Lupita Nyong'o Quotations

It's so funny, you go to acting school thinking you're going to learn how to be other people, but really it taught me how to be myself. Because it's in understanding yourself deeply that you can lend yourself to another person's circumstances and another person's experience.

My father was a professor of political science and also a young politician fighting for democracy in Kenya, and when things got ugly, he went into political exile in Mexico.

It's only when you risk failure that you discover things. When you play it safe, you're not expressing the utmost of your human experience.

I thought I was going to school to be other people, but really, what I learned was to be myself - accepting myself, my strengths and weaknesses.

I come from a very close class. I lucked out because drama schools are often very competitive... I have fourteen classmates.

I have a very ostrich mentality. I feel like I have my head in the sand so no one can see me.

In the madness, you have to find calm.

As human beings, we aren't as individual as we'd like to believe we are. And I think that's what makes acting possible. Despite the fact that I have not experienced something, I have it in my human capacity to imagine it and to put myself in someone else's shoes, and to take someone else's circumstances personally.

I didn't know any successful actors in Kenya, so I felt like I could get away with going to college to study film more easily than I could with saying, 'I want to be an actor.' That's what I did.

I grew up in Nairobi, which is the capital of Kenya, so it's hustle and bustle, and there's always something going on.

There's always a sense of newness with acting, because every role, you come to every role fresh.

What's becoming very obvious to me is that fashion is art.

Personally, I don't ever want to depend on makeup to feel beautiful.

I never, in my wildest dreams, could I have thought that the first role I get out of school would lead to an Oscar nomination.

Growing up, I had really bad skin. I had a skin disorder. Yes, I did. And my mother went to great lengths to try to find something to remedy it. I remember she took a trip to Madagascar and came back with all these alternative, medicinal herbs and stuff. They didn't smell so good, but I think they worked some magic.

I give myself homework when I have an audition. I give myself goals, and that's how I check how I'm doing. It can be something simple like 'listen,' or 'find your feet.' And then afterward it's an assessment, so in a way it's not about booking the job or not. It's about what I learned as an actor about that character.

Part of being an artist is that you are always concerned you don't have what it takes. It keeps us honest.

Slavery is something that is all too often swept under the carpet.

My mother talked about the stories I used to spin as a child of three, before I started school. I would tell this story about what school I went to and what uniform I wore and who I talked to at lunchtime and what I ate, and my mother was like, 'This girl does not even go to school.'

I discovered that joy is not the negation of pain, but rather acknowledging the presence of pain and feeling happiness in spite of it.

I am thrilled beyond words that The Academy has recognized my performance in Steve McQueen's '12 Years a Slave,' and I am deeply proud to be in the company of my fellow nominees.

I feel privileged that people are looking up to me, and perhaps a dream will be born because of my presence.

We, as human beings, have the capacity for extreme cruelty.

As human beings, what makes us able to empathize with people is a connection that is not necessarily understood mentally.

I have the opportunity to learn about the fashion world, and I appreciate it as an art form... But I never want it to take over my acting.

One of the reasons why I went to the Yale School of Drama is because I felt that I was acting off of instinct, but sometimes that is not reliable. When you're not feeling it, what do you do? So, going to grad school was about getting the tools to just use my instrument to the best of my ability.

I was raised in Kenya, and I always wanted to be an actor from when I was really, really little, but the first time I thought it was something that I could make a career of was when I watched 'The Color Purple.' I think I was nine, maybe, and I saw people that looked like me - Whoopi Goldberg and Oprah.

I grew up in the limelight and being the child of someone famous. So my relationship with fame is not bedazzled.

My father used to act in high school. He was in a production of 'Othello;' I don't know who he played, but it wasn't Othello. He would talk about it, though, and read Shakespeare to me.

My conscious life has all been in Kenya, and it's my point of reference. But going back to Mexico was very formative.

I grew up in a world where the majority of people were black, so that wasn't the defining quality of anyone. When you're describing someone, you don't start out with 'he's black, he's white.'

