Photo Credit: Getty Images
Cynthia Erivo is opening up about one of the most defining, and painful, moments of her life. In a heartfelt interview for Harper's Bazaar's November 2025 cover story, the Wicked: For Good star revisited her strained relationship with her father, revealing that he disowned her and her sister when she was just 16. Now 38, Erivo says she has long made peace with the absence.
"I don't know what my life would be like if he was still around, and I can't say whether it would be better or worse," she admitted. "Better not to find out. I've never daydreamed about that, because it's not going to happen—and the life that I have, I am so happy in it."
Erivo and her younger sister were raised in London by their mother, Edith, after their parents fled Nigeria during the civil war in the late 1960s. The moment of rejection, she recalled, became a strange turning point—one that taught her to find strength in vulnerability and to lean into honesty as both an artist and a woman.
This isn't the first time Erivo has spoken about her father's departure. In a 2021 interview with The Glossary, she revealed that he told them he was cutting ties "in the middle of a tube station." The last time she saw him, she said, was ten years ago at a cousin's wedding. That experience inspired her emotional ballad "You're Not Here" from her debut album Ch. 1 Vs. 1, where she sings about learning to live with loss.
"There's a part of me that wishes I could have my dad in my life," she said then. "But there's also a part of me that's comfortable knowing he won't be."
Still, she carries gratitude for the men who have stepped in with kindness and care. In a Father's Day post, Erivo wrote, "Those who show up have filled that room over and over."
For Erivo, forgiveness isn't about forgetting, it's about filling the silence with music, truth, and peace.
