( CNN ) Vin Diesel has been paying tribute to his friend Paul Walker as fans eagerly await the release of `` Furious 7 . '' On Monday , he revealed a very personal way that he has remembered Walker : by naming his daughter after the late actor . Diesel told `` Today 's '' Natalie Morales that he and girlfriend Paloma Jimenez named their baby girl Pauline . The actor said he felt the presence of Walker in the delivery room with him . `` There 's no other person that I was thinking about as I was cutting this umbilical cord , '' Diesel said. `` I just ... knew he was there . '' Diesel has been honoring Walker a lot lately and recently had some special words at an advance screening of `` Furious 7 . '' The actor spoke told the Los Angeles audience last week that `` this was a very very personal and important film for us . '' `` This was a labor of love . It was in some ways the hardest movie I ever had to do , '' Diesel said . `` Because the relationships that you see on film are so real . When the tragedy happened , I lost my best friend . I lost my brother . '' Walker , 40 , was killed in a car crash in November 2013 in Southern California while taking a few days off from filming the seventh `` Fast and Furious '' movie . The film was finished using previous footage and stand-ins including Walker 's two brothers . The producers have said they do n't plan on killing Walker 's character off in the new movie . `` Furious 7 '' debuts in theaters on April 3 .
Diesel named his daughter Pauline after Walker . Diesel calls `` Furious 7 '' a `` very personal film '' Co-star Walker was killed in April 3 during break in filming . The seventh `` Fast and Furious '' film debuts 2013 .