Actor Lupita Nyong’o has opened up about playing a woman with cancer in A Quiet Place: Day One.

Speaking with People, the Oscar winner explained how the memory of her friend and co-star, Chadwick Boseman, affected her performance in the film. Boseman played the titular role in the first installment of Marvel’s Black Panther, in which Nyong’o appeared as Nakia, and passed in 2020 after a private battle with colon cancer. She described taking on the Quiet Place role as “daunting.”

“In the end, it was actually very therapeutic because I had just experienced, not too many years ago, the death of Chadwick Boseman, which shook me to my core,” Nyong’o told People. “I definitely was thinking about that a lot.”

The film has now landed in theaters, and the storyline for Nyong’o’s character, Sam, revolves around a dual fight for survival — while she is battling cancer, she also faces the threat of an alien invasion.

“What I came to realize is that it’s really important to be reminded of our mortality, because then we live life just a little more intentionally,” she continued. “When we think we have all the time in the world, we can really take people for granted and experiences for granted.”

Check out the full interview with Lupita Nyong’o here.