Oscar winner Lupita Nyong’o revealed on her new podcast, Mind Your Own, that she toned down her Kenyan accent early in her career. Now, she’s reclaiming it.
The KQED’s Snap Studios production (with ad sales and distribution by Lemonada Media) which launched on Thursday, is a 10-part series examining the African diaspora through first-person accounts from across the world to unpack the nuances of Black and African communities today on what it means to belong, according to a news release.
The podcast also includes Nyong’o’s experience, and the first episode includes her reflection on her birth in Kenya, life in Mexico, and eventually, the U.S. She shared that as a young actor hoping to make it in Hollywood, Nyong’o decided to mask her Kenyan accent to secure roles.
“In order to create this podcast, I had to get very comfortable with my voice. … It has not been easy,” Nyong’o said. “I’ve long had a complicated relationship with the way I speak. … While I was in undergrad, I held on to my Kenyan accent for dear life. … When I showed up at the Yale School of Drama, I made this pact with myself that I would learn how to sound American in a way that would guarantee me a career in acting because obviously I didn’t know very many people in movies and television with Kenyan accents. There was just no market for that.”
One time, a casting director didn’t know Nyong’o had an accent
She recounted how bittersweet it was when a casting director at an audition didn’t know she had a Kenyan accent.
“[I remember] my very first meeting with a casting director and her asking me about where I was from, and I said, ‘Kenya,’ and she said, ‘Oh my goodness, you don’t have an accent.’ And I was at once so elated and also so crushed — I had ridden myself of myself, kind of,” she recalled on the show.
Ultimately, Nyong’o didn’t want to hide a big part of who she was, and before her 12 Years a Slave audition, she decided to return to her natural speaking voice.
“At the end of the day, I never wanted to lose my authenticity. [Before I started press for 12 Years a Slave], I called my reps, and we had a conference call, and I said, ‘I’ve decided that from tomorrow I am going to return to my original accent. I want to send a message that being an African is enough.’ They had never heard me speak in a Kenyan accent,” she said.
The actress no longer masks her accent
Now, Nyong’o never hesitates to speak the way she does in any situation. It’s what keeps her close to her identity.
“I spoke to my mom, and she said, ‘Your accent is representative of your life experience.’ That gave me solace, that an accent comes to being from your life and accent — just like skin and hair — it can change, and it’s OK. I guess this accent is called Lupita; I don’t know who could claim it but me,” she said.
The first two episodes of Mind Your Own are available for streaming, with new episodes dropping on Thursdays. Check out the trailer below.
