Oscar winnerLupita Nyong’ois no stranger to thehorrorgenre. After winning the Academy Award for Best Performance by an Actress in a Supporting Role for12 Years a Slave,at the 2014 ceremony, Nyong’o would go on to star in the horror comedyLittle Monstersand Jordan Peele’s follow-up toGet Out,which is titledUs. And theStar Warsand MCU alumna says, “I found myself coming again and again to horror.“Nyong’o elaborated in an interview withVarietyat the premiere of her latest film,A Quiet Place: Day One.Nyong’o said:
“This genre helps us exercise emotions that we are otherwise running away froma lot of the time. We don’t get permission to be openly scared in our real life.I found myself coming again and again to horrorbecause of the roles that have been offered to me there.There is a heightened nature to horror that makes for a really interesting character to explore.”
A Quiet Place: Day One
A Quiet Place: Day One is a spin-off of the A Quiet Place franchise conceived by John Krasinski. The film is set at the beginning of the invasion as humanity scrambles to survive, before the events of the original film, with Lupita Nyong’O leading the cast, directed by Michael Sarnoski.
Even before Nyong’o was starring in horror films like Jordan Peele’sUsand her new project,A Quiet Place: Day One, the future actress was “traumatized” at a very young age by Tobe Hooper and Steven Spielberg’s collaboration onPoltergeist(1982). Nyong’o said in a separate interview withEntertainment Weekly:
[I saw Poltergeist] way earlier than I should have. That traumatized me, but it also planted this kind of maniacal seed in me. I really love scaring people. I think it’s a powerful thing to be able to do.
Lupita Nyong’o Discusses Michael Sarnoski’s ‘Pig Touch’
A Quiet Place: Day One’stheatrical run begins with $6.8 million from its preview screenings on Thursday. John Krasinski, who created the silent yet lucrative franchise, stepped aside as director forDay Oneand brought inMichael Sarnoski to provide his “Pig Touch”to the new horror flick. And Lupita Nyong’o addressed her interpretation of Sarnoski’s so-called “Pig Touch” in the same interview with EW:
“The Pig touch for me would be that Michael [Sarnoski] has this way of telling an intense and severe story with tenderness.And there’s a purity of spirit at the core of his stories that is compelling and relatable.He also really loves to have animals in his movies and make them do impossible things.And I love that at the heart of both his films, there’s a simple mission.In Pig, it’s, ‘Get my pig back!’ And in A Quiet Place: Day One, it’s, ‘Get some pizza!’”
A Quiet Place: Day One Director Shines Light on Djimon Hounsou’s Mysterious Character
Director Michael Sarnoski says Day One will reveal more about Djimon Hounsou’s character from A Quiet Place Part II, including his name.
WhileA Quiet Place: Day One’sRotten Tomatoes scoreof 84%, at the time of this writing, doesn’t live up to the numbers the original film (96%) and the first sequel (91%) posted, the Nyong’o-led disaster movie is still eyeing a $40+ million opening weekend domestically. However,Inside Out 2is forecast to walk away with the No. 1 spot at the box office for the third weekend in a row.
A Quiet Place: Day Oneis now playing exclusively in theaters.
