Black Panther's leading man Chadwick Boseman stopped by The Tonight Show to not only talk about the record-setting film with host Jimmy Fallon but also surprise some of the film's biggest fans along the way.
Fallon set up a room where fans were told they'd be recording video messages for the actor, explaining how Black Panther made them feel, but there was a twist. Fans took their turns expressing the pride, joy, and confidence they felt watching Boseman on the big screen. "Thank you from the very bottom of my heart for all that you've done," said one fan, "and being a hero that we really need in a time like this."
Fan after fan and message after message, Boseman would step out from behind the curtains to embrace and talk to each of them, including a mother and son who were in disbelief and a young black creative who had movie-making aspirations of her own. "What kind of movies do you want to make?" Boseman asked her as he stepped out. It all made for mushy and sweet TV moment goodness.
In another segment, Boseman and Fallon were joined by comedian Marlon Wayans, whose Netflix special Woke-Ish is now out, to play True Confessions. With Wayans revealing he allegedly made out with Madonna at an unnamed Oscar party a few years ago, and Fallon explaining how he ended up as one of the few white people to ever grace the Def Comedy Jam stage, Boseman's date story is met with some suspicion, but it's funny nonetheless.
Boseman still made plenty of time to have a sit-down interview with Fallon, where he revealed the legendary actor who paid for him to do a study exchange at Oxford University. "Phylicia Rashad, she basically taught a class once a week at Howard and wanted us to do this exchange. I didn't have money to pay for this so she got a few of her friends together and they paid for us to go," he explained. "I've basically been holding this secret my whole career. When I came back I got a beneficiary letter and it said 'Denzel Washington paid for you.' I never wanted to say that until I met him."
He would eventually meet Washington at the New York premiere for Black Panther to thank him personally. "He said, 'You know, I haven't met you yet,' and I said, 'I gotta tell you something, you paid for me to go to school,'" he told Fallon. "And he said, 'Oh, so that's why I'm here, you owe me money. I came to collect.'"
We're sure Washington won't really send him an invoice, but it definitely makes for the perfect late-night talk show story.
