Despite the success and critical acclaim of films with racially inclusive casts this past year — “The Farewell,” “Hustlers,” and “Parasite” among them — just one actor of color is nominated at the upcoming Academy Awards. Cynthia Erivo is up for Best Actress for her lead performance in Kasi Lemmons’ Harriet Tubman biopic “Harriet.” This is a distinction the Broadway star and singer would rather forgo, as she told The Hollywood Reporter.
Erivo described her Best Actress nod as “a moment for celebration, but it also is a real eye-opener.” She explained, “It can’t just be me alone. There’s just such good work going on and this may sound fatalistic, but I would hate for people’s work to have gone by and then for us to have looked back and go, ‘Oh, I wish we would’ve given roses,’ when people aren’t there to actually receive them. I don’t want us to do that.”
“To be in a room and not being able to see other actors [of color] who are nominated, to not be able to share that with another black actress is saddening,” Erivo said. “I would love to share this moment with someone else.”
The “Outsider” actress — who is also nominated for Best Original Song for “Harriet’s” “Stand Up” — isn’t just concerned about the Academy Awards’ lack of inclusion of actors of color. When asked about her ambitions as a performer, Erivo revealed that she wants to play a wider range of characters — and wants other people of color, especially black women, to be given similar opportunities.
She revealed she longs to take on “roles that are not asexual,” but hasn’t been given the chance. “I would like to play the role of a woman who has sexuality. For some reason, I don’t know whether it is specifically black women, but our roles lack sexuality,” she told THR. “It’s like we can’t be badass and human and sexual at the same time. I just don’t understand that. One of my favorite films is ‘Call Me by Your Name,’ because of how tender and sensual it is,” she continued. “I still haven’t seen that for a black woman. That’s what I’m looking for.”
Complex roles, roles that are full of contradictions and nuance, are what Erivo craves. “I want to play the messiest of women and the most complicated of women. I want to play those roles you just don’t see, the stories of women that don’t get told often,” she said. “They don’t necessarily have to be the hero of the story. I just want them to be fully rounded. I want them to be real. I want someone in the world to be able to connect to those people when they see them.”
In other words, she wants what most actors want: a challenging role with substance and humanity. However, as a woman — a woman of color in particular — Erivo feels that her talents are often undervalued or ignored in show business. Women of color aren’t allowed the same latitude to play characters with moral ambiguity or a defined sexuality, not the way that white men or even white women are. As Erivo makes clear, the Academy isn’t the only institution that needs to up its inclusion. Actors of color deserve a seat at the table at the Oscars, and in Hollywood as a whole.
You can catch Erivo as Holly Gibney, a private eye, in supernatural mystery “The Outsider,” airing Sundays on HBO. Next, she’ll portray Aretha Franklin in Season 3 of “Genius,” National Geographic’s anthology series celebrating innovators and their achievements. Showrun by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Suzan-Lori Parks, the season is expected to premiere in spring. “Widows” and “Bad Times at the El Royale” are among Erivo’s other screen credits.
If Erivo takes home a statuette at the Oscars on February 9, she will be an EGOT winner. Her turn in the Broadway stage production of “The Color Purple” landed her a Tony, a Grammy, and an Emmy. The latter was for her musical performance with “The Color Purple’s” cast on “Today.”
In celebration of Black History Month, Focus Features and Regal will offer free screenings of “Harriet” around the country on February 4 and February 11. You can find tickets and screening info via Gofobo.
