Jess Hilarious is reflecting on one of her biggest regrets, and it involves Chadwick Boseman.
The Black Panther star was diagnosed with colon cancer in 2016, but he never spoke publicly about his illness.
Prior to his death in 2020, he appeared thinner than people were used to seeing, sadly drawing a ton of negative criticism online.
While some people were genuinely concerned, others made hurtful comments, including Jess Hilarious.
On a recent episode of the “The Pivot Podcast,” Jess said she regrets cracking a joke at the actor’s expense.
She said:
“I was gon’ stop doing ‘Jess with the Mess’ ‘cause all I do is riff on people… That’s my thing. And I remember Chadwick Boseman had dropped a video shortly before he passed, and I thought he was training for a movie. I thought he was, you know, some people really get into the roles that they, you know, lose weight for a role or something like that.”
“He was telling people to stay inside… I said you need to stay inside or something like that… Of course, I didn’t know anything about his cancer or anything like that… I riffed on him, and everybody thought it was funny and cool, even myself until he passed,”
“I [didn’t even] care how people looked at me. How I looked at myself was crazy… I was like, alright, I gotta change the way I move. For a minute, I didn’t want to do ‘Jess with the Mess’ no more because you don’t know what the hell people [are] going through, you don’t know when you come at somebody’s appearance… I just looked at him as a great actor.”
Some of the backlash she received
Jess Hilarious joked about how skinny Chadwick was now she’s saying she’s retiring talking about people. Half the time she wasn’t funny, don’t see how she thought making fun of others made her look good.
— A S H B (@AshBTheDon) August 29, 2020
and
In all do respect of Chadwick Boseman and his passing but let’s be real some months ago numerous ppl made a jokes about the way he looked @jess_hilarious to be exact but little did people knew he was sick shame on society #ripChadwick pic.twitter.com/hpatsKV1Jl
— PROFESSOR????????????CHAOS???????? (@MsHJSinclair) August 29, 2020
and
Jess Hilarious has decided to retire her Jess with the Mess reports after she was reminded of her comments towards Chadwick Boseman where she made fun of his weight loss. She states, “I’m tired of talking about people.” pic.twitter.com/xmAriGEKgf
— Just Ask Kai (@justaskkai) August 30, 2020
Jess said:
“I deserve all of that… He was so unproblematic… That’s the only thing I regret.”
Watch below:
Jess Hilarious understands that “Funny is Funny”, as @OfficialCrowder often says. The @breakfastclubam host lives by that as well, but she does have one huge regret. Prior to Chadwick Boseman’s passing @jesshilarious saw a video posted by the late “Black Panther” actor. She… pic.twitter.com/OU9w0Myseg
— Ryan Clark (@Realrclark25) March 3, 2024
You live and you learn!