Lupita Nyong'o's Odyssey casting exposes the enduring face of racial prejudice

Actress Lupita Nyong'o arrives at the New York Premiere of 'The Odyssey' held at AMC Lincoln Square 13 on July 14, 2026 in Manhattan. [AFP]

This week we take a break from Kenya’s eerily predictable politics to an important “going on” that should be permeating Kenyan discourse with more fervour than it currently is.

It involves the controversy arising from the casting by Christopher Nolan of our very own Oscar-winning Lupita Nyong’o as Helen of Troy in the epic movie, The Odyssey. Lupita’s casting has ignited a global firestorm and unveiled the reality of racial prejudice that still reigns in the 21st century.

The controversy erupted almost immediately after Lupita’s role was confirmed. At its core, the backlash hinges on a simple but revealing premise: that the “most beautiful woman in the world” cannot be Black. Critics, led by South African-born tech billionaire Elon Musk, have argued that casting a Black actress as Helen, a figure traditionally depicted as white in Western art, is “historically inaccurate” and a capitulation to “DEI lies”.

Other commentators declared that Nolan had “grossly insulted the Greek people” and accused the director of being an “anti-White racist”. Some American conservative commentators have gone further, claiming that “not one person on the planet actually thinks that Lupita Nyong’o is ‘the most beautiful woman in the world’”.

Greek director Yannis Smaragdis has suggested that Nolan’s choice was a cynical Oscar grab. He also alleged that casting Lupita constituted “a hostile act and a deception of the Greek people”, a claim that underscores how deeply racialised the debate has become.

The arguments against Lupita’s casting are revealing in the way they expose modern racial attitudes. While detractors contend that Homer’s varied descriptions of Helen is definitive proof of her whiteness, scholars have long appreciated that racism has not always defined human societies but is a product reinforced by more recent events, particularly the slave trade.

Ancient Greeks would never have judged someone on skin colour, they lived in a world that was far more diverse than contemporary imagination allows. In Kenya the backlash has been unsurprisingly muted, probably submerged by politics,  especially with Prof Anyang' Nyong'o being the face of President William Ruto’s Vision 2060. But where it emerges, it is mixture of both pride and dismay.

Lupita’s loyal fanbase is disappointed that what should have been a celebration of an African star landing a major Hollywood role has instead become a debate about who represents beauty. Lupita herself has responded with remarkable grace. “This is a mythological story,” she told Elle magazine. “Our cast is representative of the world”. When asked about the obsession with Helen’s beauty, she was her characteristic self: “You can’t perform beauty. I want to know who a character is. What is beyond looks?” She has refused to engage defensively, noting that the criticism will exist whether she engages with it or not.

What makes this controversy so damning is its asymmetry. When white actors are “whitewashed” into non-white roles, from Scarlett Johansson in Ghost in the Shell, Angelina Jolie in A Mighty Heart, to numerous depictions of ancient Egyptians, it is rarely met with the same ferocious outcry. Yet when a Black actress is cast in a role traditionally imagined as white, it is framed as an assault on Western civilisation.

As one columnist observed, “The same logic that scrubs people of colour from ancient epics is the logic that scrubs us from American history”. It is the logic that has made Hollywood refuse to tell heroic stories of persons of colour.

The outrage is therefore not really about Homer; it is about who gets to embody beauty and heroism, who gets to claim cultural heritage, and who belongs in the stories we tell about ourselves. Despite becoming a box office hit and surpassing $650 million in revenue, The  Odyssey controversy has not faded.

This must not be seen in isolation. It is part of a broader pattern of resistance to diversity in storytelling, a refusal to acknowledge that myths belong to humanity, not to any single race or culture. The condemnation and occasional slights lunged against Lupita tell us far more about the prejudices of the present than about the stories of the past. We however live in hope for a more enlightened tomorrow. After this dose on racism in the arts, we will revert to politics and the law next week.