The late Chadwick Boseman won Outstanding Voice-Over Performance by a Character at the Creative Arts Emmy on Saturday for his last portrayal of T’Challa in the Disney+ animated series “What If…?”
In his last performance before his death from colon cancer in 2020, Boseman put a new spin on his “Black Panther” character, playing him as Star Lord T’Challa.
Boseman was one of three actors to win posthumous Emmy nominations this year, along with Norm MacDonald and Jessica Walter, who was nominated for “Archer” in the same category as Boseman and is the only actor to win two Emmy nominations after her death (she was nominated for “Archer” last year after passing away).
“When I found out that Chadwick had been nominated for this award, I started thinking about everything that was going on when I was shooting it, what was going on in the world and what was going on in our world and I was so in awe of his commitment. and his dedication,” said Boseman’s widow, Taylor Simone Ledward, accepting the award. “What a beautifully aligned moment it really is, that one of the last things he would work on would not only be revisiting a character that was so important to him in his career and to the world, but it would also be an exploration. of something new, immersing oneself in a new potential future”.
“Particularly with all that he said about purpose and finding out why you’re here on the planet at this very moment and how you can’t understand your purpose unless you’re willing to ask, ‘What if?’ Unless you’re willing to say, ‘What if the universe is conspiring in my favor? What if it’s me? So thank you,” Ledward said.
Twenty-six actors have been nominated for posthumous Emmy Awards and five have won: Boseman, Alice Pearce (comedy supporting actress, “Bewitched,” 1966); David Burns (supporting actor in the TV movie, “The Price,” 1971), Diana Hyland (supporting actress in the TV movie, “The Boy in the Plastic Bubble,” 1977), and Raul Julia (lead actor in the TV movie, “The Burning Season,” 1995).
(Marion Lorne, for “Bewitched,” Ingrid Bergman, for “A Woman Called Golda,” and Audrey Hepburn, for “Gardens of the World With Audrey Hepburn,” also won Emmys after their deaths, but were alive when they were nominated.) .
The competition for outstanding character voiceover performance was stiff this year: In addition to Walter, Boseman beat out Julie Andrews (“Bridgerton”), F. Murray Abraham (“Moon Knight”), Stanley Tucci (“Central Park”), Jeffrey Wright (“What If…?”) and Maya Rudolph (“Big Mouth”), who won here in 2021 and 2020.
Boseman was also nominated for a posthumous Best Actor Oscar in 2021 for “Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom.” He lost to Anthony Hopkins in “The Father.”
