YouSaid · the spoken record

Cynthia Erivo

lines on the record: 49
first: 2025-02-10
most recent: 2025-02-10
sittings or episodes: 1
sources: podcast

Every line below is reproduced as it was said and linked to the record it came from. Nothing here is summarised or generated. Directory · Search · Corrections

“It's so interesting. I've been really astounded by how. Beautifully and succinctly, children have been able to put the themes that are in this film together. It's actually wonderful to hear it from kids because they just get it. I don't know why that surprises me, but it does because of how clear. They are every time.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Always try and like play the soft like it's like not a meaningful thing, but it would be really meaningful if it would be very exciting to be that, be the youngest person that wins an egot. And it's also like a sort of big pat on the back from people that I look up to for the work that I'm doing and hopefully sort of like a big kick up the bum to keep going and doing more You don't necessarily do this for awards. You don't. You do it because you love the work. If you just did it for the awards, that would not sustain. It would run out very quickly. But it is really special for people to think of you in that way. It is really special for those things to come because of this when it's rare. It's a nice place to be.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“No, I think it's the opposite. This is something I've been doing since I was 16 years old. And then I stopped doing it because I was afraid of what people would say. Realized how much fun it is to have them done How it also gave me three or five hours to sit and do nothing and have someone put their art on my fingers. In fact, the way it brings people in is actually really interesting. People are not afraid to hold my hand. They want to look at my fingers, which means that people have to be in your personal space”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I dress because I love it. I dress because I love clothes and I love dressing up and I love jewelry and I am a geek about how things are made and who makes it and I'll seek out random boutique designers that nobody else in the world knows. And I'll be in love with the way they make things. It just is how I am, yeah.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And I also want people to be encouraged that they can just be themselves. I think sometimes we dress because we want people to say that we look good. We dress because we want to be on the best dress list.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I dress for me. I dress for me because Clothing for me is like a love language. And that's everything from my piercings to the nails to what I put on my body to my jewelry. Everything I wear by whatever that is is because it speaks to me and who I am as a person and the style I want to express. Some people are more sedate with what they wear. I'm just not. I've been this way for a really long time. It's just people getting... It's a lot more now. And I guess I'm a rebel in that, that I just sort of, I'm not really afraid about whether or not people like it or not.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I really wanted to concentrate on the way the voice was used within the music. And that's what each of those songs has in common that the voice is really front forward.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Me. The album is sort of like born of a lot of vocal techniques. I build the pads using my own voice. I don't have an arranger. I don't use arrangements. They sort of come to me as they come to me. So I'll record a vocal name and then record a vocal line over that and record a vocal line over that. And as each line is being recorded, the next set of vocal lines will come to me. So I do it in real time. And then I've written on all of these songs. I have a couple of verses who have come in to work with me on some songs and sometimes it's just me and my producer Will Wells. I'm really excited about it. It's not a musical. It's not in the style of theatre. Although that doesn't mean that those songs couldn't be in a show. But it's sort of influenced by the type of music that I've listened to over my life, whether it be R&B or sort of brick pop or pop. And I wasn't even necessarily going for the style.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“She's not. She's not nice. But she believes that she's justified in her behavior. But I like. Core of where she comes from”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I definitely know that I want to go back to stage at some point. I just don't know how or what because following up Celie and the Color Purple is really hard. Need to find the thing that fills me just as much as that. And when I knew that the color purple was coming, I knew immediately that I'm willing to do it. So I want to find the thing that makes me feel that way again. We might not be exactly the same, but I want to be sure about the thing that I'm going to do. I want to experience more of this size of movie because it's really different to other things. But there are definitely stories that I'm looking at now that are not as big. They're much quieter, much more intimate things. It's the characters that pull me in, to be honest. It's not necessarily the... Project, it's always the character”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It who was acting in it as a character called Jacqueline, who was a refugee from Liberia but was born to a well-to-do family, political family, who was massacred. And then she escaped to Greece. And you're essentially watching her life as she tries to survive in Greece. It's sort of like a recitative on the condition of immigrants and refugees in other countries.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Put it in, there was no real music in drift. It's something I knew I wanted to write immediately. Felt like it was necessary to hear this character's thought process and story in music because it accesses the most vulnerable parts of people.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Music is completely, it's like my second language essentially. So I feel like it all goes hand in hand. I think it's always been a part of how I express and how I tell stories. And I love that somehow it sort of weaved its way into everything that I've kind of done maybe except for a TV role, Holly Divney who doesn't like music, strangely enough. But I think that using music to express and tell a story because I really do believe that music is the bit that comes after there's not enough, that the words aren't enough. So to be able to use that for me is great. I feel very privileged and very lucky to be able to access that part of myself because I do think it's a really vulnerable part, which is probably why I'm drawn to it a lot and why I keep trying to sometimes actively.