Lupita Nyong’o is choosing not to defend herself after being publicly scrutinized over her starring in Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey, including harsh remarks from Elon Musk.
Following the announcement that the actress will play Helen of Troy in the upcoming action-packed film, Lupita faced backlash over her role as “the most beautiful woman.”
The Black Panther actress hit back at critics, saying, “You can’t perform beauty,” in a recent chat with Elle.
She went on to say, “I want to know who a character is. What is beyond beauty? What is beyond looks? That’s the thing about doing such a well-known text, which has been studied and interpreted and derived from.”
“Research could be endless. The good thing about working with a writer like Chris is that it’s on the page,” she added of the director. “The investigation starts with the pages you’re given. That’s what I based it on.”
Moreover, Lupita remarked that Homer’s epic “is a mythological story.”
“I’m very supportive of Chris’s intention with it and with the version of this story that he is telling,” Lupita added, noting that the “cast is representative of the world.”
She concluded, “I’m not spending my time thinking of a defense. The criticism will exist whether I engage with it or not.”
This came after a conservative commentator, named Matt Walsh, criticized Christopher’s casting for Odyssey on X, writing, “Not one person on the planet actually thinks that Lupita Nyong’o is ‘the most beautiful woman in the world. But Christopher Nolan knows that he would be called racist if he gave ‘the most beautiful woman’ role to a white woman. Nolan is technically talented but a coward. Too afraid to do anything that even slightly challenges the spirit of the age.”
And Tesla’s CEO responded to the comment, noting, “true.”
Elon then posted on X, “Chris Nolan desecrated the Odyssey so that he would be eligible for an Academy Award…”
The announcement of Lupita’s casting in The Odyssey came earlier this month.
