Half of A Yellow Sun to Premiere in Lagos and UK in April, as Adichie Hints at Working with Lupita Nyong’o on Americanah
By Oladunjoye Opeyemi
Award-winning Nigerian author, Chimamanda Adichie, has hinted at working in the future with rave of the moment, Oscar winning Kenyan actress, Lupita Nyong’o.
Adichie mentioned the collaboration will have to do with her 2013 novel, Americanah – which won the US National Books Critics Circle Award on Friday – during an interview on entertainment web-series, Arise Entertainment 360.
“I’m going to do the mysterious thing and say that Lupita might be making an announcement sometime soon – I don’t know. That announcement might be about Americanah – I don’t know,” she said.
Adichie also disclosed that Nyong’o was a very early fan of Americanah, saying: “Before she was sort of well-known like she is now, she wrote me the loveliest email; very long and passionate email about Americanah.”
The critically-acclaimed book was selected as one of the 10 Best Books of 2013 by the editors of the New York Times Book Review. Its story is about race relations in America from the point of view of a Nigerian emigrant. It also highlights the lifestyle of the new Nigerian middle-class – mostly “post-democracy returnees” from the US and the UK.
Adichie, during the interview, also talked extensively about her soon-to-be-released movie based on her novel, Half of a Yellow Sun. Noting that though the novel brought her lots of accolade and firmly placed her on the world literary stage, people around her didn’t think it was a good idea at its inception.
The novel, which won the 2007 Orange Broadband Prize for Fiction, now called the Baileys Women’s Prize for Fiction, was centred on the Nigerian Civil War – popularly called the Biafran war – which took place from 1967 to 1970.
“Because you are writing about the Biafran war, which is very much a contested part of (Nigerian) history. And which isn’t “cool.” And which at the time wasn’t Darfur. Because Darfur was kind of the sexy thing to– If you are going to do Africa, you have got to do Darfur,” she explained, also revealing that she wrote about the war in order to start a conversation on it among her generation.
“I wanted to write about it because it’s also part of my family history. My father died in a refugee camp and for me, the book has so much resonance and power. It’s not just a novel. It’s also my country’s history. I was hoping that my generation of Nigerians would start to talk about that period,” she said.
Talking about the movie adaption, the author called it a very beautiful film, praising the cinematography and acting. Shot in Calabar, Cross Rivers State, tagging the cast which includes Academy Award nominee, Chiwetel Ejiofor, Thandie Newton, Anika Noni Rose, Gloria Young, Zack Orji, Genevieve Nnaji and Onyeka Onwenu, “an ensemble cast of just fantastic acting all around”.
She also commended the movie director, Biyi Bandele, also noting that she never wrote the novel thinking that a movie would be made out of it.
“I hope it does well,” she said.
Half of A Yellow Sun, the movie, will premiere simultaneously in Lagos, Nigeria and the UK in April.