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Or it's Celie who has to figure out what it means to love and is also a queer character or whether it's alphabet. I think I seek them out by accident. Those are desirable characters for me. Drawn to them because they have something to say. And I guess. I guess there's something threading about using my voice to say what they want to say, but it's also kind of saying what I want to say too.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think maybe subconsciously I'm moving towards it consistently. I think I find that the work allows me to sort of plant my flag in the sand about what I believe and the way I see our place in the world. I think I'm constantly seeking out characters who want something and who stand for more than just Nothing, you know, whether it's Aretha, who actually was an activist, and I don't know that many people even know this.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I can't lie and say that I'm not frightened for young children who are discovering who they are and trying to navigate what it is to be queer for themselves, what it is to be trans. And trying to figure out where they sit within the world. And I hope that. I hope that they seek out adults who understand what it is they might be going through because less than hiding from the world, there have to be older people, older adults that understand and have the experience that can be soft places to land. I really don't want people to hide themselves. I don't want people to hide who they are. So I don't think that actually helps. I understand. Why that is the suggestion, and I want kids to be safe, I want young teenagers to be safe, I want people to be safe. But I wonder if there is a middle ground where it is about finding.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“It's not like TV and screen. And I just was like, I don't know. One thing to be a black girl on screen, it's another to be a queer black girl in the mainstream. So I just was like, I don't know if this is going to... End this for me, but I. That I can't continue pretending. That just doesn't work. I've been in so many conversations where people were talking about their lives and, you know, how they loved. You're in theater and you're around so many people who are that way. And I was just like, why I can't pretend anymore. It's just after hear those conversations over and over and over again and you're like it's right on the tip of your tongue. You want to be like, me too and you don't. It just want to do it anymore.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, I think that's it. It just grows. And I felt myself getting almost resentful that other people could just be. Enjoy their lives as queer out people, and I was like, I want that for myself. I want to be able to talk about it when someone brings it up in a room. I want to be able to say, yeah, I'm me too. I want to be able to share in those conversations. And I wasn't, I couldn't, and I was quiet and I just was over.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“He had asked me, I call him Uncle Edward, he asked me if I wanted to share it, if I wanted to be a part of an edition, a pride edition. And I said, Yes, because I felt really safe with him. And it was the first time that I was just like, I think I'm done not being everything that I'm supposed to be because I felt like it was occupying so much space and it Like loud, and I just wanted to get rid of the noise and claim back the space a bit so I could actually just exist and be a human in the world and create more. I really felt like the more I hid something, the more I suppressed it, the less space I was using to create and be. And I wasn't truly, I felt like I wasn't being honest with myself and with other people about who I was. And I just was over it. I was done.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Yeah, I had not really talked about my queerness for such a long time. And it was so loud for me, and I was very sure of it. And I just didn't have the words and I couldn't, I've never spoken about it until Edward Enfall, who knew me very well, asked if I was.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“As I stand here in front of you, black, bald headed, pierced, and queer. I can say I know a thing or two about being the other. Story is the cautionary tale of what it can sometimes mean to have to stand in your individuality, your otherness, even when systems of oppression are set against you. It is the story of how a colorful, powerful, magical woman, despite being disparaged, demonized and discriminated against, becomes a hero. Wicked is the reclamation and the reimagining of all the labels that are used against her. It is the proclamation of her right to exist in all of her power. If that sounds familiar to you, colorful magical people in this room, it should.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Wanted that you know forefront of it. And I think it's important to keep reminding ourselves that those systems are in place if we're not mindful of it, we actually end up rewinding.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Insane, because actually it makes everyone weaker. Doing that makes everyone weaker. And I, you know, I'm sure that the opposite is to be thought of. We think that if we just, if we just ask, then it will be no, because you lose out on the thoughts of other people, on how to actually cater to an actual mass. You're actually only connecting with a small amount of people, not everybody, which is a sad lot, I think. But I don't think it will remain.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I wish we could all just get over ourselves. The word diversity simply means many different things in one place. It should be a norm. We shouldn't be discussing we need diversity because it all should just be as it is when you walk outside you see thousands and thousands of different people who aren't at the same as you. That is diversity. We're just simply wanting to see what we see in real life on our screens. There should be and in our workplaces and where we live”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I think anything that has women in the lead that is talking about difference, that is talking about people who are on the outside will always have an element of resistance in it because there's some genetic makeup of it, but more than it being resistance, I think it's a movie about humanity, which everyone can afford to see, I think, you know?”