It’s come to our attention that there might be one or two people not yet utterly enthralled by Lupita Nyong’o. To see if we can fix that, we’ll post this speech she gave a week ago at Essence magazine’s Black Women in Hollywood Luncheon.
Transcript via Essence, after the cut.
Newcomer Lupita Nyong’o was honored with the Best Breakthrough Performance Award at the 7th annual Black Women in Hollywood Luncheon for her work in critically acclaimed film, 12 Years a Slave, presented by fellow actress, Alfre Woodard. The following is her acceptance speech in full:
I wrote down this speech that I had no time to practice so this will be the practicing session. Thank you Alfre, for such an amazing, amazing introduction and celebration of my work. And thank you very much for inviting me to be a part of such an extraordinary community. I am surrounded by people who have inspired me, women in particular whose presence on screen made me feel a little more seen and heard and understood. That it is ESSENCE that holds this event celebrating our professional gains of the year is significant, a beauty magazine that recognizes the beauty that we not just possess but also produce.
I want to take this opportunity to talk about beauty. Black beauty. Dark beauty. I received a letter from a girl and I’d like to share just a small part of it with you: “Dear Lupita,” it reads, “I think you’re really lucky to be this Black but yet this successful in Hollywood overnight. I was just about to buy Dencia’s Whitenicious cream to lighten my skin when you appeared on the world map and saved me.”
My heart bled a little when I read those words. I could never have guessed that my first job out of school would be so powerful in and of itself and that it would propel me to be such an image of hope in the same way that the women of The Color Purple were to me.
I remember a time when I too felt unbeautiful. I put on the TV and only saw pale skin, I got teased and taunted about my night-shaded skin. And my one prayer to God, the miracle worker, was that I would wake up lighter-skinned. The morning would come and I would be so excited about seeing my new skin that I would refuse to look down at myself until I was in front of a mirror because I wanted to see my fair face first. And every day I experienced the same disappointment of being just as dark as I had been the day before. I tried to negotiate with God: I told him I would stop stealing sugar cubes at night if he gave me what I wanted; I would listen to my mother’s every word and never lose my school sweater again if he just made me a little lighter. But I guess God was unimpressed with my bargaining chips because He never listened.
And when I was a teenager my self-hate grew worse, as you can imagine happens with adolescence. My mother reminded me often that she thought that I was beautiful but that was no consolation: She’s my mother, of course she’s supposed to think I am beautiful. And then Alek Wek came on the international scene. A celebrated model, she was dark as night, she was on all of the runways and in every magazine and everyone was talking about how beautiful she was. Even Oprah called her beautiful and that made it a fact. I couldn’t believe that people were embracing a woman who looked so much like me as beautiful. My complexion had always been an obstacle to overcome and all of a sudden, Oprah was telling me it wasn’t. It was perplexing and I wanted to reject it because I had begun to enjoy the seduction of inadequacy. But a flower couldn’t help but bloom inside of me. When I saw Alek I inadvertently saw a reflection of myself that I could not deny. Now, I had a spring in my step because I felt more seen, more appreciated by the far away gatekeepers of beauty, but around me the preference for light skin prevailed. To the beholders that I thought mattered, I was still unbeautiful. And my mother again would say to me, “You can’t eat beauty. It doesn’t feed you.” And these words plagued and bothered me; I didn’t really understand them until finally I realized that beauty was not a thing that I could acquire or consume, it was something that I just had to be.
And what my mother meant when she said you can’t eat beauty was that you can’t rely on how you look to sustain you. What is fundamentally beautiful is compassion for yourself and for those around you. That kind of beauty enflames the heart and enchants the soul. It is what got Patsey in so much trouble with her master, but it is also what has kept her story alive to this day. We remember the beauty of her spirit even after the beauty of her body has faded away.
And so I hope that my presence on your screens and in the magazines may lead you, young girl, on a similar journey. That you will feel the validation of your external beauty but also get to the deeper business of being beautiful inside. There is no shade to that beauty.
I’m sure there’s a nice supporting role in a cable TV show in her future.
K. Bowen
I’ll let that slide without remark since you’re ordinarily so smart and incisive without any hint of catty bitchiness.
But I read this with a sigh of disappointment.
:-/
And here’s a treat for Lupita lovers(and who isn’t these days?) I tried to share this with Sasha on Facebook, but it kept sharing it and reposting it on my OWN timeline, but if you click on my name above it should take you to my blog. Where it’s posted as an article I just wrote about Lupita’s days at Yale School of Drama as told by her classmate and fellow “Wilson” actor Michael Place. On NPR radio. You have to go to 25.00 on the audio link but what Michael has to say about Lupita is eloquent and enlightening in the extreme.
