Cynthia Erivo Reveals How She Approached Elphaba Differently in ‘Wicked: For Good’: ‘She’s Delicious’

After her massive breakthrough as Elphaba in 2024’s Wicked, Cynthia Erivo is giving fans a taste of what’s to come in the film’s final chapter this fall.

In her Billboard cover story published Monday (June 2), Erivo teases what fans can expect from her green-skinned heroine in Wicked: For Good, the much-anticipated second part of the film due out this November. “Elphaba in act one, or film one, it’s head and heart … Elphaba in act two is head, sacral,” Erivo tells Billboard Pride editor Stephen Daw, explaining her use of chakras to differentiate Elphaba’s transformation across the two films. “It’s grounded. It’s really earthy, feet-on-the-ground. She’s able to access her rage more.”

That change in her gravity-defying character also meant Erivo had to take a different approach to portraying her while filming. “The scent I wore changed. The makeup changed,” she explains. “Little shifts that bring you to a more mature version of who Elphaba becomes. And she is delicious in this next one.”

The upcoming film will look to replicate the breakout success of its predecessor, which went on to become the highest grossing film adaptation of a musical, earned 10 Oscar nominations (including a best actress nom for Erivo) and scored a No. 2 debut on the Billboard 200 with its soundtrack. “The cast was like, ‘Oh, so it’s just in the ether now? People are just listening to it on their way to work at this point?’” Erivo says of the soundtrack’s success in particular. “It’s really wonderful.”

The interview comes just ahead of the release of Erivo’s sophomore LP, I Forgive You (out Friday, June 6 via Verve and Republic Records), which sees the singer exploring uncharted new territory as a performer. As she tells to Billboard, her Wicked co-star Ariana Grande helped connect her with Republic Records’ chairwoman and chief creative officer Wendy Goldstein to help make her LP shine.

“Wendy is a very singular human being who just gets it,” she says of meeting Goldstein. “It was the first time that everything became really clear. To have someone who understands who you are as a musician and a singer and an artist was just a new experience within this space for me as an artist.”

See Erivo on the cover of Billboard and a clip from her interview below: