How would you feel if you told someone that something was offensive to you and they mocked and dismissed you?
That happened with “Wicked” star Cynthia Erivo after she commented on fan art of a poster that was edited to look more like the Broadway playbill.
“Wicked” is an iconic Broadway play for theater fans. The live-action film is set to be released in theaters on Nov. 22. Fans have been obsessed with it from the start and have continued to excitedly produce well-intentioned fan art of the play and film. One fan art caught the attention of Cynthia Erivo, the actress playing Elphaba in the film, but not in a good way.
The Situation
Erivo wrote a response posted on her Instagram stories detailing why the fan-edited poster was hurtful to her. In an eloquently written post, she wrote:
“This is the wildest, most offensive thing I have seen, equal to that awful AI of us fighting, equal to people posing the question ‘is your ***** green.’ None of this is funny. None of it is cute. It degrades me. It degrades us. The original poster is an ILLUSTRATION. I am a real life human being, who chose to look right down the barrel of the camera to you, the viewer … because, without words we communicate with our eyes. 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 original creator of the fan-edited poster has responded to Erivo’s comments by reposting their formerly-deleted poster with the caption:
“Ok so I’ve decided to repost this–the last few days have been wild and have helped me realize that the initial reaction was largely overblown. This is, and always was, an innocent fan edit to pay homage to the original Broadway poster, and there’s nothing wrong with that!”
While the original intentions of the poster were pure, Erivo’s points fell on deaf ears. Comments and videos of fans mocking Erivo’s reaction, or “overreaction,” have been circulating on social media.
One of Many Offenses
The mocking nature of these fan response videos is wildly offensive, but the fans fail to see the point. Erivo’s response comes from constantly fighting to prove she belongs in the role. She received harsh criticism and rude remarks once it was announced she was cast for the iconic role. Unfortunately, these critiques and rude remarks didn’t have to do with her acting talent and vocal abilities. They had to do with her race. The point is that Black actors in Hollywood, and other actors of color, have to deal with an absurd amount of disrespectful racism from the industry and fans. The fact that fans were upset with her claiming the role of Elphaba, and edited her face out of the poster, felt like a direct attack on her identity.
Another aspect adding to this was the editing to add red lipstick to the poster. This was in addition to fans complaining about the “awful” green lipstick. While the Broadway playbill Elphaba is wearing lipstick, Erivo’s live-action Elphaba is not meant to be. The green is just the color of the character’s skin.
These small complaints and changes from fans reflect the original upset of fans not wanting her to claim the role. These microaggressions added up to make this poster to feel like an attack against her identity.
Erivo has since said, in a red-carpet interview for the 2024 CFDA Fashion Awards, that her reaction may have been a bit harsh. However, she said, “It was just a human moment of wanting to protect little Elphaba.”
