вЂAll of a sudden he had taken off his armour and said, вЂњHere it is.вЂќ He shone very brightlyвЂ™ вЂ“ Steve McQueen Sometimes you donвЂ™t have enough time to play the game.вЂќ The rawness, he says, came from looking out into the crowd that day and seeing his own fear and weariness mirrored in the eyes of the other black men present. You need to lay down what it is thatвЂ™s on your mind. вЂњI feel like, especially as celebrities, we have to talk through this filter of professionalism and emotional intelligence,вЂќ he says.

He shone very brightly and I rang him a few days after to say thank you.вЂќД«oyega himself stresses there was nothing planned or calculated about the speech, its sentiment and delivery was something he had been building towards. YouвЂ™re thinking, вЂGet your sword up.вЂ™ But thereвЂ™s strength in vulnerability and being naked. вЂњI think of myself as a warrior, because IвЂ™m all about battles, but all of a sudden he had just taken off his armour and said, вЂHere it is,вЂ™вЂќ he tells me, over the phone. But he is almost transgressively vulnerable too, open and tearful and scared in a way that black men вЂ“ and incredibly famous black men, at that вЂ“ are rarely seen publicly.ДЇor Steve McQueen, the Oscar-winning director who cast Boyega in Small Axe, this was the most striking aspect of his speech. He is angry, of course, screaming himself as hoarse as a pro-wrestling heel and letting emotion spring from him like a burst pipe. We are a physical representation of our support for Sandra Bland. вЂњWe are a physical representation of our support for George Floyd. That is never the case any more.вЂќ Voices whoop and spur him on. вЂњI need you to understand how painful it is to be reminded every day that your race means nothing! That isnвЂ™t the case any more. вЂњI need you guys to understand how painful this shit is,вЂќ he tells the mass of raised fists and camera phones, his voice cracking. For almost five minutes, Boyega вЂ“ sounding every inch the literal son of a preacher вЂ“ rallies the crowd with a visceral, personal and profane account of what itвЂ™s like to be black in the same societies that gave us the barbaric deaths of George Floyd, Breonna Taylor, Stephen Lawrence and the countless others like them. Though widely shared now (one Twitter clip has been viewed 3.6 million times), what happened next still has the power to quicken the pulse. вЂWhat I say to Disney is do not market a black character as important and then push them asideвЂ™ It is part of the accumulative origin story that, as he faces a Star Wars-free future for the first time in six years and takes a lead role in the BBCвЂ™s forthcoming Windrush generation saga Small Axe, is animating his choices both on screen and off it. It is the fact that, alongside the other tales he will tell me about a childhood punctuated by incidents of racism and police profiling вЂ“ about how when he first went to Nigeria as a ten-year-old he witnessed his uncles slaughtering a cow and fought the shiver down his spine to help heft buckets of still-warm blood вЂ“ it is offered up to better illuminate exactly what this 28-year-old has been through and what he is made of. No, it is the conduct of its protagonist. But the point of this skilfully relayed, typically Boyega-ish story is not really its dramatic resolution. Of course, it did not come to a physical confrontation and two watery graves in the Atlantic (after 15 minutes or so of noisy back-and-forth, Boyega heard the approaching growl of a police boat, manned by AK-47-toting officers sent by the filmвЂ™s production staff to look for him history sadly does not record just how quickly the boatвЂ™s would-be hostage taker soiled his pants).

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