Cynthia Onyedinmanasu Chinasaokwu Erivo (born 8 January 1987) is an English actress, singer, and songwriter.
She is known for her performance as Celie in the Broadway revival of The Color Purple, for which she won the 2016 Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical, the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Actress in a Musical, the Grammy Award for Best Musical Theater Album, and the Daytime Emmy Award for Outstanding Musical Performance in a Daytime Program, the latter two she shared with the rest of the cast.
Erivo ventured into films in 2018, with roles in the heist film Widows and the thriller Bad Times at the El Royale. In 2019, she portrayed abolitionist Harriet Tubman in the biopic Harriet, for which she earned nominations for an Academy Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Screen Actors Guild Award.
Cynthia Erivo has broken her silence for the first time after she hit out at fans for creating an AI poster for her new feature film Wicked with Ariana Grande, which saw her face edited from the movie's original poster - something which she deemed 'offensive'.
Fans edited the poster to make it more similar to the original poster for the theatre production of Wicked, something which Cynthia disagreed with.
And speaking out this week following the controversy, the actress insisted her response to the poster "wasn't necessarily a clapback".Talking to Entertainment Tonight, she continued: "I think I'm really protective of the role.
I'm passionate about it, and I know that the fans are passionate about it." Sign up to OK!'s daily newsletter to get updates sent to your inbox for free Describing it as "a human moment of wanting to protect" her character Elphaba, she added: "I probably should've called my friends, but it's fine." Cynthia portrays the iconic character of Elphaba in the new feature film, which is set to be released in November, while Ariana plays Glinda.The film is based on the 2003 musical Wicked, which is also a prequel to the Wizard Of Oz movie.The film's official poster was released earlier this year and saw Cynthia, as Elphaba, looking directly into the camera while Ariana - as Glinda - whispered in her ear.This is clearly an adaptation of the original poster for Wicked: The Musical, which has the characters in the same positioning.
Read more on ok.co.uk