I am sad, so profoundly sad. I screamed, literally, on a call, when an alert crossed my laptop this week that Malcolm-Jamal Warner had died. I could not believe it, did not want to believe he, my friend, had drowned during a swim, somewhere in Costa Rica, while on a vacation with his wife and little daughter. Fifty-four, only 54-years-old. Why do the good often go prematurely? Matthew Perry. Tupac Shakur. Amy Winehouse. Kurt Cobain. Marilyn Monroe. Aaliyah. Bobby Kennedy. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Billie Holiday. Bruce Lee. Selena. Janis Joplin. Vincent van Gogh. Whitney Houston. James Dean. Princess Diana. Brittany Murphy, the list is diverse, mythical, and, yes, so profoundly sad.
Meanwhile, we have also had a relentless parade of Black male celebrities—Chadwick Boseman, Kobe Bryant, DMX, Michael K. Williams, and more than I dare to count this decade—just go, gone, none of them even remotely senior citizens. Any death troubles my soul mightily, no matter who it is, famous or not. But I must admit, without shame, that it hurts in a certain kind of way any time I hear of another Black man gone, as elder Black folks often say, before their time.
Now it is Malcolm-Jamal Warner. Emmy-nominated actor. Grammy-winning musician. Grammy-nominated poet. Beloved husband, father, son.
I do not recall when nor where nor how I first personally met him, but it was back in the day. Nevertheless, like hundreds of millions of viewers across the planet I was introduced to Malcolm-Jamal via The Cosby Show, one of only three U.S. television programs which have been No. 1 in ratings for five seasons (the others: All In The Family and American Idol). To say The Cosby Show was revolutionary and game-changing would be a gross understatement. In the 1980s America of Ronald Reagan, the AIDS and crack epidemics, and the initial explosion of brands like Apple and Nike, the show was a unicorn. It saved a struggling NBC network. It introduced our nation to a different way of viewing the Black experience. It became a global pop culture phenomenon during its eight-season run.
We had never witnessed a Black family like this in television history: two professional parents with five children—four girls and one boy—supremely confident in their beings, the entire household a manifestation of the post-civil rights era of what was possible. No racist stereotypes, no demeaning facial expressions, no bowed heads, and no broken bodies from the old Hollywood. Yes, legit and righteous representation do matter, and as the lone male child in the clan Malcolm-Jamal remixed Theo Huxtable with an enchanting recipe of Black boy joy, a cool jazz meets hip-hop swagger, and an unsatiable thirst for the wholeness of life.
I am just slightly older than Malcolm-Jamal and never thought I would see someone like him on television. But there he was, in living color. I was inspired. I was doubly amped when I learned he had been born in Jersey City, N.J. like me. He was me and I was him. In Malcolm-Jamal’s smile and laughter were mine, too. In his struggles from boyhood to manhood were my trials and tribulations, too. He was a kindred spirit, and, moreover, what Mary Tyler Moore meant to women 10 years earlier is what Malcolm-Jamal Warner meant to Black America, to boys Black like me.
No, we cannot delete what the show’s creator, Bill Cosby, has been charged with these many moons later. The rape, sexual assault, and sexual harassment allegations are brutal and “tarnished,” as Malcolm-Jamal said in one interview, the great legacy of The Cosby Show, likely forever.
But we also cannot merely throw away this historic TV show and its participants because of one person. The Malcolm-Jamal Warner that I came to know, as an actor, as a musician, as a fellow poet, as a voice, leader, and bridge-builder, was kind, supportive, and genuinely full of hope and love. If one simply scans any social media platform since the tragedy one will see the testimonies, from a wide spectrum, saying the exact same. Malcolm-Jamal Warner was a very different kind of man.
Alas, I do not know what Malcolm-Jamal Warner thought about the accusations against his TV father other than a few statements here and there that one can easily Google. I imagine that he was tormented, and torn. I never spoke with him about being on a hit TV show so early in life. He knew I knew, just like I know he knew I had been on the very first season of MTV’s The Real World. Ours was a safe space, two products of pop culture, who preferred to speak about poetry, music, and hip-hop. Two Black men in America, on this Earth, trying to navigate any and all spaces, perpetually, as we journeyed through the chapters of Reagan, the Bushes, the Clintons, Obama, Biden, and Trump.
I do know in losing Malcolm-Jamal Warner, and the way we lost him, with so much breath still to breathe, leaving his wife and daughter and mother and father behind, is collective trauma that is unexplainable. I have cried, my wife has cried, my wife’s mother and so many others we know have cried. Because losing him is akin to losing a blood relative, a close friend. Because Malcolm-Jamal, named after civil rights icon Malcolm X and jazz pianist Ahmad Jamal, was truly the brother we all needed.
Kevin Powell is a Grammy-nominated poet, filmmaker, and author of 16 books. He previously wrote a Newsweek cover story on Spike Lee. Kevin lives in Brooklyn, N.Y. Follow him on all social media platforms: @poetkevinpowell.
The views expressed in this article are the writer’s own.
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