Cynthia Erivo maintains a rigorous lifestyle to keep pace with her demanding schedule, though she admits to the occasional indulgence. Sitting in a west London restaurant, she highlights her love for Ruffles crisps, noting that when the salt-to-potato ratio is exactly right, they are perfect. This focus on discipline extends to her professional life; she even utilizes an infra-red sauna to assist in her internal healing process. The ridged American brand Ruffles, as we sit talking in a quiet corner of a west London restaurant, c ynthia Erivo is contemplating her favourite crisps. She is known for her healthy lifestyle, but everyone, it seems, has their vices. “Ruffles are just perfect,” she says. “When you get a good batch, and the salt-to-potato ratio is perfect … it’s amazing.”, dressed all in black and sporting her signature elongated nails. Erivo bristles when I ask if she was hesitant about picking up a role so associated with someone else. “I get asked that question a lot,” she says. But you’ve not picked up a Shakespeare before, you now have to learn a new language, if you’re a kid who is just really talented. In her forthcoming memoir, Erivo recalls being asked at Rada to sing the parts of a white student who was ill, but rather than being replaced was allowed to mime along. “The powers that be took my voice away and gave it to someone else,” is how she described it.
Her schedule remains intense. Recently, she performed in Phoenix, Arizona, after attending the Dior show at Paris Fashion Week. Her professional range remains vast, underscored by her performance in the London Marathon earlier this year, followed immediately by a stage run of Dracula where she performed all 23 roles—a feat she managed by practicing her lines during grueling training sessions. Erivo has just touched down after singing in Phoenix, Arizona, the night before, and has been running me through the health routine that helps her maintain her frantic schedule.
Erivo is currently promoting her new legal drama, Prima Facie. The film is an adaptation of Suzie Miller’s one-woman play, which previously saw Jodie Comer receive acclaim in 2022. Addressing any suggestions of hesitation regarding taking on such a well-established role, Erivo emphasizes that she does not concern herself with the prior work of others. She values respect but is committed to making the character of Tessa her own. Only her own prepacked meals, erivo doesn’t drink alcohol (today she orders some peppermint tea); she’s vegan; she doesn’t eat airline food. The pair actually met at a fashion dinner and spoke about the role – “Not asking any tips or anything” – and Erivo insists she was always going to make Tessa her own. “I’m never worried about what someone else has done,” she says. “I try to be respectful.”. According to erivo, The incident showed how at Rada there could often be “a deep misunderstanding of what it is like to need money”, which is something she is trying to address in the role she has held since 2024 as vice-president of the institution. “I want it to be different,” she says. “Rada is not an easy place to go to school. That’s a big shift from doing plays at school.”. Later publishing an anti-racism action plan and appointing David Harewood president alongside Erivo, in 2020 Rada apologised for institutional racism.
In the film, Erivo portrays a successful barrister who frequently defends men accused of sexual violence. Her character is adept at finding inconsistencies in victim testimony, rendering the prospect of proving guilt beyond a reasonable doubt nearly impossible for the prosecution. However, the narrative takes a dark turn when Tessa herself is raped by a colleague, forcing her to confront the harsh realities of the British legal system. Tessa knows how to dance around the courtroom – and the victim – raising inconsistencies that mean convicting a man “beyond reasonable doubt” becomes almost impossible. According to tessa,, Erivo, doesn’t see how hard it is for anyone to recall traumatic events in detail, or how lopsided the system is, until it’s swallowing her whole. “I don’t think she realises that until she’s on the other side.
The story underscores significant systemic issues. According to Rape Crisis, women have a one in four chance of being sexually assaulted, yet only 2.7% of reported cases result in conviction. Suzie Miller, a former barrister, wrote the play based on her own professional experience, realizing the extreme difficulty of winning sexual assault cases in court.
Erivo hopes the film will spark a broader conversation, particularly concerning the legal definition of consent. She believes that the current discourse is often unclear, stating, “If a person isn’t conscious, they’re not saying yes.” Her goal is for the film to reach both legal professionals and the general public, encouraging a more definitive understanding of consent. According to is Erivo hopeful the film can have a lasting impact? “We have had judges see it, we’ve had lawyers see it, [but] one of the major issues is the way we view consent,”, Erivo. “I hope that as this film filters out, we start to have a conversation not just among us as people, but within law.”. So people were like: ‘She doesn’t care.’”, i’m falling asleep in class.
This portrayal of a woman navigating a challenging legal environment mirrors Erivo’s own experiences in the entertainment industry. Her time at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (Rada) was defined by the struggle of balancing her studies with the need to work multiple jobs to survive. While classmates from more affluent backgrounds could focus solely on their education, Erivo worked at the Stratford East theatre, often finding herself exhausted. After arriving at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art (Rada), Erivo had to traverse a strange world, deeply rooted in tradition and privilege that she wasn’t exposed to growing up in south London. But also the subtler demands of R&B, it’s a tool capable of the grandstanding volume needed for musical theatre.
She recalls a significant missed opportunity during her training: she had to decline a two-week role as a backing singer for Westlife that would have provided £10,000, enough to cover her tuition. Her request for leave to take the job was rejected by the registrar, illustrating the rigidity of the institution she navigated.
Her talent was evident early on. James Norton, who studied in the same year at Rada, remembered how she would occasionally start singing, silencing the room. Before her rise to fame, she performed in various venues, eventually gaining widespread recognition for her 2015 Broadway role as Celie in The Color Purple, a performance that surprised critics who expected little from the production. According to james Norton was in Erivo’s year at Rada and recently recalled how she would occasionally burst into song, something she had been doing since her school days in Clapham, where she’d perform Brandy and Monica’s The Boy Is Mine in the playground. “The room would go completely silent,”, Norton, which is no surprise because despite Erivo being little over 5ft tall, she possesses a gigantic voice.
Erivo has also faced public scrutiny regarding her interactions with peers. When faced with online criticism labeling her a bodyguard to Ariana Grande after an incident, she rejected the narrative, feeling her humanity was being ignored. She remains frustrated by the expectation that people in the public eye must silently endure such invasive commentary, arguing that the recent treatment she received crossed a line. She emphasizes that she was simply acting in a human capacity, and the public reaction to her actions felt remarkably aggressive.
