ON LAUNCHING 1000 SHIPS AND BURNING TOPLESS TOWERS PART 1

NADIRA GOFFE PUTS IT SUCCINCTLY in her movie review, “What Did Helen of Troy Look Like? That’s the Wrong Question to Ask,” Slate, July 17, 2026: “Lupita Nyong’o plays the Spartan queen in Christopher Nolan’s The Odyssey. The worst kind of people are furious over it.” 

Well put, Nadira. 

Here, in Parts 1 and 2 today and tomorrow, are tidbits about this gleaned from several sources as well as my own Internet sleuthing (including some self-reflection). 

The Trojan War and Ever-Simmering Culture Wars. Nadira Goffe observes, “The Odyssey premieres this week, but even before it hits screens nationwide, the film—something of an epic itself, given its nearly three-hour runtime—has already broken the record for the highest IMAX ticket presales of all time. Simultaneously, a more sinister wave has threatened to capsize discussion of the movie, going back to when a casting announcement reignited—what else—the ever-simmering culture wars.”

Race-bending Casting. Goffe continues, “At this point, it’s par for the course for race-bending casting to be a way for a small, but vocal, contingent of the far right to prematurely discredit diverse films and television. This remains true with Nolan’s vision of The Odyssey, which includes the Kenyan Mexican actress Lupita Nyong’o as Helen of Troy (and her twin sister, Clytemnestra), a figure of beauty so immense, her face famously launched 1,000 ships and started the 10-year Trojan War.”

“The popular contemporary imagining of Helen,” Goffe observes, “is as a blond white woman, like Diane Kruger’s portrayal in 2004’s Troy. Nyong’o is Black. Naturally, conservative figureheads kicked up a lot of dust about this casting; technocrat Elon Musk and conservative political commentator Matt Walsh decried the decision on X, while cast of The View and Nolan himself rallied behind Nyong’o.” The film also casts transgender actor/LBGTQ activist Elliot Page in the role of a Greek soldier.

Wouldn’t you know, a punky South African white kid kicking up dust?

Instead, Let’s Have An Odyssey Authority’s View. Daniel Mendelsohn is the author of An Odyssey: A Father, a Son, and an Epic.” His translation of the Odyssey was published this spring. He writes a Guest Essay in The New York Times: “Does Matt Damon Look Greek? No. So Stop Complaining About Lupita Nyong’o,” July 10, 2026.

Writes Mendelsohn, “Helen of Troy is starting wars again. But this time the legendarily beautiful, semi-divine queen of myth, whose adulterous elopement with the Trojan prince Paris brought on the 10-year-long Trojan War, has launched a thousand tweets.”

Tomorrow in Part 2, Mendelsohn continues his analyses of Christopher Nolan’s blockbuster. Sappho, Orson Welles, and Eartha Kitt show up as well. ds 

© Dennis Simanaitis, SimanaitisSays.com, 2026