Lupita Nyong’o achieved a remarkable feat in 2014 when she won an Oscar for her role in 12 Years a Slave.
But the 42-year-old, in a recent CNN Inside Africa interview with Beninese singer Angélique Kidjo, revealed that she was subsequently offered more slave roles after her Oscars win, something that did not sit well with her.
“After I won that Academy Award, you’d think, ‘I’m gonna get lead roles here and there,'” Nyong’o, who was born to Kenyan parents in Mexico, said, per Complex. “[They’re like], ‘Oh, Lupita, we’d like you to play another movie where you’re a slave, but this time you’re on a slave ship.’ Those are the kind of offers I was getting in the months after winning my Academy Award.”
Nyong’o also revealed that besides the multiple offers to portray a slave in movies, there were think pieces that suggested her career was done.
“There were think pieces of ‘Is this the beginning and end of this dark-skinned Black African woman’s career?’ I had to deafen myself to all these pontificators because, at the end of the day, I’m not a theory. I’m an actual person,” she said.
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Nyong’o stated that she ultimately declined offers to portray a slave, and she had no issues with that so far as she wasn’t going to promote the stereotypes regarding Africa.
“If that means I work one job less a year to ensure that I’m not perpetuating the stereotypes that are expected of people from my continent, then let me do that,” the Black Panther star said.
Nyong’o also said that she wants her portfolio to help change the stereotypes about Africa and African women, adding that she aims to be a “joyful warrior” advocating for that shift, Complex reported.
