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      Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande Perform ‘Defying Gravity’ at Oscars

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      The stars of “Wicked” Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo opened the Oscars with a spirited tribute to the cinematic versions of Oz, culminating in a rendition in “Defying Gravity” from their nominated film.After a montage of classic onscreen Los Angeles moments — a nod to the recent fires — Grande emerged, singing “Over the Rainbow” from “The Wizard of Oz” in a sparkling red dress, evoking Dorothy’s ruby slippers. Erivo then took the stage, belting “Home” from “The Wiz.”Grande then returned for “Defying Gravity,” before Erivo brought everything home with her emphatic war cry. The crowd roared and gave them a standing ovation. The camera caught their co-star Michelle Yeoh in tears.While Grande and Erivo have been essentially joined at the hip during the promotional tour for the film and, of course, harmonize onscreen, they have rarely performed live together. They sang a duet at the 2024 Met Gala, singing “When You Believe,” an Oscar winner for the 1998 film “The Prince of Egypt.” That ballad, famously recorded by Mariah Carey and Whitney Houston, was written by the “Wicked” composer Stephen Schwartz.“Wicked” — a prequel to “The Wizard of Oz” that focuses on the character of the Wicked Witch of the West, otherwise known as Elphaba — has 10 Oscar nominations, including one apiece for Erivo and Grande, nominated in the leading and supporting actress categories, respectively.While the movie is not a best picture front-runner, it is the highest-grossing nominee, coming in fifth at the 2024 worldwide box office, just ahead of fellow nominee “Dune: Part Two.” Including a performance from “Wicked” in the ceremony is likely a draw for audiences who might not have seen, say, “The Brutalist,” which has been relatively difficult to watch as it slowly expanded its theatrical release.“Wicked,” directed by Jon M. Chu, became a phenomenon, in part because of the wave of merchandise it spawned as well as the viral moments it generated. Take, for instance, the interview in which a reporter told Erivo and Grande that people were “holding space” for the lyrics of “Defying Gravity.”Grande and Erivo’s appearance on the telecast is also a reminder that they may be back next year. “Wicked” only covers the first act of the Broadway musical on which it is based. The sequel, “Wicked: For Good,” is due out in November. More

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      Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo Continue ‘Wicked’ Theme at Oscars Red Carpet

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      In the words of Glinda, pink goes good with green.After months of method dressing, “Wicked” stars Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo both arrived on the Oscars red carpet in their Ozian characters’ signature colors.For Ms. Grande, nominated for best supporting actress, that meant an icy pink satin and tulle bustier gown from Schiaparelli decked out in more than 190,000 crystal sequins, rhinestones and beads. The wiggly waistline was inspired by an lamp designed by the artist Alberto Giacometti.Ariana Grande’s Schiaparelli gown was decorated with more than 190,000 crystal sequins, rhinestones and beads.Nina Westervelt for The New York TimesErivo’s signature fingernails were decorated with elaborate, hand-sculpted gilded art, including a tiny watch and clock.Jutharat Pinyodoonyachet for The New York TimesMs. Erivo, who is nominated for best actress, opted for a shade of deep forest green, so dark it almost appeared black at first glance. But make no mistake, the subtle homage was intentional. Speaking with E! on the red carpet, she said the velvet Louis Vuitton gown — with an almost vampiric architectural collar — was a “nod to Oz, a nod to the green, and a nod to old Hollywood.” Her signature fingernails by the nail artist Mycah Dior were decorated with elaborate, hand-sculpted gilded art, including a tiny watch and clock.Over the course of the “Wicked” press tour, both stars regularly stepped out in styles that referenced their characters. At the premiere in Los Angeles, Ms. Grande wore a pink Thom Browne gingham dress, while Ms. Erivo donned a green vinyl Louis Vuitton number.Even at events not officially related to the film, the pair remained committed to the bit, like during an appearance at the Olympics in Paris where they each wore … well, you know.The second installment of “Wicked” comes out later this year. We’ll have to wait and see if the duo will still be holding space for pink and green come November. More

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      What to Watch For at the Oscars: ‘Emilia Pérez,’ Cynthia Erivo and More

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      From the most competitive races to the lasting controversies, here’s a guide to becoming an instant expert.The Best Picture Race Looks Wide OpenRalph Fiennes in “Conclave,” which is a top contender for the best picture Oscar. Its biggest competition: “Anora.”Focus FeaturesWhen the Ralph Fiennes-led papal thriller “Conclave” secured the highest honor at the 31st Screen Actors Guild Awards last weekend, it seemed like a strong indicator that it would prevail in the best picture category at the Academy Awards on Sunday night. After all, the last three winners of SAG’s top prize — “Oppenheimer,” “Everything Everywhere All at Once” and “CODA” — all won the best picture statuette at the Oscars.But it isn’t exactly that clear cut.Those past three films had essentially swept their awards season, and aside from the SAG Awards, “Conclave” has won only one other best picture title, at the BAFTAs in February.“Anora,” the comedy-drama about a stripper (played by Mikey Madison) whose modern fairy-tale romance implodes, had several of the other early big wins this season, including two major industry prizes — from the Directors Guild of America and the Producers Guild of America — that almost always signal a best-picture Oscar up ahead.Also, Edward Berger, the director of “Conclave,” was not nominated for a best directing Oscar. Only six films in the history of the Oscars have won best picture without a best directing nomination, most recently “CODA” in 2022.Scandals Plague ‘Emilia Pérez’Karla Sofía Gascón in “Emilia Pèrez.” She is up for a best actress Oscar, but her chances of winning may have been derailed by recent scandals.Shanna Besson/NetflixJust a few weeks ago, “Emilia Pérez” was on top of the world. The Spanish-language musical out of France had earned 13 Oscar nominations, the most of any film this year (and nearly the most ever), and its lead, Karla Sofía Gascón, made history as the first openly transgender actress to be nominated for an Academy Award, in the best actress category no less.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      How to Watch the Oscars 2025: Date, Time and Streaming