I always envisioned working in film and in theater. Theater and film are not, they're not in any way substitutable. What I love about theater is so different from what I love about film, and I enjoy the craft of both.

I went to an all-boys high school, and they accepted girls in only the two A.P. classes.

My parents gave me a Mexican name. In our culture, we are named after the events of the day.

I'm still trying to get over the fact that my name is being mentioned with people like Brad Pitt.

I thrive on structure. I find my freedom in structure.

I was born in Mexico because my father was teaching at a school in Mexico City. I was born during the third year he was there. And when I was 16, I returned to Mexico to learn Spanish.

Being a part of '12 Years a Slave' has been one of the most profound experiences of my life.

Every single laundromat, grocery store, everything is called 'Lupita' in Mexico.

I spent some time back in Mexico at 16 because my parents thought it would be prudent for me to learn Spanish, because I held a Mexican passport.

There is something about acting that's mysterious and magical because there is only so much I can do to prepare, and then I have to just let go and breathe and believe that it will come through.

Ralph Fiennes was a pivotal influence on me. He asked me, 'So what is it you want to do?' I very shyly, timidly admitted that I wanted to be an actor. He sighed, and he said, 'Lupita, only be an actor if you feel there is nothing else in the world you want to do - only do it if you feel you cannot live without acting.'

I've loved the opportunity to learn about the fashion world and appreciate it as an art form, and I look forward to my continued education, but I never want it to take over my acting.

I learned at Yale, one of the biggest lessons was to learn how special I am and therefore how totally unspecial I am. I was special among everyone else who was special. The fact that we're all so individual and that's what makes us special.

I love filmmaking, but I decided to go to drama school because I thought that when I'm 60 and looking back on my life, if acting hadn't been a part of it, I would hate myself.

I had moved back to Kenya after undergrad, and I went through this crisis of, 'What is my life going to be about?'

I loved make-believe. I was the child in the cupboard playing with my Barbies.

Slavery is something that is all too often swept under the carpet. The shame doesn't even belong to us, but we still experience it because we're a part of the African race. If it happened to one, it happened to all. We carry that burden.

I want to be uncomfortable - acting is uncomfortable.

The set of '12 Years a Slave' was an extremely joyous one! We all recognized that we were making a powerful, necessary and beautiful film, and we weren't about doing it without that sense of responsibility, and we recognized that we needed each other to tell this story. We also knew we needed to hold each other up as we told the story.

I never understood who all those people are behind the actors! When you see them on the red carpet on TV, you go, 'Why does that person need such a large entourage?' And then you realize that every single person there has a role to play.

All throughout filming '12 Years a Slave,' there was a focus like no other. Everyone took ownership of this film and gave their all.

The Hollywood Film Awards were really stressful. It was the biggest press line I'd ever seen.

The first time I cut all my hair off was when I was 19. I just got fed up going to the salon every week. I'd had enough! On a whim, it was off. It's low-maintenance.

No matter where you're from, your dreams are valid.

You can't eat beauty, it doesn't sustain you. What is fundamentally beautiful is compassion, for yourself and those around you. That kind of beauty inflamed the heart and merchants the soul.

What I will say is that what I have learned for myself is that I don’t have to be anybody else; and that myself is good enough; and that when I am being true to that self, then I can avail myself to extraordinary thingsYou have to allow for the impossible to be possible.

What I've learned from myself is that I don't have to be anybody else. Myself is good enough.

You fail, and then what? Life goes on. It's only when you risk failure that you discover things.

I realized that beauty was not a thing that I could acquire or consume, it was something that I just had to be.

You have to allow for the impossible to be possible.

What is fundamentally beautiful is compassion: for yourself and for those around you.

When I was younger, I was almost too afraid to admit that I wanted to be an actor. I didn't know any successful actors in Kenya, so I felt like I could get away with going to college to study film more easily than I could with saying, 'I want to be an actor.' That's what I did.

