Top of page

April 15, 2026 | 7:30 p.m.
Lawrence Joel Veterans Memorial Coliseum

Cynthia Erivo

Award-Winning Actress, Singer-Songwriter and Producer

MORE ABOUT CYNTHIA ERIVO

Cynthia Erivo is a multi-hyphenate tour de force who captivates audiences with her award-winning music and acting, both on the stage and the screen. Erivo has an uncanny ability to shape and drive narratives across entertainment while continuously evolving her body of work with poignant breakthrough characters that hit emotional cores and transcend race, gender, and cultural boundaries.

Erivo stars as Elphaba opposite Ariana Grande’s Glinda in the highly-anticipated film adaptation of the musical Wicked directed by Jon M. Chu. Wicked: Part I debuted in November 2024, and Part Two will follow in November 2025.

In 2023, she produced and released her first film under her production company, Edith’s Daughter – a riveting film about a Liberian refugee in Greece called Drift, directed by Anthony Chen.

In 2021, Erivo was nominated for an Emmy® for her critically-acclaimed portrayal of Aretha Franklin in National Geographic’s Emmy-winning global anthology series Genius: Aretha. This season is the first-ever, definitive, and only authorized scripted limited series on the life of the universally acclaimed Queen of Soul. That same year, she released her debut album, Ch. 1 Vs. 1.

In 2019, Erivo received two Oscar® nominations—one for her role as Harriet Tubman in the Focus Features biopic Harriet, and the other for the film’s title track “Stand Up,” which she co-wrote. Her prolific performance as the American hero abolitionist also garnered nominations from the Golden Globes®, Screen Actors Guild, and NAACP Image Awards. In 2024, Erivo was nominated for another Oscar® in the best actress category for her role in the musical adaptation of Wicked. enthralled audiences in 2016 with her revelatory and star-making turn as “Celie” in the hit Broadway revival of The Color Purple, for which she won a Tony®, Emmy®, and Grammy®. Beyond her influential and critically acclaimed performances, Erivo is a fearless voice for women and people of color who raises awareness and sets new standards for diversity across the arts.

Erivo released her first children’s book titled, Remember to Dream, Ebere. The book follows a young girl named Ebere whose mother encourages her to dream as big as possible. Erivo wrote the book as an ode to a child’s imagination, a parent’s love, and the big dreams shared by both. Her passion for empowering others resounds as loudly as her award-winning voice.


Learn more about our other speakers