Lupita Nyong’o is riding that Black Panther wave into a number of new projects, and her latest one is majorly exciting.
Nyong’o will be joining Viola Davis for The Woman King, a story inspired by true events set in the Kingdom of Dahomey, one of the most powerful status of Africa in the 18th and 19th centuries. Davis will play Nanisca, an Amazon general, who fights alongside her daughter, Nawi (played by Nyong’o) against the invading French and other tribes who “violated their honor, enslaved their people, and threatened to destroy everything they’ve lived for,” per The Hollywood Reporter.
“The Woman King is the powerful true story of an extraordinary mother-daughter relationship,” said Hannah Minghella, president of TriStar, the film studio that picked up the worldwide rights to the project. “And there’s no one more extraordinary than Viola Davis and Lupita Nyong’o to bring them to life.”
Davis, who is currently a star on ABC’s How to Get Away With Murder, will also have a role in Steve McQueen’s upcoming crime thriller, Windows.
Nyong’o currently can be seen in theaters as Nakia in Black Panther, but she has a couple other roles besides The Woman King coming up. She is set to appear in the zombie comedyLittle Monsters, and also made headlines last week when she revealed she will be playing Trevor Noah’s mother in the adaptation of his memoir,Born a Crime.
Nyong’o will also join her Black Panther co-star Danai Gurira in producing a TV miniseries adaptation of Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s Americannah, a novel about two “star crossed lovers torn apart when they immigrate to the West from Nigeria,” as the A.V. Club describes it. Nyong’o will star in the miniseries and Gurira will write.
Nyong’o has also reportedly been in talks to star in a Charlie’s Angels reboot alongside Kristen Stewart.