She grew up in the spotlight in Kenya, which is why she is so comfortable there, seemingly. Her family was political and used to giving speeches(check) and she starred in a television series there called “Sugah”(sp?)And her adopted family is “the Wilsons” the name she(and they) gave to each other at Yale. Enjoy!
So much time talking about what The Academy does wrong. We need to celebrate when they get it right. Congrats to AD for doing this. Whatever happens for Lupita next doesn’t matter. She is a class act and an inspiration to others. How can you complain about that?
This woman really knows how to write a speech. But her heartfelt delivery is what makes it resonant.
Whatever Z, I loved her in non-stop 😉
Boom!
haha lets settle down ryan…. of course i don’t actually hate her. i’m kidding. my critique is with you. and the overkill on issues and your “favorites”. and how thin is your skin that i make a simple (and valid critique) and you take personal shots at me (or try to) by making a joke about my ex-girlfriends and basically tell me i need a psychiatrist? haha please
Dan, if you don’t actually hate her then you should not use the words “and now I hate her” when you write to say how you feel because none of us can see the twinkle in your eyes when you’re “only pretending” to be insulting. We only have your blunt words to go by. If you’re kidding then you need to provide more clue.
This is a recent event only 5 days old and that’s why it’s surfaced as newsworthy now.
Your critique of my “overkill with issues” sounds small enough to fit neatly up your ass.
I have NEVER addressed the issue of shades of blackness on this site in my entire life so I fail to see how mentioning it one fucking time is already wearing you out.
If you get sick of hearing a smart articulate actress speak in terms this touching and profoundly consequential then you should hang out someplace that covers celebrities mouthing off about insignificant trivial nonsense.
The thing about me joking about psychiatrists is you know I’m joking — which is something completely missing in you flat confession that the more you see of Lupita the more you hate her.
I wasn’t joking about your exgirlfriends. I said “future exgirlfriends.” The joke is this: you say the more you see of a fantastic girl the more you hate her and everything she represents? The point of joking about that was to help you see how sick that sounds.
Next time you want to “critique” what I do, you should please come at me directly instead of pissing on an actress.
alright, dan. I am settled down.
here’s something to think about. The last thing you said about Lupita Nyong’o before last night was this: “really hope Lupita Nyong’o isn’t a one-hit wonder”
you said that yesterday afternoon. So I just had a little trouble reconciling your two concerns: “I hope we see more of Lupita” and “man, I’m getting sick of seeing Lupita”
aside from slightly not-nice implication that “hey, u guys, Lupita might be a one-hit wonder” … you come along a few hours later saying how you’re bored with seeing her face around here.
so let’s take your earlier comment at face value. If you really do sincerely hope to see more of Lupita then maybe we can not just churn her under with the plow just yet? maybe we can continue to follow the extraordinary she does or says, so that we don’t appear to be saying “Oscar? yeah, well that happened. Next! Gimme somebody fresh now!”
see what I mean? I gotta admit that I’m having trouble getting to the core of your problem with this post. It almost worries me that you might be tired of seeing “Black” in a headline. Is that the issue your bored with?
Cheer up. I’ll be posting the Godzilla trailer here in a minute. Hardy any black people in that one at all.
sorry for biting your head off. now that I know you like to joke about hating people I’ll be slower to defend the things you claim to hate,
🙂
Lupita is certainly a breath of fresh air. Anyone put off by her has a host of personal issues.
I didn’t think she could get any better. Damn. I for one welcome our new celebrity overlord Lupita.
ahahaha, Thank you Rebecca for putting me to bed with a smile.
I’m interested in seeing what she does next (not counting NON-STOP), but I’m not enthralled. Good for her with winning the Oscar, though: a powerful performance of hopelessness if there ever was one.
haha. thank you AD for making me go from loving Lupita Nyong’o to hating her with your oversaturation.
yeah, dan, don’t blame your immaturity or any other personality problems you might have on Awards Daily.
I’m no psychiatrist, but if you love somebody until you see one too many great things about her and then you suddenly hate her… then you might have some sort of really sad mental illness.
good luck with all your future ex-girlfriends who will be so beautiful and so smart and want to be with you so much that you begin to hate them.
If I was a psychiatrist I might prescribe that you try real hard not to waste your time making hateful comments on posts that you hate. I’d advise that you spend more time commenting on things you love — if any.