I think it's a real gift to be faced with man's potential for extreme cruelty but also man's resilience and the fact that love really does conquer everything. It's the only answer to these kinds of atrocities and it's not a passive thing.

Everyone said, ‘Brace yourself, Lupita! Keep a granola bar in that clutch of yours!’ I didn’t really understand what they meant, and it was only once it was past that I realized that my body had been holding on by a thread to get through this very intense experience. Nothing can prepare you for awards season. The red carpet feels like a war zone, except you cannot fly or fight; you just have to stand there and take it.

There is no shame in black beauty,

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.

You can’t eat beauty. It doesn’t feed you.

Seek perfection, and find joy in never attaining it.

I feel privileged that people are looking up to me and perhaps a dream will be born because of my presence,

I've worked hard to feel beautiful in my natural skin. Personally, I don't ever want to depend on makeup to feel beautiful.

And my one prayer to God, the miracle worker, was that I would wake up lighter-skinned,

As actors, you become an expert at starting over.

As human beings, it is our nature to dream about the future, but there is no future without a healthy nature. It's the common denominator that we all depend on, not just to live but to be happy. That's why we owe it to each other to make sure nature stays healthy.

It doesn't escape me for one moment that so much joy in my life is thanks to so much pain in someone else's.

Human beings have an instinct for freedom.

It's in understanding yourself deeply that you can lend yourself to another person's circumstances and another person's experience.

Whoopi Goldberg looked like me, she had hair like mine, she was dark like me. I'd been starved for images of myself. I'd grown up watching a lot of American TV.

Being called gorgeous is not a bad thing! But at the same time, I don’t want to thrive on people’s opinions of me.

I had this vivid image of myself at the age of 60 looking back on my life and truly regretting the fact that I hadn't tried to be an actor

I like to wear things, I don't like things to wear me.

I do my best work when I feel conviction to say something through the character I play. Always I want to have integrity and not compromise that.

Even in my dreams of being an actor, my dream was not in the celebrity. My dream was in the work that I wanted to do.

I grew up watching foreign programs - American, English, Mexican, and very little Kenyan. 'The Color Purple' was the first time I saw people who looked like me.

Makeup isn't something I've worn a lot of in my life.

It's great to have something to dress up for. You know, I spent three years in slacks at drama school, so now I like putting a dress on.

Steve McQueen is a genius. And I think that word is overused, but I think with Steve it's rightly used. He's a genius.

I'm interested in generating work for myself. I have trouble with this waiting-for-the-phone-to-ring lifestyle, especially after drama school, which was so creatively fulfilling.

I can speak of actors that I love. I love Cate Blanchett, Viola Davis, her tenacity. I love Charlize Theron. She's so surprising and so exhilarating, the kinds of projects she takes on. Marion Cotillard as well.

My immediate family was always very supportive. It was my own fear of the rest of the world not accepting me, the rest of our society not accepting my wish to be an actor.

The muscles you flex in theater are muscles that you really need. I must always find a way to get back there. It's irreplaceable.

I always love to learn new things. That's the reason I like being an actor.

I'm pretty awesome at making salad dressings.

I would love to have a career that's governed by the material; I always want to be part of stories that I feel are worthwhile.

To this day, I love eating steak tacos before going to the red carpets.

Drama is my sweet spot, but the thing about being an actor is that you want to do a variety of things. I definitely love fantasy and would want to be in a fantasy project.

I come from a loving, supportive family, and my mother taught me that there are more valuable ways to achieve beauty than just through your external features. She was focused on compassion and respect, and those are the things that ended up translating to me as beauty. Beautiful people have many advantages, but so do friendly people...I think beauty is an expression of love.

[My mother] always said I was beautiful and I finally believed her at some point.

Happiness is the most important thing.

I definitely intend to create my own work in the future so that we don't have to keep saying we don't have work for black women. But right now I don't know what's next. I hope that there are more opportunities to come my way.