Cynthia Erivo has touched down at Los Angeles’s Shrine Auditorium and Expo Hall to attend the 31st annual Screen Actors Guild Awards ceremony.
The Wicked star briefly stepped away from her signature green-and-black color palette in favor of something more metallic—think more Tin Man and less Wicked Witch. The centerpiece of her marvelous ensemble was a vintage Givenchy gown, with dramatically long sleeves lined with spiky fringe. The high neckline featured a mane (a Cowardly Lion’s mane, perhaps?) of even more silver fringe. Of course, it’s not truly a Cynthia Erivo outfit until she shows off her nails. This time, the actor opted for an emerald set tinged with metallic accents.
Tonight, Erivo is up for a SAG Award in the category of Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Leading Role, which recognizes her performance as Elphaba in Jon M. Chu’s adaptation of the beloved Broadway musical, Wicked. The SAG Awards are the latest ceremony in what has been a jam-packed awards circuit for Erivo. Next week, she will once again contend for the Best Actress award at the 97th Academy Awards.
“I never really know how to respond when the question of awards comes up. It’s not my raison d’être,” Erivo, who is just an Oscar away from EGOT status, previously told Variety. “Do awards help for getting some space to create more? Yes, but what else can we do? I just want to continue making fucking fabulous work and widening the aperture on what’s possible for women who look like me in film.”
Erivo is the second-ever Black woman to play Elphaba in Wicked, following Alexia Khadime’s West End run from 2008 to 2010. “I knew there was a long line of history behind me, and you take the responsibility on and you have to let it go,” she added. “My responsibility is to hold that, see it, understand it, respect it and then create my own. If I’m trying to do something that came before, then I’m not in the room.”
