ET spoke with the singer and actress after her special performance at the 2023 ESPY Awards.
If there's one thing H.E.R. is going to do, it's wow a crowd.
The 26-year-old singer delivered a stunning performance during Wednesday's 2023 ESPY Awards, playing her latest single, the elegant power ballad "The Journey," as a tribute to the 30th anniversary of basketball coach Jimmy Valvano's inspirational speech at the first ESPYS in 1993 when he was terminally ill with cancer.
Valvano was an American college basketball player, coach and broadcaster who served as head coach at North Carolina State University and led his team to win the 1983 NCAA men's basketball title against the heavily favored Houston Cougars.
Per Billboard, Valvano's famous speech implored the audience to laugh, think and cry each day. He also announced the formation of the V Foundation for Cancer Research, whose motto would be "Don't give up. Don't ever give up." Valvano died less than two months later, on April 28, 1993, from adenocarcinoma.
ET spoke with the singer fresh off the stage of her performance, where she shared how special the experience was for her.
"This is my first time at the ESPYS and to be able to perform for a moment like that, the 30-year anniversary of that impactful speech, it was just so fitting with the song and the message," she says. "Everybody has a journey [and] for it to be told in this way, on this stage, is really really special for me. An honor for me and I'm a huge sports fan, so the fact that I'm here is like, wow. I'm fangirling!"
It's a time of many firsts for H.E.R., who will embark on an entirely new journey when the holidays come around. She'll begin promoting her first-ever feature film, The Color Purple. The Blitz Bazawule-directed reimagining of the story made iconic in the 1982 Pulitzer Prize-winning novel by Alice Walker, the 1985 Warner Bros. Pictures film and the Tony Award-winning stage musical, hits theaters on Dec. 25.
H.E.R. makes her big-screen debut as Squeak alongside Fantasia Barrino, who also makes her major motion picture debut by reprising the role of adult Celie, which she first portrayed in her Broadway debut in 2007 and won a Theatre World Award for, and Danielle Brooks, who stars as Sofia, a role that she played on Broadway during the 2015 revival production, which earned her a Tony Award nomination.
The rest of the star-studded cast includes Taraji P. Henson as Shug Avery, Colman Domingo as Mister, Phylicia Mpasi as Young Celie, Corey Hawkins as Harpo, Louis Gossett Jr. as Ol' Mister, David Alan Grier as Reverend Avery, Tamela J. Mann as First Lady, Halle Bailey as Young Nettie, Ciara as Adult Nettie, Deon Cole as Alfonso and Stephen Hill as Buster.
When ET's Nichelle Turner asked her what fans can look forward to experiencing with the upcoming musical film, H.E.R. quipped that viewers can expect something new that "celebrates the story."
"It's not necessarily just another rendition, it's a celebration of the story," she vows. "This is not your mother's Color Purple, this a new one, you know? And it's amazing."
With such an impressive cast, it's not surprising that the singer recalled learning many lessons from the seasoned stars starring alongside her.
"I learned so much. You know, Taraji is amazing, [so are] Fantasia, Halle Bailey, Danielle Brooks and Oprah. I was fangirling over Oprah!" she admits, beaming. "The whole experience was insane. I can't wait for people to experience it."
Steven Spielberg and Quincy Jones serve as producers alongside Oprah Winfrey, a full-circle moment for the trio since Spielberg directed the film adaptation in which Winfrey made her film debut, and Jones produced.
H.E.R. recalled her experience with Winfrey behind the scenes, sharing how the former talk show host gave her advice while on set. "It's so amazing because she was so vulnerable with us and she didn't even talk about necessarily her successes, but she taught us about the beginning," the singer says. "[She shared] what she might have felt [were] not necessarily failures but just the beginning, you know, when you're not Oprah, yet."
"And she talked about how her name wasn't even on the original [movie's] flyer, so that was really special for her to share and to see her progress now, and it's important to see people's journeys," H.E.R. adds. "It's important to see and understand that things just don't happen, you gotta work hard for it. So she gave us that advice and told us those stories and they were very inspiring."
Called a "revival" by Winfrey during the trailer's presentation, the film tells the powerful and heartbreaking story of Celie, a young Black woman living in the South from the early to mid-1900s, who finds strength in an extraordinary sisterhood and unbreakable bond.
"The reason this moment is so important is because for as long as there is a need for self-discovery, self-empowerment, as long as there's a need for victory in someone's life, as long as there's a need for people to know what it feels like to be loved up and to be made full and whole through somebody's love, there will be a need for The Color Purple," Winfrey told journalists.
The Color Purple opens in theaters on Dec. 25.
RELATED CONTENT:
