Lupita Nyong’o says she attempted to eliminate her Kenyan accent

Lupita Nyong’o has had trouble with her speech for many years.

The 41-year-old actor, whose big break came when she played abused plantation worker Patsey in Sir Steve McQueen’s “12 Years a Slave” movie, was born in Mexico and mostly grew up in Nairobi, Kenya. She has lived in the US for the past 20 years.

She talked about having a “complicated relationship” with her voice all her life in the first episode of her new podcast, “Mind Your Own.” She also said, “In order to make this podcast, I had to get very comfortable with my voice.”

“I promised myself that I would learn how to sound American in a way that would help me get a job as an actress, since I didn’t see many people in movies and TV shows with Kenyan accents.”

“That wasn’t something people wanted.”

Her publicists told her, “I’ve decided that from tomorrow I am going to return to my original accent.” This was before she started the press tour for “12 Years a Slave,” which came out in 2013. I want to say, “It’s enough to be African.”

“They had never heard me speak with a Kenyan accent,” she said.

She also said that her mother supported her choice, saying, “Your accent shows what you’ve been through in life.”

“That made me feel better—that an accent comes from your life…” It can change, just like hair and skin, and that’s fine.

She was excited about her voice and said, “I guess this accent is called Lupita!” No one else could claim it but me.

Lupita recently said that she wanted to try different types of parts by doing comedies.