Actor and producer Charles F. Porter, known for ESPN’s Wendell Scott film and the 2025 movie Finding Faith, has died at 47 after a years-long cancer battle.
Porter died Monday at his home in Calabasas following a lengthy fight with cancer, his family confirmed. He was 47.
Entertainment Weekly reported that the family shared the news on Nov. 4 with The Hollywood Reporter. His wife of 18 years, Candice Tab-Porter, later posted a public tribute on Instagram, calling him a man of integrity and a protector of their home.
In an industry that often rewards image over character, the portrait she offered was simple and concrete. He kept his word. He led by example. He did not quit on the people who depended on him.
Porter is survived by Candice; their daughters, Layla Rose, 9, and Juliette Jasmine, 6; his mother, Dorothy Fourmeax; his brother, Sydney Sparks-Fourmeax; and his sister, Natalie Zore.
Candice Tab-Porter wrote that God brought them together and that their years as husband and wife were a gift, not an accident of timing.
"I am honored to have been by his side for the incredible 18 years we had together and truly believe that God brought us to each other for a reason."
She said he taught her to be present, to notice ordinary beauty, and to hold the line on his values. He “never compromised,” she wrote, and “always did what he said he was going to do.”
Throughout the long illness, she said, he refused to turn bitterness into a lifestyle.
"He always just said it’s part of our journey and tried to find the silver lining."
She called him “a true hero” to their girls and said the time the family had together, while far too short, left a permanent mark.
"Thank you, Charles Porter, for being the greatest man I have ever known, our family protector, for loving me and the girls so deeply, and for giving us a life filled with more love, laughter, and beautiful memories than I ever could have imagined."
“It was and always will be, the greatest privilege of my life to have been your wife,” she added.
Charles Frederick Porter II was born March 13, 1979, in Oxford, England. He graduated from Duke University with a degree in cultural anthropology, then moved to Los Angeles in 2002 and began building an acting career the hard way, credit by credit.
His best-known screen role came in 2011, when he starred in the ESPN film Wendell Scott: A Race Story. He also appeared in House, Without a Trace, Bones, Johnny Was, and Peppermint.
Porter did not stop at acting. He founded Black Bench Productions and moved into producing work with an open moral center. Credits tied to the company include the 2025 film Finding Faith, along with A Miracle Before Christmas and Christmas Angel for BET+. He also published three books.
Seventeen years before his death, he first battled Hodgkin lymphoma. The later illness stretched across years. Even then, his wife said, he “found beauty in the little things and never complained.”
That is not Hollywood branding. That is a husband and father choosing steadiness when the easier path is self-pity.
The public file on Porter is not a scandal sheet. It is a work history, a production slate, and a family statement that keeps returning to the same words: integrity, presence, protection, faith, and follow-through.
He told people he would do something, then did it. He built a company and put faith-centered stories into the marketplace. He stayed married for 18 years and helped raise two little girls who will now grow up on the memory of a father their mother calls a hero.
In a culture that treats vows as optional and fatherhood as a side role, that record still matters.
A man’s real legacy is not the credit roll. It is whether the people who lived with him can say he kept his word, and Candice Tab-Porter just did.