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      Conan O’Brien will host the annual awards, which will be available to watch live on a streaming service for the first time.It seems like a lifetime ago that Sean Baker’s screwball comedy “Anora” first emerged as the favorite in the best picture race (no one was yet even thinking about holding space for “Wicked”).But we’re now right back where we started in the fall with both math and our Projectionist columnist, Kyle Buchanan, predicting that “Anora” will emerge triumphant. It’s by no means a sure thing — last weekend’s big Screen Actors Guild Awards winner, the papal thriller “Conclave,” could play spoiler.In the acting races, Demi Moore appears to be the one to beat after notching another win at the SAGs (though Buchanan says not to count out Fernanda Torres, who delivers a tour de force performance in the quiet Brazilian drama “I’m Still Here”).But could Adrien Brody, who plays a Jewish architect who survives the Holocaust in “The Brutalist,” be in for an upset from the 29-year-old Timothée Chalamet, who has embarked on a decidedly unconventional — and very online — Oscar campaign for his lead role in the Bob Dylan biopic “A Complete Unknown”?Here’s everything you need to know.What time does the show start and where can I watch?This year’s show is again one for the early birds: The ceremony is set to begin at 7 p.m. Eastern, 4 p.m. Pacific, at the Dolby Theater in Los Angeles.On TV, ABC is the official broadcaster. Online, you can watch the show live on the ABC app, which is free to download, or at abc.com, though you’ll need to sign in using the credentials from your cable provider. There are also a number of live TV streaming services that offer access to ABC, including Hulu + Live TV, YouTube TV, AT&T TV and FuboTV, which all require subscriptions.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Oscar Nominees Makeup Got Real in 2025: “The Substance,” “Wicked” and More

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      This year’s Oscar nominees for makeup and hairstyling, for movies such as “The Substance,” “Wicked” and “A Different Man,” showcased prosthetics and special effects.Actors may deliver impassioned speeches about achieving their “childhood dreams,” but we don’t often hear about how those sculpting wounds with clay and bubbling skin with latex are fulfilling their lifelong fantasies.“Teenager treats” is how Pierre Olivier Persin, the special effects designer nominated for an Oscar for makeup and hairstyling for “The Substance,” described his work on the film, which involved two full-body prosthetics and countless other pieces and puppets. Mike Marino, the makeup designer for Sebastian Stan in “A Different Man,” nominated in the same category, described his childhood bedroom as a sort of cabinet of curiosities, filled with “jars of experiments and screaming Siamese twins.”It’s a particularly exciting year for makeup and hairstyling nominees: buckets of blood and pus-filled injections in “The Substance”; face tumors sloughing off like jelly in “A Different Man”; green witches and blue horses in “Wicked”; a vampire shriveling away in “Nosferatu”; and a menacing drug lord created with facial prosthetics in “Emilia Pérez.”“She wanted to see her hands. She wanted to get that reaction” from the other cast members, said Frances Hannon, the hair and makeup designer for “Wicked” about Cynthia Erivo, who played the green-skinned witch Elphaba in the film and has been vocal about her preference to be physically painted rather than having the hue added in postproduction.Universal Pictures, via Associated PressWhile in years past the category has sometimes leaned toward honoring the subtle transformations of delicately coifed period hairstyles, these nominees reflect a year that relied heavily on the use of makeup to create practical special effects.Once upon a time, most special effects were achieved with makeup. Think “An American Werewolf in London” (1981), “The Fly” (1986), “Beetlejuice” (1988): All the various monsters, mutations and marvels in these films were largely created with latex, foam and human hands. Then, in the early 2000s, studios became more reliant on computers to digitally generate these effects.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      How to Watch the SAG Awards

