Yahoo Movies Ariana Grande responds to Wicked controversy
Ariana Grande has responded to the controversy involving Wicked which saw her co-star Cynthia Erivo blast a fan edit of the film's poster.
The upcoming musical-fantasy, the first in a two-part saga, is an adaptation of the hit Broadway show and prequel to The Wizard of Oz. It follows Elphaba (Erivo) and Galinda (Grande) as they meet as classmates at university, beginning a journey that goes from friendship to rivalry.
Ahead of the film's release next month (November 22), Universal Studios released a poster which resembled the stage musical's, showing Galinda whispering something in Elphaba's ear.
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In a bid to replicate the original poster more closely, one fan edited it to have Elphaba's hat tipped lower and changed her lip colour from green to red, a decision which Erivo blasted as "offensive" and "degrading".
Erivo also criticised an AI-generated version of the poster which saw the two stars locked in battle as their characters, and Grande has now commented on the situation in an interview with Variety.
"I think it's very complicated because I find AI so conflicting and troublesome sometimes, but I think it's just kind of such a massive adjustment period," she said. "This is something that is so much bigger than us, and the fans are gonna have fun and make their edits."
"I have so much respect for my sister, Cynthia, and I love her so much," she added. "It's just a big adjustment period. It's so much stimulation about something that's so much bigger than us."
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Erivo, who has also starred in Widows and Harriet, took to Instagram Stories last week to address the fan-made edit, in which 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 [p***y] 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 look right down the barrel of the camera to you, the viewer… because, without words we communicate with our eyes."
She added that hiding her eyes "is to erase me" and "is just deeply hurtful."
Wicked - Part 1 is in cinemas on November 22.
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