Ma Rainey's Black Panther

Like listening to jazz musicians perform together, there is an immense pleasure in watching a group of actors completely in the motherfucking pocket. Ma Rainey's Black Bottom, currently streaming on Netflix, just happened to feature both. It's a joy to see Viola Davis provide an immense swagger to the titular role, to watch Mayor Royce seesaw between secretly smart and bumbling old man, to witness Jeremy Shamos precariously balance roles as both overly sympathetic manager and music-appropriating capitalist. This is all good shit.

But Chadwick Boseman undoubtedly steals the show, and I'm not just saying that as some sort of posthumous overcompensation. The man gives a virtuoso performance as Levee, the hard-headed big-dreaming trumpet player in Ma's band. Boseman's performance is absolutely wild from start to finish. He plays the highs very high (having sex on a piano), the lows very low (describing his mother's rape and his father's lynching), and the out of control, well, completely and gloriously out of control (threatening god with a knife). 

Even knowing that Boseman soon thereafter died of cancer, I was shocked at how thin and gaunt he looked. Not only does his appearance add to the sense of desperation his character exudes, but also, it adds to the appreciation that Boseman was even able to go as far as he did at all. I mean, the man doesn't look well as a human, and that he was still able to pull out an earth-shattering performance speaks volumes to the man's talent and dedication to the craft, despite the circumstances.

I wonder if there are many actors who can count their final film credit as one of their best. Like, I'm thinking now about Paul Newman, whose acting is legendary, and whose final film credit is listed as Cars 3. In many ways, the fact that Chadwick Boseman absolutely shined in his final role is a mark of how unfair it all is. The man clearly had many, many performances left to give, and he never will.

I have no idea what the Best Actor and Best Supporting Actor fields are looking like for the upcoming Oscars. I have to imagine that Boseman's Ma Rainey performance has to be nominated for something. I also have to imagine that Boseman's death increases his chances of actually winning the award. If he does win posthumously, you can rest assured that he will have without a doubt earned it.