A poster of Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo for the upcoming film adaptation of hit Broadway musical Wicked was met with mixed reactions
Ariana Grande has addressed the ‘troublesome’ fan edit of the Wicked poster which co-star Cynthia Erivo found ‘deeply hurtful’.
The highly anticipated film adaption of the hit Broadway musical is coming out in two parts, with the first set for release next month. It stars Ariana Grande as Glinda – previously Ga-linda, if you know, you know – and Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba.
Paying homage to the poster for the original musical, the film released its own version featuring Grande and Erivo, however, some fans weren’t best pleased, even going so far as to digitally alter the image to be more in line with what they imagined.
Some fans criticized the poster for the brim of Elphaba’s hat not being as true to the original Broadway image as it could’ve been and edited it so there was more of a shadow falling over Erivo’s face – alongside adding some red lipstick too.
And it didn’t take long for Erivo to take to social media to address the change.
She said: “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 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.”
And Grande has since weighed in on the edited version of the poster too.
Fans took to X to ‘fix’ the poster (X)
On Saturday (October 19), while at the Academy Museum Gala in Los Angeles, Grande told Variety she thinks it’s all ‘very complicated’.
She continued: “Because I find AI so conflicting and troublesome sometimes, but I think it’s just kind of such a massive adjustment period.
“This is something that is so much bigger than us, and the fans are gonna have fun and make their edits.”
The singer agreed she ‘think[s]’ things can go too far.
Grande resolved: “And I have so much respect for my sister, Cynthia, and I love her so much. It’s just a big adjustment period. It’s so much stimulation about something that’s so much bigger than us.”