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“They loved it, and it was really special. Films can shift the way people think and feel. This movie, I think, is able to shift the way people feel and think. And there are people, and anyone who doesn't want to shift or think or feel or change the way they see things, it's just simply, I think, afraid of what it looks like on the other side if they have to look at the mirror and go, oh, maybe I've been wrong.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I don't think I was ever worried about whether I would come under attack because I actually, strange enough, I think people of all ages, from all walks of life are watching this movie. I think a person who might be wearing a MAGA cap is still watching it. In fact, I know there are people who are wearing Magacaps that have worn it. They've spoken to a person who's wearing a mag cap who definitely watched this movie and loved the movie.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And I think that the amount of times I've been told that this is the film that people need right now because there's so much hopelessness. People are so afraid. They're really, really scared about what will happen to them and their families and whether or not we're going to go back in time. Now, we do not know for sure, but I think a film like this can help us be hopeful about the fact that we are not helpless and that it takes a little bravery to change things, but things can change. We are more powerful than we allow ourselves to be even against the worst of it. I just think that this film is really important for that now.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“There's no way we could have imagined that this was what was going to happen. I mean, honestly, it took more than 20 years for it to become what it is, for it to get to the screen. And yet somehow we've managed to land right from when we're supposed to land.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“To know about the human condition, and I believe that this is what this film has the power to do. Bring people in, make people believe in magic, but also make people think about what it is to change your mind, to make a person feel like they don't belong, to ask for forgiveness and to forgive, to know what it feels like to not belong and also to see yourself in that and then maybe find ways for yourself to accept who you are so you aren't searching for other people to accept you. There is so much in this film that I think is really important for people to see.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And I think that's actually the important thing. I think part of doing this tour is to make sure that everybody understands that it's not just a chick film. It's not just for little girls. It's not just for kids, that it's actually for everyone. It is something for everyone in it. And that just because there are two women protagonists, that doesn't automatically mean that no men can understand what's going on. We don't say that of films that are mainly male and most films are mainly male. I mean, we have the Irish moment, which was quite frankly, all men, but nobody is saying this is a dude film. No, we go and we watch it because it's a good film. We go and we watch good cinema. And I think with big movies, we sort of like, we don't allow them to also be medicine too. They can also feed you things that we need.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I look at it as the tool, I think, is just to make sure that people go and see this film. I think it's an important film to see. I think it's important for everyone to see not just for women to see. And that's sort of the thing that's coming back to me. Men are saying that they've been to see this film and they are connecting with it on a level.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I don't know, it felt really guttural. You know, I mean, it felt connected. It did feel like a war cry for me. And it sort of stuck. And I know there's a feeling you get when it's right. And that's what I was looking for when it came with that.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Originally, I was doing it Bible, so I was doing what was written, which is what Adina did. And when we started to record the practice comps, Stephen Aramis and Stephen Schwartz, Said now you do your own. That's great. Thank you for doing the Bible. What's your war cry? What does your war cry sound like? And I I tried a couple and then I just sort of let go and that came out. And when it came out, when that sound came out, when those succession notes came out, it felt, it just felt right. It wasn't necessarily a sort of cerebral, thoughtful choice. It just happened. We were rehearsing, we were recording it, and I tried something. The first thing didn't quite feel right. And I tried something else that didn't quite feel right. And then I landed on this and it felt really right.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“The perimeter, the loop-de-loop, and the back flips, all of those things, whilst making sound. And all of that training sort of came beforehand before we could even get to the set. But I just was really prepared to do it, to be honest.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Didn't care how hard it was going to be because I really felt like experiencing it all helped me to understand what it actually felt like to fly and finding a way to make the sound made me feel really powerful. You have to sort of conjure up that power in other places as opposed to getting it from your diaphragm where you can have to breathe or getting it from the full lung capacity. You actually have to engage your entire body to make sound. And it means that you immediately have to make different choices than if you were just standing on the ground. And I wouldn't have changed that for the world. I knew I was up for the challenge. And that challenge kind of started when we got there because I needed to know what it was to fly in a harness that way to do those sort of big vast tricks and stunts, the flying around.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I feel like defying gravity literally, even though it has the word in it, is the ultimate defiance. It's the one time that she gets to proclaim that she is done with meeting people's expectations. She is done with listening to what people say she can and cannot do. And is deciding to take on the hardest thing. But not because of anyone else, but because she sort of realizes that the only one that can do this for her is her, the only one that she's seeking really acceptance from is herself. And I knew how physically tasking it would be. I knew that singing and flying would be difficult. But I just.