Cynthia Erivo

Cynthia Erivo (birthname: Cynthia Onyedinmanasu Chinasaokwu Erivo) has emerged as an actor of uncommon power and grace across a wide span of roles from Harriett Tubman to the Wicked Witch of the West and made a potent first impression in her feature debut under Steve McQueen’s direction in the British-made crime revenge movie, Widows (2018), starring Viola Davis, Michelle Rodriguez, Elizabeth Debicki, Colin Farrell, Brian Tyree Henry, Daniel Kaluuya, Jacki Weaver, Carrie Coon, Robert Duvall and Liam Neeson, premiering to acclaim at the Toronto Film Festival and earning $76 million globally in a 20^th Century Fox release.

Erivo’s next turn was in the California-Nevada border thriller, Bad Times at the El Royale (2018), alongside Jeff Bridges, Dakota Johnson, Jon Hamm, and Chris Hemsworth under writer Drew Goddard’s direction for 20th Century Fox, underperforming with a $32 million return.

Erivo had her breakout role and earned her first two Oscar nominations (for, unusually both Best Actress portraying American slave freedom fighter Tubman and Best Song–as co-writer with Joshuah Brian Campbell) for director/co-writer Kasi Lemmons’ biopic, Harriet (2019), with Leslie Odom Jr., Joe Alwyn and Janelle Monae, and grossing a healthy $44 million for Focus Features/Universal Pictures.

Erivo joined the cast of the troubled Lionsgate sci-fi production, Chaos Walking (2021), starring Tom Holland, Daisy Ridley, Mads Mikkelsen, Demian Bichir, Nick Jonas, and David Oyelowo under Doug Liman’s direction, and tanking at the box office with a $27 million return against $125 million estimated costs.

Cynthia Erivo co-starred in another failed Lionsgate-released sci-fi movie, director/writer John Ridley’s Needle in a Timestack (2021), starring Leslie Odom Jr., Freida Pinto, Orlando Bloom, and Jadyn Wong, and then after playing The Blue Fairy in Robert Zemeckis’ widely dismissed

Disney’s Pinocchio (2022) (pulled from theatrical release and streaming only on Disney+), Erivo was lead and a producer on the Anthony Chen-directed drama, Drift (2023), co-starring Alia Shawkat, Ibrahima Ba, Honor Swinton Byrne, and Zainab Jah, and which premiered at the Sundance Film Festival and released to little business (in North America) by Utopia.

Erivo co-starred with Idris Elba reviving his London sleuth title role in the big-screen (and streaming) Luther: The Fallen Sun (2023), with Andy Serkis as a wealthy serial killer run amok, produced by BBC Film and Chernin Entertainment and released theatrically and on streaming by Netflix.

Erivo landed the lead role as the Wicked Witch of the West in the two-film adaptation of Stephen Schwartz’s and Winnie Holzman’s musical, Wicked (2024) and Wicked Part Two (2025), co-starring Ariana Grande (as Glinda the Good Witch of the North), with Michelle Yeoh, Jeff Goldblum, Jonathan Bailey, Bowen Yang and Peter Dinklage, and budgeted at a combined $300 million.

Cynthia Erivo starred in the Susanna White-directed law drama backed by Participant, Prima Facie (date to be announced), and then Erivo starred in Netflix’s sci-fi thriller written by Eric Matthew Brown, Blink Speed (date to be announced). Erivo also starred as a truck driver in a terrible situation in director/writer Dan Blank’s thriller, Carrier (date to be announced), with James Wellington and produced by Steven Spielberg’s Amblin Partners.