Lupita Nyong’o

Lupita Nyong’o (birthname: Lupita Amondi Nyong’o) enjoyed one of the most extraordinary breakthroughs of any actor in recent film history when—after acting in only a few short films and one British TV series—she appeared as the slave Patsey in Steve McQueen’s acclaimed drama, 12 Years a Slave (2013), for which she won the Best Supporting Actress Oscar in 2014.

Before this, Nyong’o—who had trained as an actor in Kenya and the U.S.—worked as a production runner (on The Constant Gardener (2005)), as well as sound editor, film editor assistant, and art director intern, and a director of the feature documentary, In My Genes (2009).

Immediately after earning her acting MFA at the Yale School of Drama, Nyong’o was cast in 12 Years a Slave, with Chiwetel Ejiofor, Michael Fassbender, Benedict Cumberbatch, Brad Pitt, Paul Dano, Paul Giamatti, Alfre Woodard, and Sarah Paulson, earning nine times its $22 million price tag, for a global take of nearly $188 million.

Nyong’o had a supporting role in the Jaume Collet-Serra-directed thriller starring Liam Neeson, Non-Stop (2014), with Julianne Moore and Anson Mount. Nyong’o became a part of two major franchises, first as the character Maz Kanata in Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015), directed by J.J. Abrams; Star Wars: The Last Jedi (2017), directed by Rian Johnson; and Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker (2019), directed by Abrams and co-starring Mark Hamill, Adam Driver, Daisy Ridley, John Boyega, Oscar Isaac, Domhnall Gleeson, and Billy Dee Williams, with the three movies earning a total box-office take of $4.4 billion.

Lupita Nyong’o branched out to voice and motion capture acting in the extremely successful Jon Favreau-directed remake for Disney, The Jungle Book (2016), with Bill Murray, Ben Kingsley, Idris Elba, Scarlett Johansson, Giancarlo Esposito, and Christopher Walken, and grossing just under $967 million. Nyong’o continued with Disney in her first starring role, Queen of Katwe (2016), co-starring David Oyewolo and Madina Nawanga and directed by Mira Nair. However, it was Nyong’o’s first feature to lose money (a $10.4 million global take).

Lupita Nyong’o’s second major franchise casting was as Nakia in writer-director Ryan Coogler’s Afro-Futurist epic for the Marvel Cinematic Universe, Black Panther (2018), starring the late Chadwick Boseman, Michael B. Jordan, Danai Gurira, Martin Freeman, Daniel Kaluuya, Letitia Wright, Angela Bassett, and Forest Whitaker, and earning $1.35 billion worldwide, becoming the highest-grossing film ever made by a Black filmmaker.

Nyong’o parlayed her new-found stardom into another starring role in the zombie comedy, Little Monsters (2019), premiering at the Sundance Film Festival and a theatrical release by Neon, immediately followed by streaming on Hulu. Nyong’o won Best Actress from the New York Film Critics Circle for her stunning double performance in Jordan Peele’s second, acclaimed horror thriller, Us (2019), with Winston Duke, Elisabeth Moss, and Tim Heidecker, going on to earn $255 million globally, or ten times budget ($20 million).

After the failed all-woman spy thriller, The 355 (2022)—with Nyong’o co-starring with Diane Kruger, Penelope Cruz, Jessica Chastain, and Fan Bingbing—Nyong’o returned to the role of Nakia in Coogler’s hotly anticipated follow-up, Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022), with a return of the original (except for the late Boseman). Nyong’o was cast in the anticipated third entry in the A Quiet Place post-alien invasion saga, A Quiet Place: Day One (2024), directed by Michael Sarnoski.