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“And it wants to be filled with hope and joy and laughter and like. And funniness, and all those things that sort of start to slip away from her. And the moment you think it's not going to happen again after the Osdos, you get that back again and then it's ripped out from underneath her again. For her to believe that anything's possible still exists. And I really wanted that for this character because I knew that the fall is much harder and the fall is a much further fall to have.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“She's already given up, then what's the point in her even turning up to the Uzdos boreroom? What's the point in her even putting that hat on and leaving her dorm room to get there? What's the point in her even staying at shares if she truly believes that she can't do the things that she wants to? I really wanted to sort of build her up to take the rug out from underneath her almost, you know.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Always like waiting for it's like a quiet anxiety that someone's going to say something all the time Tries to get there just before someone does say something, but also I wanted her to have a little joy. I really I wanted her to have hope because you can't get to the uncomfortability and the heartbreak of the Ozdust scene if there isn't hope beforehand. If she's already in that space, if she's already in the hurt.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I don't think I was trying to hide. I actually think she's defense. It's like getting there before everybody else does. There is defiance in it in that she is not trying to hide herself from anyone and it's resistance against what people would have other people believe about you. I don't believe this about myself. If you believe it, that's fine, but I don't believe this. And I think it's so interesting because I do think that there's a slight weariness in Elfigo because it's sort of something that she's known her whole life as constant mockery, the constant making fun of her.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Like a moment where she stops trying to appease people and just be herself. I'll be alone and I'll be okay with being alone. And so we figured out how that would work. And I felt like this was maybe the beginning of the spell, like maybe the first time she tries to conjure something Which is why if you put power into this hat, which becomes the emblem of the wicked witch, there's a reason to put it back on. We wash away what hat was, the embarrassment of it, the way people see her in it, and we make it something that is imbued with power and magic. There's a pride in wearing it”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Source of embarrassment and shame, then why would she put it back on again? And if she's standing in the middle of the circle, why does she not just walk out? Why does she stay to do this dance? And for me, I felt like that dance was a sort of reclamation of the room she was in. And to take back the way in which people would scorn her. So you can scorn me, but I know I'm supposed to be here. So I'm going to own this space right here, even though you would have me not be here.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Because when I had gone in to start rehearsing for the dance, there was already a dance that had been choreographed by Christopher Scott and Comfort Fidoku. And it was really lovely. It just didn't feel like the language she spoke. So I asked if it was possible for us to sort of go back to the drawing board and begin again and create something that felt more like her and Christopher and Comfort kindly said, yes. So we started figuring out how she moved. And instead of it being sort of a moment for laughter, it wasn't that I wanted to take the laughter out. It's just that I wanted to make sure that there was a reason for her to do this dance. So she took that hat off. What in that dance makes her put it back on? This hat is the...”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“You see, I think those things bring it to life, not just for the people watching, but for me now this person is real and human, you know.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Myself. And so I could speak for her when we were discussing things or actually I think Alphabet might do this or she might speak up for herself in this moment or she might actually just be really quiet here. And it meant that we had this ongoing, growing creative relationship, not just for the peace as a whole, but for the small, tiny, minute details that each person might have. And particularly for me, I'm a details girl. I like all of the little, if I can find out why does she have these two rings or can she have an earring or can she, is it necessary for her to have jewelry or can she dress like this in a certain way? Can this be more tailored? Can she wear her hair like this? And if she wore glasses, they'd be like this. And those little tiny things that make the character three-dimensional as opposed to a 2D picture.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I love it. I think it's kind of important. I think something happens when a director trusts an actor. And let's not say that everyone, you always have to have your input. That's not to say that. It's just that when your director trusts that you know when it's necessary or they trust that what you have to say will enhance something for some reason there's an element of freedom within that because you immediately know that you're trusted so you can play a little more you can make mistakes and try again and try things over and over and i think because john sort of gave me a little bit of room to play and to to influence the way she looked and the way she moved it meant that i could really own her as the character for my”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“Know why, but it really moved me. I came away from it. I couldn't stop thinking about it. I think it was, it was particularly that character alphabet. I think maybe seeing the songs in situ sort of woke something up in my brain. It was just the first time I'd seen a story about one two women in a relationship because that's not never a story that you see. And then two, about a person who just doesn't fit. On top of which it was to do with her skin color. So I just was to sort of taken by it. Yeah.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT
“I was 25 and I saw it in London. I took myself on a solo date. I knew the music before I knew the show. So after having learned the music, after leaving drum school and essentially being able to afford tickets to go and see. I took myself C wicked for my birthday.”
2025-02-10 · On with Kara Swisher · Wicked’s Cynthia Erivo on Defying Gravity, the Attack on Diversity and (Maybe) Getting an EGOT · IDENTIFIED FROM THE TRANSCRIPT