The bae Lupita Nyong’o and bae Danai Gurira are working together to make some epic #BlackGirlMagic. Lupita is staring in the Broadway play entitled “Eclipsed” written by playwright Danai. (We’ll allow you to pause to collect yourselves here…) The play, which tells the story of the difficult choices that many Liberian girls have to make when they becomes a woman, is Lupita’s Broadway debut and has already garnered rave reviews. “Eclipsed” also is the first Broadway play that is both performed and directed by black women. See a preview of “Eclipsed” its brief run at the Windybrow Centre for the Performance in 2010 below.
In Lupita fashion of keeping us on our toes with her Instagram posts, the Oscar winner shared a color coded list of of things to know about the play before seeing it as well as how excited and grateful she is to be performing Eclipsed on Broadway.
- This is my Broadway debut! Such a thrill. I can’t believe it.
- We are the first play on Broadway to be written, directed and performed by ALL women. Making history!
- Liberia is a country on the West African coast that was founded by freed and free-born African-Americans, and was thus a colony of the United States!
- The play takes place during the Second Liberian Civil War when the Women’s Peace Movement helped bring an end to the war in 2003 through nonviolence movements, including a sex strike.
- Leymah Gbowee, one of the members of the initiative won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2011!
- I first played my character as an understudy in Drama School. I never went on, and I promised myself back then that I would play “The Girl” someday, somehow, somewhere and it’s mindblowing to get to do it on Broadway.
- The Liberian constitution and flag were modeled after the United States’. The flag contains one star. This is why Liberia is called Africa’s Lone Star state.
- Liberia is Africa’s oldest republic. The capital city is Monrovia, named after American President James Monroe.
- Being in the play is an emotionally intense experience for me, and it means a lot to me to see your bright faces afterwards at the stage door each night. Thank you!
- Some of the countries represented in our cast and crew are: Kenya, Liberia, Haiti, Sierra Leone, Ghana, USA, Zimbabwe, South Africa & Philippines.
- Before the curtain goes up, you can typically find me knitting backstage. It helps calm the nerves!
- The play opens today, March 6th! AAAH!! Visit eclipsedbroadway.com to get tickets. See you there!
