“Cynthia Erivo praises fan-released ‘Wicked’ poster”

Cynthia Erivo calls out a fan-issued “Wicked” poster that partially obscures her face.

On Wednesday, the actress shared a photo of the altered poster – which obscures Erivo’s eyes and changes the color of her lips from green to red – to her Instagram Story and called the altered image “deeply hurtful.”

In the upcoming Jon M. Chu-directed film, Erivo plays Elphaba, who becomes the Wicked Witch of the West, alongside singer Ariana Grande as Glinda, the Good Witch.

The film’s official poster references the famous illustrated version of the original Broadway musical, but differs in that it shows Erivo’s Elphaba with her hat raised, revealing her eyes, and also has green lips rather than red. The fan-edited poster appears to be an attempt to make the official version similar to the illustrated version.

“This is the wildest and most offensive thing I have ever seen. It’s equal to this horrible AI we fight in and people asking ‘Is your damn green?'” Erivo captioned her post alongside the fan-made poster. “None of this is funny. None of it is sweet. It humiliates me. It demeans us.”

“The original poster is an ILLUSTRATION,” the Grammy winner added. “I am a real human being who has chosen to look directly through the camera at you, the viewer… because without words, we communicate with our eyes.”

HuffPost has reached out to Universal Pictures (the film’s distributor) and Erivo’s representatives for comment.

In a subsequent Instagram Story post, Erivo re-shared the film’s official poster and wrote, “Let me put this here to remind you and cleanse your palette.”

Grande hasn’t publicly commented on the edited poster, but appeared to support Erivo by also resharing the official “Wicked” poster on her Instagram Story on Wednesday.

“Wicked,” which also stars Michelle Yeoh, Jeff Goldblum and Bowen Yang, hits theaters November 27.