“Cynthia Erivo Criticizes Fan Edit of ‘Wicked’ Poster: On the Controversy”

Cynthia Erivo, who plays Elphaba in the upcoming film Wicked, condemns a fan-made poster for the film that is making the rounds online.

“This is the wildest and most offensive thing I have ever seen,” Erivo wrote on her IG Stories on Oct. 16 beneath the altered artwork for the film, which depicted Erivo and Ariana Grande as their respective characters Elphaba and Glinda.

In the original version of the film’s cover, first shared by Universal on October 9, Erivo is looking straight ahead, her eyes are fully visible and her lips are green. But in the altered version shared on Erivo’s IG story, her eyes were obscured by her hat and her lip was bright red and curved upward.

Grande remained mostly untouched, aside from moving her hand further up to show less of her face.

Erivo wrote that the fan-edited version was not “cute” and “degraded” her, continuing, “I am a real human being who chose to come straight through the barrel of the camera at you, the viewer look.” . . because without words we communicate with our eyes.”

Erivo then pointed out on her IG story that the original Broadway poster that the movie poster was inspired by was “an ILLUSTRATION.”

When Wicked opened on Broadway in 2003, posters everywhere featured the illustration of Glinda whispering in Elphaba’s ear. In the picture, Elphaba’s eyes are hidden under the brim of her hat, her lips are pulled upwards in a red-lipped grin, while Glinda’s eye can be seen in side profile.

“Our poster is a tribute, not an imitation,” Erivo continued in her message. “To edit my face and hide my eyes is to erase me. And that’s just deeply hurtful.”

After viewing the fan-edited image, Erivo posted another Instagram Story featuring the film’s original artwork and wrote, “Let me put this here to remind you and cleanse your palette.” The film’s director , Jon M. Chu, re-shared Erivo’s slide of support on his own Instagram Story.

Fans appear to be divided over Erivo’s reaction to the fan-edited version of the film’s poster, with some expressing support for her reaction and explaining why it was justified.

An X user wrote, “Racism couldn’t be clearer on a young woman’s skin.”

Another wrote: “Re: the Wicked poster controversy: the optics of editing a black queer woman’s face are not great. All they did to Ariana is move her hand while they covered Cynthia’s eyes and changed her mouth.”

On the other hand, some felt that the edit was merely an homage to the original Broadway poster.

“Girl they didn’t delete you…people just wanted the new poster to have the same energy as the original Wicked poster…you know, one with her eyes covered and she’s grinning…” one person said on X.

Another wrote: “Oh my god. Tell me you’ve never seen the poster for Wicked The Broadway Musical without telling me.”