‘Wicked’: Witches Get Stuff Done. Also Cynthia Erivo Is God

It was a wonderful day in Oz when the Wicked Witch of the West died, or so you’d think from the celebratory mood of the residents of Munchkinland. Every man, woman and child were whooping with joy, crying tears of relief, tearing down terrifying posters of the green-hued tyrant like they’d been liberated from the second coming of Stalin. Thank god that a young woman from the exotic, faraway paradise known as “Kansas” found that lethal bucket of H2O! Rejoice, you petite friends of Dorothy. The reign of terror had finally come to end.

Yet there was one voice that did not add to the deafening chorus of “Ding dong!” Her name was Glinda, and in terms of witches, she was very much on the good side. Descending upon the throng in her giant pink bubble, the sorceress with the kind heart and three-octave range agreed that a new day was dawning in Oz. So why the slight tinge of sorrow in her announcement? A voice from the crowd spoke up: Didn’t you know her, Glinda? Is it true you were her [gasp] friend?! Well, ok, yes, the good witch admitted. She did room with her at school, so very, very long ago. And the lady in the tall, pointy black hat wasn’t always so, y’know, wicked. But perhaps this is a backstory best told in song….

When author Gregory Maguire first suggested in his 1995 novel Wicked that the enemy of Dorothy, so memorably depicted in The Wizard of Oz, might not have been a villain so much as a victim, it was a clever stab at a revisionist I.P. history. Not until Stephen Schwartz and Winnie Holzman’s juggernaut of a musical entered, stage left, onto Broadway eight years later did the idea that maybe, just maybe, we’ve completely misjudged this iconic character enter the mainstream. Now, in a world where virtually every theater kid can belt out a passable version of “Popular,” more folks know Oz’s Public Enemy No. 1 as a gravity-defying antihero than a monster with Margaret Hamilton’s cackle. Fans have been patiently waiting for the screen version of Wicked for decades now, and it’s safe to say that their faith will be rewarded. It’s also obvious that as much as this is still a tale of two witches, each blessed with equally beautiful voices, there’s a very clear standout here that’s lifting this occasionally leaden jazz-hands-extravaganza up to higher ground.

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From the moment Elphaba entered the world, the tiny, green-skinned baby was viewed as a freak. Yet even as a child (Karis Musangole), she displayed wit, intelligence, empathy, and supernatural talents that suggested was different in more ways than one. Still, the college-age Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) is merely a chaperone for her younger paraplegic sister/apple of dad’s eye, Nessarose (Marissa Bode). When the family arrives at Shiz University to drop Nessa off, however, Elphaba’s impulsive, angry use of her gifts attracts the attention of the institution’s expert in magic, Madame Morrible (Michelle Yeoh). She senses an alpha witch in the making. So even though Elphaba is not officially enrolled, Morrible wants to train her. All she needs is a place to stay. Luckily, some try-hard newbie in pink has been bragging about how she has a single suite. Bingo! They can be roommates.

Never mind that Glinda (Ariana Grande) and Elphaba hate each other, and the last thing this entitled goody-two-glitter-shoes wants is some outsider outshining her and living in her space. “Something’s wrong,” Glinda trills, concerned. “I didn’t get my way.” The two have to make the best of a horrible situation, and the frenemy dynamic is already well-established before the good witch’s human-sideye sidekicks, played by Bowen Yang and Bronwyn James, purposefully unload a humiliating black hat on Elphaba. Eventually, the super-popular Glinda decides to give her roomie an unsolicited makeover. [Editor’s note: Don’t be offended by her frank analysis, just think of it as a personality dialysis.] She also helps turn Elphaba’s Elaine-Benes-at-a-wedding dance during a school function into the hottest new foxtrot in Oz. Soon, the pair are inseparable.

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Meanwhile, over in Emerald City: The Wizard — you remember him, all-powerful dictator, really just a blustery grifter, pay no attention to him when he’s behind the curtain — has heard there’s a student over at Shiz who has the potential to read a rare spellbook and turn it into a weapon. Elphaba is invited for a personal visit. She takes Glinda along for the trip. And once both witches-in-training are in the presence of His Wizardness (Jeff Goldblum), it becomes apparent that both of them have to make a choice about what side of the rainbow they will respectively end up on.

