Sincerely, Saskia

When will Black women in Hollywood ever get any empathy for their continued struggle?

In case you haven’t heard, because let’s face it the current news cycle has been heavy the last few weeks with Lebanon and Palestine, Liam Payne’s death, all this heinous Diddy stuff and the ongoing Gisèle Pelicot trial… I absolutely wouldn’t blame you for trading it all in for some hilarious cat videos or viral recipes you simply must try this autumn.

However, if you have been keeping in the loop, a drop in the ocean over the last few weeks has been that the official poster for the upcoming film adaptation of Wicked was released – being shared on Instagram by the cast, including Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo.

The attention it garnered was as expected, especially with it being one of the most anticipated films of the year. And, with it already being a well-established musical, the fan base is already there – a curse and a blessing as we can all appreciate. As you can imagine, the fans had their expectations.

Mostly it seems they had hoped that Hollywood’s new favourite besties would emulate the iconic poses featured on the musical cover, with Elphaba’s face half-covered sporting that signature red-lipped smirk. However, to the disappointment of many fans, the movie poster features a full face shot of Erivo, staring down the barrel of the camera, and a more revealing side profile of Grande.

Yes, and?

To me, the poster does what it needs to do – especially considering the cast have already said the movie poster is an homage to the musical and is not supposed to be an exact replica. But I don’t need to tell you about the minefield that is fan culture, and almost on cue, one fan decided to “fix” the poster by lowering Elphaba’s hat to obscure Erivo’s face and add red lipstick to her lips.

What’s the harm? It’s just a harmless fan edit honouring the much loved musical, right? Well, no. It went with Erivo like a f***ing lead balloon, with Erivo coming forward to explain how “deeply hurt” she was.

“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.”

Currently, Erivo is the face, she is the moment, and she deserves to have that moment proudly plastered on every poster without people feeling the need to “fix” it in a move conducive to removing her identity.

Sometime afterwards, Grande came forward saying the whole thing is “complicated” and, not long after, the creator of the poster came out on Twitter to defend herself and her innocent intentions behind her edits. This garnered some pretty mixed responses, but for those who are confused as to why Erivo was so hurt by the whole thing, let me break it down for you.

Cynthia Erivo is a dark-skinned Black woman in Hollywood, who I should not need to tell you has probably had to work harder than her non-Black peers. Yes, we are going there.

Erivo is known for her stellar performance in Harriet but even that wasn’t without its controversy, with her being British causing a stir as to why she was awarded the role in the first place. Despite her success so far, being nominated for an Oscar for Harriet, this movie is about to propel her into dizzying heights.

So, with that in mind, having her face on the poster of the soon-to-be global phenomenon, for someone to then come along and “fix” it by covering her face, is obviously (or maybe not so obviously) going to be a crushing blow.

All those people saying she’s overreacting are completely refusing to muster any empathy and look at this slight through the eyes of a Black woman in Hollywood. I don’t know the ins and outs of Erivo’s personal struggle with being Black in Hollywood, but we know enough about the culture of the entertainment industry and her past controversies to know a fight has been had. And let us not forget that the erasure of Black women in that environment makes it consistently difficult for their hard work to garner the same success as their white counterparts.

Now, I’m not saying the “artist” set out to intentionally erase Erivo’s identity, and I can understand that fans, especially fans of art that has a cult-like following, don’t like change. However, your need for things to be the same does not trump Eviro’s need to be seen – especially when she is carrying the weight of what being Black in that space actually means.

As Erivo said, the musical poster is an illustration: it’s nameless, faceless and as interchangeable as the people who play that character on stage every theatre run. In that respect, it’s fine because that’s how theatre works, but movies by nature are more permanent. Currently, Erivo is the face, she is the moment, and she deserves to have that moment proudly plastered on every poster without people feeling the need to “fix” it in a move conducive to removing her identity – as she has said that’s how it felt.  People have called her arrogant, they’ve said her ego is out of control, that she’s overreacted and that because of this outburst they are now refusing to watch the movie.

The lack of empathy or willingness to understand Black women’s feelings is so loud, it’s deafening. The outpour of hatred towards her for simply speaking on her feelings is, unfortunately, expected, but doesn’t make it any less hurtful to see – and that’s just as a bystander. Black women do not have the space to express their feelings without being completely shot down and met with such dramatic and hostile reactions – is it any wonder she has limited comments on her Instagram?

Whether you can relate or not, you cannot tell someone there’s no place for their feelings, especially when you haven’t even tried to see it from a perspective that is beyond valid.

Image credit: Warner Bros.