Chris Nolan's adaptation is reaching levels of irony that were previously thought to be impossible.

That is an excerpt of an interview with Kenyan actress Lupita Nyong'o and Elle magazine, published May 21st in the Year of Our Lord 2026.

When her agents informed her that Nolan wanted to see her for a role, she admits that she 'went in quite blind.' During their meeting, he gave her the script, and she read it in one sitting. She was immediately all in. 'I mean, I was saying yes even before he told me what role it was.' Once signed on, she was excited to dive into the world of Homer. She had performed a few monologues from Greek mythology in drama school at Yale, but was unfamiliar with the source material.

'I really had no idea what The Odyssey was,' she says. 'I was like, "Oh, snap, I don't know the first thing about this.'"

• Diversity hire? ✅

• Totally unprepared for the role? ✅

• Graduated from Yale without ever encountering a book that most people study in 9th grade English class? ✅

How does one graduate with a master's in acting from Yale University without knowing what might be the foundational epic poem of Western literature? One can graduate from an Ivy League school without studying Homer?

But wait, it gets worse.

'I have this film to thank for my Greek mythological education.' And by 'picked up the books,' she really means she read The Odyssey and listened to The Iliad, and for good reason. 'Audra McDonald reads it,' she says by way of explanation, in between sips of hot lemon water. 'It is the best audiobook I have ever listened to.'

Audra McDonald is an actress who reads the 2017 feminist translation of "The Odyssey" by Emily Wilson that inserts phrases whole-cloth into the original Greek. Nolan is said to have liked her translation, but it has been panned by every respectable historian, dramatist, and linguist on the planet. Wilson portrays Odysseus, the hero, as "problematic," following the modern theme of painting the male heroes of film and literature as sad, broken, and bitter (Luke Skywalker, Indiana Jones, etc.).

Here's Wilson explaining how she took "misogyny" out of her translation and made sure to include "intersectional" (Marxist) analysis to smooth out "gender inequalities":

As for Nyong'o, she addressed her "racist" critics by saying it's a work of fiction, so who cares:

After her casting was announced, Nyong'o faced racist critiques about the decision to cast her as a Greek character. But, she reminds those who may have forgotten, 'this is a mythological story.'

Fair enough, but why does it only seem to work one way?

If the rules are made up and the points don't matter, why can't we cast a white actor in a black role? Why are we told that "representation matters," but only for certain traits?

And why is it essential that every fictional character, including animated toys, have "black" versions?

Nyong'o had this to say about Nolan's version of the Greek poem:

We're occupying the epic narrative of our time.

Are we?