*While speaking about his film “Queen of Katwe” with Lupita Nyong’o, actor David Oyelowo recalled the dark side of life as a young man living in Nigeria, Page Six notes.
“I lived in Nigeria from 6 to 13. I know about poverty and the dark side of life. Making ‘The Last King of Scotland’ was my last time in Africa. I learned prejudice is the unknown. Born of fear. This movie shows we are more alike than different.”
Sitting in producer Barbara Broccoli’s home, he remembered: “There, I was not [in] the minority. But self-awareness, born of opportunity, creates confidence. I never thought with Nigerian descent I’d be a big name. It was not what I anticipated. Growing up in England, your aspiration is just to do theater.You figure you’ll maybe be Judi Dench. But I trained. Worked hard. Used self-belief.”
He added, “Opportunity. My big moment was [in] Stratford-upon-Avon doing ‘Henry VI,’ then in London a TV show. I’d outwork anyone. Directors respond when others believe in you.”
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On “Queen of Katwe,” he said: “In Uganda, Katwe is an impoverished slum. A 10-year-old girl rising up to become somebody is the protagonist. If we’d had a male director instead of Mira Nair, it would have a different perspective. Probably a male protagonist. When I read the script, I wanted to write a love letter to my daughter Zoe — I have four children — and I want to tell her if she works hard, she can achieve everything. When she gets to her teenage years, and by then hates me, she can read this.”
Oyelowo recently talked to Radio Times about racial diversity in Hollywood, and singled out the hit HBO fantasy-drama series “Game of Thrones” as an example of a show that’s lacking.
“The fact that they put any ethnic minorities in that means that there should be space for bigger characters. Because you’re not just saying ‘OK this is purely a white world, and here are very story-driven reasons why that’s the case…You are interspersing people of colour into it,” he said. “And so therefore it’s a conscious decision to put them on the margins, as opposed to put them front and centre. Even if for whatever reason, it’s a world in which people of colour in those stories are subservient, or they are more in a helper role, that doesn’t mean they can’t have prominent storylines. All you have to do is shift the focus to focus on those characters.”
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