8 Actors Who Were Scared Of Other Actors - Commenter Edition
3. Lupita Nyong'o Goes Method And Creeps Out Her Co-Star In Us
Who She Scared: Shahadi Wright Joseph
In Us, a family is attacked by a group of doppelgängers who come from an underground world peopled with similar creatures. One of the four duplicates, Red, was played by Lupita Nyong'o, whose "normal" character was called Adelaide Wilson.
Red speaks in a raspy and broken manner, which is hardly the only unsettling thing about her. Her companions are all similarly different from their above-ground counterparts, though they are all violent and seek to kill and replace their counterparts from the world above.
The movie takes a brilliant approach at analyzing the xenophobic fear of "the other" by anchoring that fear within ourselves. Nyong'o's portrayal of Red was particularly creepy, as she was the principal protagonist and antagonist of the film. She played the character somewhat method, which freaked out her co-star Shahadi Wright Joseph, who said the following about working with Nyong'o:
“She really kinda spooked me out a little bit. She would really get into character and wouldn’t talk. It was kind of creepy. It's a lot of fun because you never know which [Lupita] you're gonna get sometimes, which I think makes her perfect for this role because she has so many great different personalities."