvenile perspective on society. Chadwick still had time at a young age to see things for what they were; time Derrick never caught up to. Liberation theology, Derrick Boseman says, is the message he was called to preach.

Boseman wanted his baby brother to view the world in a way no one had ever taught him. His favorite tools in reaching uncharted portions of Chadwick’s mind?

Books.

“I handed him The Autobiography of Malcolm X when he was 12,” said Boseman. “That’s a heavy book for a 12-year old. I got my hands on it at 22. He got his hands on it at 12. It impacted me at 22, so there’s no telling what it did to him at the age of 12.”

Once he got to high school, Chadwick began to stand out amongst his classmates and peers. He carried himself with graciousness, never losing his peace in the face of moderate hatred and pushback. Anderson, nicknamed “the friendliest city in South Carolina,” was still plagued with racism, yet Chadwick stood firm.

But Chadwick’s gifts — which there was no shortage of — found the 18-year-old choosing which road to take out of high school. He was a stellar basketball player for the T.L. Hanna Yellow Jackets and perhaps could have made a career out of the sport.

Chadwick thought about his future and how he wanted to design it. Sure, he enjoyed basketball. He’d grown up with a natural talent for the sport, and basketball was the game his father loved most.

But his passion, the potential path his heart was drawn to and jumped at the thought of, wasn’t basketball. It wasn’t a sport at all, for that matter.

Deep down within the core of himself, Chadwick had fallen for a new love: writing. Beginning at age 17, he developed an infatuation for the idea of becoming a playwright.

During his junior year of high school, Chadwick wrote his first production, titled Crossroads. Boseman based the story around a T.L. Hanna classmate who had been shot and killed. The play was met with praise, and it helped Chadwick cope with the reality of the loss.

Crossroads also served as the diving board into his affection for the performing arts.

Chadwick chose to pursue writing after graduating high school, and as soon as he made his decision, his older brother believed in him.

“I knew he was going places from the moment he said he wanted to do it,” the eldest Boseman sibling said. “His intention was never actually to be an actor. He wanted to be a writer and director.”

And Derrick believes that if he continued down that road, Chadwick would have excelled.

His journey took a different exit, however, following advice from a prominent Hollywood actress.

Phylicia Rashad, award-winning star of The Cosby Show, advised Chadwick to mold acting into his creative arsenal. Rashad was a professor at Howard University in Washington, D.C., the institution Boseman attended, hoping to advance his screenwriting prowess.

“[Rashad] convinced Chad that if he learned acting, it would make him a better writer and a better director,” explained Derrick Boseman.

The advice Boseman received from Rashad proved invaluable, as he began sharpening his skills on camera. Decades and decades passed without making prevalent headway, but Chadwick persisted as an actor.

And in 2013, Boseman’s hard work finally paid off. Warner Bros. came calling his name.

Chadwick earned the opportunity of a lifetime, securing the role as baseball legend Jackie Robinson in the biopic 42. The film turned out to be a critical and commercial success, with much of the movie’s fanfare directed at Boseman’s graceful portrayal of Robinson.

From that point, much of Boseman’s story is public knowledge. The very next year, he performed as James Brown — aka “The Godfather of Soul” — in Get on Up. In 2016, Boseman made his first on-screen appearance as Black Panther in Captain America: Civil War.

Black Panther — the 2018 cultural phenomenon — converted Boseman into a global icon.

But despite Chadwick Boseman’s unprecedented fame and success, his older brother admired his unwavering dedication to who he was. Nothing ever changed Chadwick’s character at heart. Beneath the cover of celebrity life, Chadwick Boseman was still just a kid from a small town in South Carolina.

“He just wanted to be normal,” said Derrick Boseman. “He wanted to be treated normal like everyone else. He ran from being famous. He didn’t want to be noticed; he hated that.”

This explained why, aside from Chadwick Boseman’s closest circles, no one knew of the beloved actor’s continual struggles with colon cancer.

“He handled [the diagnosis] the way a normal person would,” said Derrick Boseman. “Who wants to walk through the mall or an airport, and everybody say ‘He has cancer?’”

His 2020 passing came as a shock to the world.

Throughout four years of tireless fighting, Boseman combatted the disease with his signature gracefulness. His million-dollar smile hid the pain.

And on Aug. 28, 2020, that pain left Chadwick Boseman’s body for good. With his family by his bedside in his Los Angeles home, he said his final goodbye to the world that had come to cherish him so dearly.

Derrick Boseman was right next to his younger brother through it all.

“It was devastating,” he said. “It was painful, stressful. It was impossible, like it wasn’t real. Like it was a dream. Even though it was happening, it didn’t seem fair. It didn’t seem right.”

During his final days, Chadwick maintained his unbreakable sense of humor. He had always loved to laugh, but as cancer took over his body, Derrick Boseman says, even laughing hurt.

And while Chadwick Boseman’s final moments drew near, he leaned on the man he’s always looked up to for support.

“[Chadwick] told me he was in the fourth quarter. And that he needed me to get him out of the game. He was in the fourth quarter of his life, and there was no overtime. He was tired. He couldn’t go any longer.”

And if God had allowed it, Derrick Boseman would have stood in for his baby brother.

“I was angry about it,” he remembered. “In my prayers, I asked to take [Chadwick’s] place. If it would make him better, give the cancer to me. Give him my health.”

Derrick’s selfless hopes didn’t come to fruition, and Chadwick’s death left him reeling with questions.

“It was time spent saying prayers that obviously didn’t get answered. And trying to come to grips with why the prayers weren’t answered.”

Although the pain subsides more and more each day, Derrick Boseman still hasn’t fully come to terms with his brother’s departure from Earth. But Derrick’s faith, despite the lack of clarity behind the reasoning of his brother’s death, grows stronger every day.

“I’m still struggling with it,” he admitted. “It doesn’t make sense. But even though I have questions, Chad’s death has increased my faith. It has broadened my relationship. I’ve got something to talk to God about. It’s increased my relationship with God, not diminished it.”

Derrick Boseman offered one final reflection over his relationship with Chadwick.

“It’s like I was his big brother, but a father figure to him at the same time. I was a person who cared for him throughout his whole life. My role never changed, really. I cared for him; I talked to him about things he should and shouldn’t do. I was his protector.

“And I still am.”