Dax Shepard Asks Cynthia Erivo About Butt-Wiping Habits With Her Nails

Everybody wants to know the same thing about Cynthia Erivo’s signature long nails.

The Wicked star, who has been sporting talon nails while promoting the new fantasy musical, was asked by Dax Shepard how she uses the bathroom with her ultra-long nails during an interview on the Monday, November 18, episode of the “Armchair Expert” podcast. And, well, it turns out, he’s not the only one curious.

“Can I ask you a really crazy question that’s inappropriate?” Shepard, 49, asked the U.K.-born actress.

Erivo, 37, invited Shepard to proceed with his line of questioning, but she quickly realized where things were going.

“When you’re wiping your butt—” the podcast host began saying before Erivo interjected, “I knew you would ask that question. Everybody asks that question!”

“Nobody uses just their fingers to wipe their backside. You use tissue. Correct? And you wipe,” Erivo explained her bathroom routine.

“Does the tissue go on the fingernails?” Shepard then asked. “Pads of the fingers,” Erivo responded.

Shepard probed if Erivo ever feels a “tingle” around her backside because of her nails. “No, because the tissue’s there,” she said.

Shepard asked Erivo if she was offended by the question. The Oscar nominee admitted that she was “annoyed” by the question.

Related: ‘Wicked: Part 2’ 2025 Release Date Gets Bumped Up

After nearly 10 years of development, the long-awaited film adaptation of Broadway’s Wicked is finally on the way. The film version of the musical, a theatrical staple since its 2004 Broadway debut, has been in development since 2012. Wicked, based on Gregory Maguire’s 1995 novel Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of […]

“I’m like, ‘Come on, guys.’ But I get it. But it’s also like, I’m a functioning adult and I’ve never walked around smelling like, you know…” Erivo said. “People are bold. People are like, ‘How do you get anything done with those nails?’ I’m like, ‘I mean, I’m here. I’m dressed.’”

Erivo’s striking manicures have been a highlight of the Wicked press tour and befitting the magic of the new movie. Erivo plays Elphaba opposite Ariana Grande as Glinda. The pair became close friends while rehearsing for and filming Wicked in London in 2022.

“I feel really inspired by her fierce ability to be truthful and protect herself,” Grande told The New York Times earlier in November of her bond with Erivo. “Just by being around her, I have become more of an ally to myself when I used to do a lot of self-abandoning, and I really do credit that to our friendship.”

For her part, Erivo said of Grande, “I don’t know if she knows, but she’s definitely changed my life. I think it was one of the first times a person looked at me and just was happy with what was there. I would tell her about what I wanted for myself as a musician and she just believed it, I think more than I did. I don’t think it was up until I met her that I was like, ‘Oh, I think I can have what I want in this lifetime, and I can have it in my way.’”