Lupita Nyong'o worried about Oscars curse
Lupita Nyong'o feared winning the Best Supporting Actress Oscar would be the end of her career.
The 33-year-old received the top gong at the 86th Academy Awards in 2014 for her role in 12 Years a Slave, and while she was elated, there was a shred of fear at the back of her mind over what she would do next.
"Right after the Oscars, I had no idea what I was going to do
next... Zero clue," she told InStyle magazine, before revealing her
concerns over the so called Oscar curse, which is usually linked to
her category. "They (previous winners) go on to appear in bomb
after bomb after bomb."
Thankfully her concerns were unfounded, as her career has gone from
strength to strength since her win, with a role in blockbuster
movie Star Wars: The Force Awakens and a forthcoming part in the
live-action version of Disney's The Jungle Book.
Her success still catches her by surprise, as Lupita half expected
to return to the life she had had before 12 Years a Slave made her
a household name.
"There's a part of me that thought my life would go back to
normal," she confessed. "Like at school. But it didn't. I did not
get out of that unscathed, you know?"
While Lupita is overjoyed with her career, she still believes
Hollywood needs to do more when it comes to diversity, especially
after this year's #OscarsSoWhite controversy, which occurred after
no African-Americans were nominated in any of the four major acting
categories for the second year in a row.
"There is a real imbalance, from the very creation of the stories
and who's telling them, how, and why," she explained. "Change has
to happen with the writers, the studio, the marketers, the
directors. That's got to be diversified because there is a hunger
for the expansion of the role of people of color in the center of
narratives."