Lupita Nyong'o Says Entertainment Industry 'Exploded Into My Life'

(Mikael Jansson for Vogue)

In just a year, Lupita Nyong’o has become Hollywood’s golden girl.

The 31-year-old, who just landed on the cover of Vogue for the July issue of the high-profile magazine, said it’s been a surreal year since she wowed every one as a tormented slave girl, Patsey, in “12 Years A Slave.”

“It just feels like the entertainment industry exploded into my life,” she told Vogue. “People who seemed so distant all of a sudden were right in front of me and recognizing me – before I recognized them!”

The Mexican-born Kenyan won an Academy Award for her role. She said the experience was “very confusing, very numbing.”

“I had already gotten the nomination, which was truly, truly astounding and enough,” Nyong’o said. “Even in my dreams of being an actor, my dream was not in celebrity. My dream was in the work that I wanted to do.”

As for her award-winning role in “12 Years A Slave,” the actress said she was really nervous seeing herself in the film because it was such a “profound experience.”

“I remember it being one of the most joyful times in my life – and also one of the most sorrowful,” she told Vogue. “I didn’t want my experience to be a vain one. But I will say that when I watched it, my heartstrings were pulled so tight for Solomon that I couldn’t go into the ego trip. I cried – I mean, I was inconsolable. I wept for an hour after the movie.”

Nyong’o has since been named People’s Most Beautiful woman and was cast alongside Oscar Isaac, Adam Driver and Gwendoline Christie in J.J. Abrams’ “Star Wars: Episode VII.”

“It’s a wonderful opportunity to be working in these fantastical realms,” she said. “They are worlds away from ’12 Years a Slave,’ that’s for sure – but that kind of diversity is what dreams are made of.”

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