Filmmaker Christopher Nolan has lost all integrity, said billionaire industrialist Elon Musk after reports of actress Lupita Nyong being cast as the Helen of Troy in Nolan’s upcoming epic drama The Odyssey: A Journey Begins surfaced online.
Replying to an X post about the cast of The Odyssey, Musk wrote, “Chris Nolan has lost his integrity.”
According to US-based Entertainment news website Variety, several X users considered a Black actress’s casting “an insult” to the Greek poet Homer, who wrote The Odyssey around 700 BCE, because he originally described Helen as “fair skinned, blonde, and the face that launched a thousand ships”.
However, the makers of The Odyssey have not yet made any official announcement about Nyong’s role in the upcoming film.
The Odyssey: A Journey Begins chronicles Odysseus’s (Matt Damon) extensive journey home following the Trojan War.
The Odyssey features an ensemble cast that includes Tom Holland, Mia Goth, Zendaya, Anne Hathaway, Lupita Nyong’o, Robert Pattinson, Charlize Theron, Benny Safdie, Jon Bernthal, and John Leguizamo.
The Odyssey marks Damon’s fourth collaboration with Nolan following The Departed (2006), Interstellar (2014) and Nolan’s Academy Award-winning Oppenheimer (2023).
Nolan has directed and written the screenplay for The Odyssey in addition to serving as a producer alongside Emma Thomas under their Syncopy production company.
The film is set to hit theatres on July 17.