There are, of course, a number of other factors happening over, under and through Wicked‘s main good-vs.-bad plotline, including the arrival of a handsome party-boy prince named Fiyero (Jonathan Bailey) who causes a hormonal uproar at school; Nessarose falling for a suitor (Ethan Slater), who has eyes for Glinda; and bigotry against talking animals, including Peter Dinklage’s scholarly goat, that eventually devolves to mass deportation and is as allegorically heavy-handed as it is eerily, nightmarishly timely. Director Jon M. Chu has dabbled in everything from mid-level franchise entries (G.I. Joe: Retaliation) to crowd-pleasing rom-coms (Crazy Rich Asians), but he has a thing for musicals, with both two Step Up movies and a dizzying take on Lin-Manuel Miranda’s In the Heights under his belt. The bigger set pieces seem to be a better fit for his more-is-more sensibility, which is why a comparatively minor showstopper like “Dancing Through Life” gets an acrobatic, Busby Berkeley-style staging, complete with rotating ladder wheels, and a mostly solo hit like “Popular” feels like it’s over before it’s really begun.

Not that you really need elaborate bells and whistles for that number — it’s all about who’s singing it and if they’re nailing the right wink-nudge spin of the lyrics, which is why you cast Ariana Grande. The singer has made no secret that she’s been pining to play this role for close to a decade, and you get the sense that she shares Glinda’s need to prove herself, if not the character’s grating self-centeredness. If Grande occasionally seems a little stiff doing the physical comedy bits and relies on the 1939’s version’s fluttering high notes as a punch line a tad too much, she’s completely at home belting out a theater-kid perennial like this one. The woman has incomparable pipes. She’s also a charitable screen partner, knowing when to goose scenes with Erivo for effect and when to cede the spotlight so her counterpart can shine just that much brighter. They’re an extremely complimentary team. Just not exactly, shall we say, an equal one.

This is the part where we risk damning the bulk of Wicked with faint praise in favor of lavishing over-the-moon accolades on one performer in particular. And to be sure, this high-fidelity screen adaptation has its perks outside of a single above-the-title star. Witches get stuff done. There are Easter eggs for both longtime fans of classic film and the original-cast run, and though IMDb may have already given away the “secret” cameos, we’ll just say that there’s a nice passing of the torch here. It has the sort of manic, let’s-put-on-a-show energy that makes for good musical theater, even if it never gets close to Freed-Unit levels of inspiration and verve that you associate with the golden age of screen musicals. The powers that be have dropped the “Part 1” from the title, but it’s still been bifurcated, for better or worse, so prepare to end on a cliffhanger and report back to the theater next November for Part 2. The first half may feel stronger as part of a whole rather than an opening half.

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But much like the story within the movie itself, there’s someone who clearly has something extra-special she’s bringing to the party, and draws you deep into Wicked‘s emotional orbit regardless of whether or not you know the lyrics to “I’m Not That Girl” by heart. Cynthia Erivo has already established herself as a singer, a stage performer and a screen presence extraordinaire, whether she’s a supporting-role dynamo or the best part of an otherwise so-so project. What she’s doing here with Elphaba is, quite simply, magical. Erivo can go big, filling up a frame with sound and fury when needed. But she can also give you so much by simply moving her eyes, slightly adjusting her jaw, tilting her head back in a way that suggests pride, or unexpected joy, or a rage that’s on the verge of spilling over. It’s hard to think of a recent turn in a big look-at-me studio movie, much less a brash movie musical, that manages to be so simultaneously buoyant and grounding. It’s not so much that Wicked doesn’t rise to meet her. It’s more like Erivo keeps soaring higher and higher above it.

This is why it makes a cockeyed sense to break Wicked into two distinct parts, even if a year-long intermission will likely break whatever spell the film casts on those who aren’t already true believers. But it also means we end with “Defying Gravity,” the Act 1 swan song that separates the musical-theater dilettantes from the legends. (Had the O.G. wicked witch Idina Menzel not recorded “Let It Go,” this would be the first thing you’d bring up in terms of her go-for-broke chops.) In so many ways, Erivo seems built to take on a song like this, not just in terms of hitting the notes but showing the way the song takes the character’s arc to the next logical step. It is not just the song in which Elphaba breaks bad, but the one in which she finally breaks free. And when Erivo nails that moment and rides into Oz’s history books on a broomstick, for a split second you feel like there’s no place you’d rather be than riding alongside her. Not even home.