Cynthia Erivo and Jennifer Hudson had a reunion to sing about, okay!

The two actresses, who starred in the 2015 revival of “ The color purple – were together again in the Wednesday, November 27 episode The Jennifer Hudson Showwhere they remembered their experiences on stage and even started singing.

It was an emotional experience for Erivo, who had tears in her eyes as she looked at photos of her time in the musical with Hudson. “Why do I feel like I’m going to cry?” she said before the screams came, later telling Hudson that she was emotional. “It was a really long journey. The young lady there had no idea what was in front of her. She was just trying to get through every show.”

But Hudson saw more than that. The EGOT winner praised Erivo, telling the audience that Erivo “sung to us every night on that set.” Color purple live. I sat there and watched her do it every night.

“You earned your way here, young lady,” Hudson said. “So pick it up and embrace it.”

Erivo, 37, played Celie in the musical adaptation of The color purplealongside Hudson’s Shug Avery. The musical, written by Marsha Norman and based on both the Alice Walker novel and the 1985 Steven Spielberg film, starred Danielle Brooks.

All three actresses made their Broadway debut in the show, which opened on December 10, 2015 and ran until January 8, 2017. Erivo subsequently won a Tony Award for her role, as well as a Grammy Award for Casting the Show Album and a Daytime Emmy Award for performing a song from the show Today.

After her stage success, Erivo launched a career on the screen. She has been nominated for an Oscar twice and is currently starring in the film adaptation of ” Evilwhich will undoubtedly be one of the biggest films of the year.

It’s an incredible journey, especially considering Erivo never thought she’d make it to Broadway. She starred in John Doyle’s revival of ” The color purple at the Menier Chocolate Factory in London, but didn’t think the producers were serious about transferring it to the Great White Way.

“I thought they were joking,” she told Hudson, 43. “We did the show in London in a really small 200-seat theater. And I enjoyed doing that. And then on press night, one of the producers said, “Would you take it to Broadway?” And I thought he was just being nice. I said, “Oh, that’s nice.” … ‘If you want me,’ I said.”

Things only dawned when Erivo boarded her plane to move to New York. “I didn’t believe it until I was actually at the airport with a ticket in my hand and had to get on the plane,” she said. “When I was on the plane… I realized, ‘Oh, I have to leave the place where I was born to go somewhere.’ I had never done that before.

After reflecting on their time on the show and how they felt when Aretha Franklin came into the theater, the two women sang an excerpt from “What About Love?”

The love ballad sung between Celie and Shug is one of the most popular songs from the musical’s score by Brenda Russell, Allee Willis and Stephen Bray. Famously, this ended Act 1, with the two characters realizing the power of their budding romance.

“I want you to be a story for me that I can believe in forever,” they sing.

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Viewers may also remember the song from the 2023 film adaptation, which starred Fantasia Barrino as Celie and Taraji P. Henson as Shug.

“Do you remember that?” Hudson said afterwards. “It came back! Like old times!”

The Jennifer Hudson Show airs weekdays (see local listings).