Lupita Nyong'o used to pray to be lighter skinned...

Lupita Nyong’o might be the new face of dark-skinned beauty, but the 12 Years a Slave star says she wasn't so confident about her skin tone growing up. 

She told the press at yesterday's (Thursday) Essence Black Women in Hollywood Luncheon, “I got teased and taunted about my skin. My one prayer to God was that I would wake up lighter skinned.The morning would come and I would be so excited about seeing my new skin that I would refuse to look down at myself until I was in front of the mirror because I wanted to see my face first. Every day I would feel the disappointment of being just as dark as the day before.”

Lupita added that seeing supermodel Alex Wek changed how she felt about herself. “She was dark as night and was in all the magazines and on runways. I couldn’t believe that people were embracing a woman who looked so much like me as beautiful. It was perplexing and I wanted to reject it because I had begun to enjoy the seduction of inadequacy. But a flower couldn’t help but bloom inside of me.”