Lupita Nyong’o Discusses Painful Role In “12 Years A Slave“

In preparing for her first film role as a petite, hard-laboring slave in “12 Years a Slave,“ actress Lupita Nyong’o sized herself up against 500 pounds of cotton, which her character Patsey picked every day. The film itself is considered a heavyweight Oscar contender, having won widespread praise for its brutal depiction of pre-Civil War American slavery. “12 Years a Slave“ is based on the 1853 memoir of Solomon Northup, a free black man tricked and sold into slavery who cannot fathom the hell he has