Lupita Nyong'o describes the cancer storyline in 'A Quiet Place' as 'therapeutic' following the loss of close friend Chadwick Boseman

A Quiet Place: Day One debuted in theatres on June 28th, 2024. One of the major characters in the movie was a terminally ill cancer patient played by Lupita Nyong'o, an aspiring poet named Sam with a cat named Frodo. In the beginning of the movie, Sam is in hospice care with other patients and her cat, but during a trip to Manhattan to see a puppet show, the Death Angels arrive and she has to hide and stay silent in order to not be killed by the invading aliens.

In an interview with PEOPLE, Nyong'o said that it was "scary to have to go there", since she was playing a role as a character who was "really facing their mortality, even before this apocalypse takes place, and whose life is slipping between her fingers." According to Nyong'o, it was "daunting to have to go there, psychologically and emotionally."

The role was especially close for Nyong'o due to having lost her close friend and costar in Black Panther, Chadwick Boseman. He died due to colon cancer during the filming of Black Panther: Wakanda Forever in 2020. "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. I definitely was thinking about that a lot," she said, referencing her relationship with Boseman and how she had mourned for him.

"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. When we think we have all the time in the world, we can really take people for granted and experiences for granted," Nyong'o said about how the role made her feel.

At the end of the film, Sam gives her cat to a friend she met during the invasion who escapes on a boat, and decides to go out on her own terms. After doing everything she wanted to do before her death, she leaves her hiding place and plays an upbeat song out loud, inviting the aliens to kill her. Nyong'o enjoyed the ending, saying she “loved that she was given agency up until the end, that she went out on her own terms.”