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      In a wide-open best picture race, the awards, which are streaming on Netflix, could offer some clarity.This year’s Oscars best picture race is, for the first time in years, wide open.Will the newly ascendant front-runner “Anora,” Sean Baker’s Palme d’Or winner about a stripper who impulsively marries the son of a Russian oligarch, take the statuette? Will Brady Corbet’s epic “The Brutalist” find its way to the top? And what about the wild card, the papal thriller “Conclave,” which recently took top honors at the EE British Academy Film Awards, or BAFTAs — Britain’s version of the Oscars?With the days ticking down until the March 2 Academy Awards ceremony, the Screen Actors Guild Awards could offer some clarity. In four of the past five years, the SAGs have given their top honor — best ensemble — to the eventual Oscar winner.The 15 awards, which are voted on by actors and other performers who belong to the SAG-AFTRA union, honor the best film and television performances from the past year. The movie musical “Wicked” and the FX series “Shogun” are the leading nominees.Here’s how to watch, and what to watch for.What time does the show start, and where can I watch?The two-hour ceremony begins at 8 p.m. Eastern time (5 p.m. Pacific time) at the Shrine Auditorium in Los Angeles, a historic venue that has also hosted the Oscars. For the second year, the awards show will stream live and exclusively on Netflix; there is no way to watch without a subscription.Is there a red carpet?The red carpet preshow will stream live on Netflix beginning at 7 p.m. Eastern time (4 p.m. Pacific time). The YouTube star Lilly Singh and the actress and former “Saturday Night Live” comedian Sasheer Zamata will host the event, which will include interviews with nominees and the announcement of the winners in the best stunt ensemble categories.Who is hosting?Kristen Bell, who recently starred in the Netflix rom-com “Nobody Wants This,” will steer the ship. This will be her second time hosting; the first was in 2018.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

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      Cynthia Erivo Will Host This Year’s Tony Awards

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      The actress won a Tony Award for “The Color Purple,” and is now nominated for an Oscar for playing Elphaba in the film adaptation of “Wicked.”Cynthia Erivo, the Tony Award-winning actress whose Oscar-nominated performance in the “Wicked” film has brought her wide recognition, will host this year’s Tony Awards.The American Theater Wing and the Broadway League — the two organizations that present the awards — announced on Wednesday that Erivo would host the ceremony on June 8 at Radio City Music Hall. Much of the event will be broadcast on CBS.Erivo, 38, is a British actress who had her breakout role in “The Color Purple,” starring as Celie in a revival of the musical adaptation of the Alice Walker novel. That production opened on Broadway in 2015; Erivo’s performance was the talk of the town that season, and she won the Tony Award for best leading actress in 2016.She pivoted quickly to work in film and television, picking up two Oscar nominations, for best leading actress and for best original song, for the 2019 film “Harriet,” and this year she is nominated as best leading actress for “Wicked,” which is the first installment of a two-part film. (The second half, in which Erivo also stars, is to be released in November.) In the “Wicked” films, Erivo plays Elphaba, the green-skinned witch whose debatable wickedness is the subject of the story.Erivo has been busy this year — ubiquitous as she has promoted “Wicked” with her co-star Ariana Grande, but also pursuing her own projects. On Tuesday, the Hollywood Bowl announced one more: in August Erivo will star as Jesus in a one-weekend revival of the musical “Jesus Christ Superstar.”The Tony Awards honor plays and musicals staged on Broadway; this year’s ceremony will consider shows that open between April 26, 2024, and April 27, 2025. This year’s nominees are to be announced on May 1. More

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      What ‘Wicked’ Has to Say About Our Current Political Moment

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      By breaking the story into two movies, the emphasis in “Part One” shifts to a nation’s potential decline into authoritarianism. Sound familiar?In the big-screen adaptation of “Wicked,” Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) uses magic to defend her sister and unwittingly destroys a courtyard mural of the Wizard at Shiz University. When her outburst shatters the wall, it also unearths an image that has been intentionally covered up: the school’s original founders, animal professors whose ability to speak, teach humans, and organize politically posed a threat to the Wizard’s autocratic reign.This surprising fact is revealed early on, but as I watched it, I realized Elphaba’s discovery came too late.As a repeat viewer of Broadway’s “Wicked,” I’m usually fascinated by how the story’s retrospective lens encourages us to sympathize with Elphaba, who eventually will become the Wicked Witch of the West. Her rich back story — she’s a perennial outsider and highly empathetic person — has forced me to rethink my assumptions about her and reflect on how easily I accepted L. Frank Baum’s own prejudices and his representation of her as a one-dimensional villain in his novel, “The Wizard of Oz.”But, unlike the stage version, which tracks Elphaba as a young adult to her fateful encounter with Dorothy, the movie delves even more into Elphaba’s biography. It follows her to Shiz University, where she ends up rooming with her frenemy, Galinda, later renamed Glinda (Ariana Grande), whose jealousy of Elphaba’s magical powers leads to conflict. The film ends at the characters’ climactic midpoints. “If Part One is about choices,” the director, Jon M. Chu, recently told Entertainment Weekly, “Part Two is about consequences.”But for now that also means the story remains unresolved. At the end of the Broadway version, there’s relief in the surprise ending when we learn that the Wicked Witch was far kinder than we gave her credit for and that she successfully challenged the Wizard’s dominance.Instead, onscreen, Elphaba is left suspended in midair (on her broom), made a scapegoat by the Wizard (Jeff Goldblum) as the Shiz professor Madam Morrible (Michelle Yeoh), falsely warns the people of Oz about an enemy who must be captured. Madam Morrible goes even further, blasting on the loudspeaker, “Her green skin is but an outward manifestorium of her twisted nature. This distortion! This repulsion! This wicked witch!”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More