'Wakanda Forever' Star Lupita Nyong'o Says Speaking Spanish in Marvel Film 'Was a Straight Gift'
PIUS UTOMI EKPEI/AFP via Getty Lupita Nyong'o
Lupita Nyong'o was ecstatic to celebrate her heritage in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever.
The actress, who plays the multi-lingual Wakandan spy Nakia in the films, talked about the opportunity to speak Spanish in the new Black Panther movie while chatting in EW's Around the Table video series.
"I was so excited about it," the 39-year-old Oscar winner said. "It was just a straight gift. And I was very, very happy to do it… I've always wanted to work in Spanish and never in my wildest dreams did I imagine that that opportunity would come in Black Panther."
The film "represents different sides of my heritage," Nyong'o said. "Being born in Mexico and having that Mesoamerican culture represented, it's something that's very close to me."
Marvel Studios Lupita Nyong'o in Black Panther: Wakanda Forever (2022)
For Nyong'o, speaking Spanish was necessary for the story: the sequel introduces new villain Namor, the ruler of Talokan, a lost city based on Aztec Legend. This isn't the first time Nyong'o's multilingual character spoke a different language.
"I always thought that was a very cool thing from the last movie that she spoke Korean, and I always thought that had never been seen before," Nyong'o said.
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After the worldwide success of Black Panther in 2018, the close-knit cast and crew couldn't wait to return to Wakanda to film a sequel — until tragedy struck their familial foundation in 2020 when Chadwick Boseman died of colon cancer at age 43.
Nyong'o says she didn't think they could continue with a sequel until writer/director Ryan Coogler called with a new idea for the film.
"At first, right after he passed, I just could not imagine how we go back to Wakanda," she told PEOPLE recently. "And then Ryan calls me and walks me through this story that embraces the loss and is very much asking the question, 'How do you go on after you experience tragedy and deep loss?'"
RELATED VIDEO: Lupita Nyong'o Says Making Wakanda Forever Gave Cast and Crew an Outlet to Grieve and Pay Tribute to Chadwick Boseman
"When Chadwick died, we were in isolation in a way that was new to all of us. And we didn't have the opportunity to come together to process it," she explains.
"And so coming back to Wakanda was kind of that delayed moment of a community that lost him, coming back together. And so I was relieved personally that I didn't have to pretend that I wasn't going through grief and I could bring my grief to work and put it to good use. And I was actually eager to get back on set because I knew that that set would be populated with people who knew what I was going through. Who had the empathy, the sympathy, and were themselves going through it," she concluded.
Black Panther: Wakanda Forever is in theaters now.
