'I feel a sickening emptiness. How is Presley gone?'

It is dark as we gather on a quiet suburban street in 2004 to film the final scene of Tsotsi, a low budget, all-South African film. For months I have fretted over how to end this story of a violent young gangster who, through a carjacking gone wrong, becomes an accidental father to a stolen infant.

I have written two endings. In one, the eponymous Tsotsi, played by an extraordinarily gifted nineteen-year-old first-time screen actor named Presley Chweneyagae, will be shot dead by an on-edge police officer and bleed out on the street.

In the other, he will bolt, clear a stone wall and escape across burnt veld into a sprawling world of thousands of shacks. Redeemed by returning the stolen child to its distraught mother and father, should Tsotsi live or die? Or is there a third way?

We rehearse both endings. We start filming. Glued to my monitor I watch Presley in close-up begin to tremble as he bravely carries the kidnapped baby across the empty street to deliver it into the arms of the child’s father, played by the great Rapulana Seiphemo.

The two stand together for a moment, both holding the child. Presley does not immediately release the baby. Rapulana does not snatch it away. They seem frozen.

I watch. Presley is a contained well of emotion that rises from somewhere unfathomably deep and spills from eyes filled with more feeling than I have ever seen in any other actor, before or since. He is a master of restrained emotional honesty. A broken child himself.

Presley lets go. The father retreats slowly with his child. Presley remains alone in the middle of the street; the guns of two police officers trained on him. And then he slowly raises his hands. They rise silently over his head. Nothing is forced. The action is a simple surrender. A giving over to whatever fate, whatever punishment, may await him. He is neither dead nor free. But he is redeemed — by the simple gesture of the raised hands of Presley Chweneyagae.

And that is how the film ends. With the audience left to be his judge.

As I sit now, remembering this moment — and so many others like it where Presley’s performance vastly exceeded my expectations as we made Tsotsi together — I feel a sickening emptiness.

How is he gone? He was only 40. And I, 20 years older, am still here?

I have nothing but beautiful memories of this man. Of working with him scene by scene, and watching him, moment by moment, as he opened himself to the camera without an ounce of vanity or ego.

I have said it to young would-be actors many times: if you want to see what great screen acting is, watch Presley Chweneyagae in Tsotsi. Watch how he commands our attention, even when he has no dialogue. Watch his stillness, that is not still at all. Watch how he vibrates with an inner life, as nuanced as you will see in only truly great actors.

His central performance, alongside the exquisite Terry Pheto as Miriam, and the rest of our incredible cast, is why our film won an Oscar. And why Presley won the award for Outstanding Performance by an Actor in a Leading Role at the 2006 Black Movie Awards in Los Angeles, up against fellow nominees Denzel Washington, Cuba Gooding Jr, Chiwetel Ejiofor and Tyrese Gibson.

I remember sitting with him over a lunch a few days later and discussing whether he might stay with me in LA for a while and meet American agents. There were many who wanted to meet him.

After some discussion, he was clear: We had been on the road promoting Tsotsi at film festivals for many months leading up to the Oscars and he needed to go home. He wanted to see his mother, who had apparently sent him to drama lessons as a child to keep him away from real “tsotsis”.

And, importantly, he wanted to be an actor in South Africa, not in America. His connection to the character of Tsotsi was deep because he loved and cared about the people back home. It wasn’t that he didn’t care about Americans. They just weren’t his people. And anyway, he said, they had plenty of actors to tell their stories. He belonged in South Africa, telling South African stories.

And he did that. He went home and brought joy to South African audiences for years. And now he is gone, far too soon. And I can only say I am honoured to have known you, Prez, and forever grateful to have worked with you, sir. Rest well.