the Wicked post
by popular (--ler? lar?) demand
It’s impossible to write about Wicked in any way that or interesting or new. Everything that could be said has been said, screamed, belted, vibrato’d. Even so, my friend Andrea assumed I would cover it in this newsletter, and I am nothing if not a people pleaser, so I’ll lay out all my thoughts here and then they will all be laid out here. (spoilers? obv?)
THE SHOW
I saw the show on Broadway when I was thirteen and HOO BOY did it take up residence in the lizard part of my brain. I wore my hair in a braid every day for at least a month to Elphie-at-Shiz myself, and it was certainly a contributing factor in my years-long half-hearted attempt at vegetarianism.
Of course I tried to read the book. It’s a canon event. You see the show, you pick up a copy of Gregory Maguire’s book and realize it’s dark and graphic. I got about twenty pages in before thinking, “hmm, this is not for me,” skipping to the sex scene (Book Fiyero has blue gems in his skin), then putting it away forever. All girls must, at some point around puberty, have their minds blown by reading a cult classic paperback with sex stuff, be it Flowers in the Attic, Forever, Emmanuelle, The Thorn Birds, The Other Boleyn Girl, Clan of the Cave Bear, or Wicked. For me, it was The Red Tent, and later, The Mists of Avalon. Hm, maybe I should write about this tradition.
Idina and KChen ARE Elphie and Galinda to me, there will never be another(s).
Elphaba is a NUTS difficult role, physically.
“Defying Gravity” is one of the all-time great musical theater songs.
…as are “For Good,” “Popular,” and “The Wizard and I”
Calling this an “easter egg” is weird but yeah, Stephen Schwartz goated with the sauce.
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Enable 3rd party cookies or use another browserAre Glinda and Elphaba in full sapphic love with each other? Well, it’s a complicated question. On the one hand, yes. On the other, yes they are.
THE PRESS TOUR AND PRODUCTION
I was initially skeptical of the decision to split the show into two parts. Not skeptical. I thought it was idiotic. The second act is not as good as the first, both in terms of having fewer banger songs and a weaker story. But this is true of many musicals. After watching Part One, I see the vision. It’s an epic.
When the cast was announced, I wasn’t against Ariana Grande, per se, but I had been hoping that Dove Cameron would land the role. Honestly, I’d still like to see The Dove Edit, but I have no beef with Ari. Cynthia Erivo, though obviously in possession of the vocal chops, read as too old to me. Some people can pass for younger than they are and I didn’t think Erivo was one of them (the story starts when the two women are in college). But I’ll tell ya, she impressed me. She aged herself down really well. Jonathan Bailey was born for this, no notes.
I have no idea what really went down with Ariana Grande and Ethan Slater and their respective spouses, but it amuses me greatly that, in the show, Slater plays a guy who can’t appreciate the nice girl who loves him because he is too focused on the shiny princess, played by Grande..
The press tour has gone on way too long. It got good and now it’s annoying again. Press tours should stop when the movie comes out. “Holding Space” took off because it typified the way people had utterly run out of things to say about this movie and yet the press tour was still ongoing.
The poster photoshop thing was the dumbest and worst blunder I’ve seen in a minute. Not only was Erivo wrong on every level factually (posters are made for mass consumption and it’s a picture of Elphaba made to look like another picture of Elphaba, not of Cynthia), it was pretty bizarre for her to equate it to questions about anatomy or like, actual harassment. I can only imagine the racism that she has faced in her career that make her sensitive to such things, but she is a grown woman who should understand that not everything is about her and there’s a vast difference between a fan edit and, you know, actually offensive images. Wicked has such strong messaging around resisting propaganda, looking past appearances and questioning power structures, and sometimes it’s best to let the art speak for itself and not make a stink over every little thing. And ma’am, you’re the face of a blockbuster. It’s 2024. There are going to be memes you don’t love. Was this not explained when you signed up? You don’t have to like it but there are some rants that should be saved for your journal.
THE MOVIE
It’s its own thing. It could be bad, great, anything in between, and it wouldn’t take away from what the show is, which is wonderful. But, it’s pretty good! Long but doesn’t feel like a slog, the world-building and visual design are excellent (if not the color grading), there’s a lot of respect for the original material but it still feels fresh and cinematic, the story beats land and the actors sell it even during some of the more ridiculous bits (it’s always going to be a stretch when the emotional catalyst of your plot is a talking goat).
Every time Jon M. Chu showed the back of someone’s head while they were singing I wanted to scream. You don’t turn away from the audience. And now that you’re aware of this habit you won’t be able to un-see it and I’m sorry.
Chu could have done more with the fact that he has a camera. Other than a brief dream projection during “The Wizard and I” and a split-screen/montage during “What Is This Feeling?” there was not a lot of Movie Stuff. Gimme a Birdman-y oner scene transition! Cross-dissolve! Find any other way to stitch different takes together besides cutting the back of the actor’s head.
He broke up the momentum of some of the songs with dialogue? It didn’t irk me in the theater but seeing people’s reactions, I do understand why it might have been a bit much.
There is one bad performance in Wicked and it’s Michelle Yeoh as Madame Morrible. This is a common opinion. It’s not (just) that she isn’t a strong singer (I don’t think the part demands a golden voice), she’s also taking the material far too seriously. It’s a musical about witches, it’s supposed to be camp! That said, still love Michelle Yeoh in general. Here’s my real issue... Carole Shelley, who originated the role on Broadway, is sadly deceased, and though I personally would have loved to see Carol Kane, the first National Tour Morrible, she’s a tad old and probably wrong for the tone. (Christine Baranski, tho…) BUT OKAY, the filmmakers clearly wanted a woman of color who was Having A Moment to make this, frankly, oddly shaped role work. Michelle Yeoh, who won an Oscar while they were in the middle of filming, probably seemed like a great fit. But there was a greater one staring them in the face: SHERYL LEE RALPH, FOR THE LOVE OF ALL THAT IS BROADWAY! A thousand times more than I want to see Dove Cameron’s Glinda, I am dying for a version of Wicked with Sheryl, who played the part on Broadway, is currently a network TV darling, and simply drips with the diva glamour the role requires. Look at her smash it off the cuff, I just…
There is are above and beyond performances in Wicked, and the first is Baby Nessarose, who has one line (“yeah”), which is the perfect amount of lines for a child to have. She’s become the internet’s new It Girl and she absolutely deserves it because she is the cutest and sweetest thing on the planet and I would die for her, no big.
The second is Peter Dinklage, who is given the unenviable task of voicing a talking goat and really voices the hell out of that talking goat!
Oscar buzz? I don’t care. I don’t. But Jonathan Bailey will get the Golden Globe or we riot.
IS THAT ENOUGH??? ANNIE????
Lizzie
PS: Earlier this year, I strongly recommended the British show Stath Lets Flats, which I watched when it was on HBO’s streaming service. However, in my recommendation, I noted that it had since been removed from that platform and was generally unavailable. Well, update, IT IS CURRENTLY ON PEACOCK. WATCH IT BEFORE IT DISAPPEARS AGAIN.