Review by J1 Reporter Elizabeth Wepfer

Perhaps you have seen the Broadway musical or read the book, or maybe you’ve only ever heard of it, but it’s safe to say that “Wicked” is an absolute sensation. I’ve met few people who haven’t heard about it and its splendor. But does the movie do it justice?

Many movies based on books or musicals make attempts to remix the original by going off script or cutting scenes, but “Wicked,” directed by Jon M. Chu, expanded on the original musical and the book, as opposed to trying to make a unique experience. Scenes that were shorter in the musical were longer and had more time to be processed and felt. It stayed pretty loyal to the musical in terms of not cutting scenes or songs.

In Part 1—or Act 1–the story begins with the town of Munchkinland celebrating the death of the Wicked Witch of the West, and a witch adorned in pink, Glinda, played by Ariana Grande, tells the residents of this village about her time with the Wicked Witch—Elphaba, played by Cynthia Erivo. She is explained to have been born green and with supernatural power.

When Elphaba’s sister, Nessarose, goes to attend a prestigious school—Shiz—she comes for support and ends up being picked up by their magic teacher after she makes a scene with her powers. During this time in Oz, animals were being oppressed and silenced. Elphaba, feeling that this was wrong, works her way to a point where she can visit the Wizard of Oz in attempts to fix this problem. After learning it was him behind the animal ban, she runs away to solve the problem herself.

Along this wild journey, her roommate Galinda—later to be named Glinda—goes from enemies to best friends with her and the two endure this craziness together until they are separated at the end of Act 1/Part 1. Now that all that background is over, onto actually talking about the movie.

The music in this 2024 rendition was amazing. It sounded similar to the original songs but with new talent. The singing was phenomenal from both Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo. The opening song “No One Mourns the Wicked” felt just like the opening of the musical. Although the transition from singing to talking and vice versa was much smoother in the movie, it is a lot rougher on the soundtrack on Spotify and other platforms.

The scenery in the musical is intricate and unique to the production, and the movie does a great job at replicating that uniqueness. The Emerald City felt huge, busy, and full of opportunity—the way it is meant to be felt. Shiz felt elegant and prestigious, like it really cost a lot to attend. Munchkinland felt homely and small. All of the scenery was on point and helped add to the story. 

The acting was excellent as well. The emotions felt raw and the mannerisms of the characters felt natural. During the scene where Elphaba is at the Ozdust party in particular felt incredibly emotional and real.

Spoilers ahead—During this scene, Elphaba had essentially been given a pointy, ugly hat as a joke from Galinda/Glinda. Because Elphaba believed this to be an act of kindness, she pulls some strings to get Galinda/Glinda into her magic class with her.

When she attends the party, her green skin and odd attire makes her the center of attention and a sort of bubble forms around her as if everyone is afraid to be near her. She tries to act as if she doesn’t notice and starts dancing anyway but Galinda/Glinda notices how she’s getting emotional and joins her in the bubble to make her feel less alone.

The scene is mostly silent but it does a great job of illustrating Elphaba’s feelings of embarrassment and sadness and Galinda’s feeling of shame after having been cruel to her when Elphaba had just helped fulfill Galinda’s dreams.

Major spoilers over. One of the most iconic moments in “Wicked,” the musical, is the sequence during “Defying Gravity” where Elphaba flies up on a broom and a long cape flows behind her while she sings. The movie ends with this scene and recreates it surprisingly well. I was worried the iconic moment may not be possible without the closeness of the stage to frame it but I was wrong. Although it looked better in the musical in the fog and the green of Elphaba’s skin standing out against the darkness, the movie did a lot better than I had expected.

Some have argued that the musical felt way too long, considering just the first part is longer than the entire musical. I believe that the movie did a great job of replicating the original Broadway musical into a movie without changing everything amazing about its, even if it was long.

It felt like it was an expansion of the musical as opposed to a “movie adaptation.” You can tell that there was a lot of passion put into it, with the sets being built by hand, actual auditions being held to find the right talent for it and little Easter eggs alluding to the original broadway production—like the cameo of Idina Menzel and Kristin Chenoweth, who were the original Glinda and Elphaba on Broadway. It was so good, in fact, I might just see it again with my family.