Playing Glinda the Good Witch in the official Wicked movie was Ariana Grande’s lifelong dream because of her lasting love for musical theater, which started at a very young age. Since her casting was announced, she has received mounds of attention and praise for landing her dream role and reclaiming herself as an actress after many years. However, her co-star Cynthia Erivo, who plays the green witch named Elphaba, seems to be attempting to claim more of the spotlight for herself.
A recent TikTok video went viral for showing an edit someone made of the official Wicked movie poster, declaring that it was not close enough to the original Broadway poster so they decided to tweak it to appear more accurate. This went viral on social media, and once it got to Cynthia Erivo, she began expressing her disgust and disapproval. In the movie poster, her character’s eyes looked directly at the camera. Still, in the edit, her eyes were covered because it was more accurate than the original Broadway poster. Cynthia then proceeded to rant on social media about how insanely disrespectful it was to cover her eyes. On Instagram, she stated, “This is the wildest, most offensive thing I have ever seen,” and “Our poster is an homage, not an imitation; to edit my face and hide my eyes is to erase me. And that is just deeply hurtful.” The reaction to Erivo’s anger was not what she hoped for. Many people came forward, calling her dramatic and saying that she was overreacting. If she is playing the role of a witch in a movie remake of a Broadway play, why is she so worried if someone wants to make the poster look more like the original? A Wicked fan page also created this edit, which was only created out of admiration and excitement for the movie to release, not to offend anyone. Many spectators of this situation online have claimed this attitude could possibly be out of insecurity on Cynthia’s behalf. It could be possible that Cynthia wanted more attention on herself now since she is just as much a part of the movie as Ariana is but hasn’t received the same recognition.
When Ariana Grande was interviewed about her opinion on the poster, she took a respectful and neutral stance. “I think it’s very complicated because I find AI so conflicting and troublesome at times but I think it’s just such a massive adjustment period. It’s so much bigger than us… But I have so much respect for my sister Cynthia.” This shows how she attempts to stay to herself and not speak negatively about an innocent fan’s hard work in making this movie poster edit.
On top of this, social media users are speculating and speaking on old comments Cynthia has made that make her seem like “a mean girl”. For one, when she and Ariana sat down for an interview with the New York Times, she revealed that she was “relieved” that Ariana was cast for the role of Glinda. This seems like praise to Ariana at first, until she followed it up with, “Because it was not the two ladies I auditioned with.” Her choice of words caused many heads to turn, and even during the interview, Grande nervously laughed and said “Oh my gosh!”, seeming to feel awkward and caught off guard. It has also come out that Renee Rapp, Amanda Seyfried, and Dove Cameron were all in the running to play Glinda before Ariana was chosen. So, it was pretty apparent that Cynthia was referring to one of them, even though they are all deeply loved in Hollywood and the acting industry. This is incredibly disappointing because Cynthia saw for herself how much time and effort went into auditioning for this role, so just to turn around and say she was “relieved” they didn’t get the role, they just didn’t sit right with many people.
After over a year of backlash and hate surrounding Ariana Grande and this movie, she is now beginning to redeem herself by her mature and unproblematic responses. This could be why Cynthia Erivo is acting out in such ways. Fans of the movie conclude that this could be the restart of Ariana Grande’s career and the downfall of Cynthia’s. It will be interesting to see if Cynthia realizes her mistakes now that everyone else has, or if this will progress into being hated in Hollywood.
