Wicked (Movie)

Subterms

    More stories

    • 150 Shares149 Views

      in Movies

      Jon M. Chu Waited 20 Years for the Chance to Direct ‘Wicked’

      by

      On a recent morning, Jon M. Chu was in his office in the Toluca Lake neighborhood of Los Angeles, describing what it was like to direct “Defying Gravity,” the thrilling finale of his forthcoming adaptation of “Wicked.” In the Broadway version of the scene, the green-hued Elphaba, a.k.a. the Wicked Witch of the West, rises above the stage atop a huge platform, its mechanical guts hidden behind an enormous black cape. Onstage, the effect is showstopping.In Chu’s version, however, Elphaba really flies, crashing through windows and barnstorming Oz. “We’re whipping her around with C.G. monkeys and C.G. backgrounds on a physical set,” Chu said. The Wizard’s guards are rushing in, the wind is blasting, and Cynthia Erivo, who plays Elphaba, is performing the signature song live, “even though I said she didn’t have to.”“That scene took all of us,” Chu said. “But without Cynthia, who is just a powerhouse, it would have been all for nothing.”Directing a film adaptation of “Wicked” would be a plum assignment for any fan of American musicals. Since its debut in 2003, “Wicked” has become one of Broadway’s most beloved shows, winning three Tonys and playing to more than 63 million people worldwide, from London’s West End to Tokyo. So how did Chu, who’s done lots of movies with music, but not a whole lot of musicals, get the gig? “I really am a newbie in the musical world,” he admitted. “So I feel like I’m living the theater kid’s dream.”Scenes from a career: Chu’s credits include, clockwise from top left, “Justin Bieber: Never Say Never,” “Step Up 2 the Streets,” “In the Heights” and “Crazy Rich Asians.”Indeed, Chu, 45, has been a lover of musicals dating to his earliest days. As a boy, he regularly saw shows in San Francisco and grew up on a steady diet of film musicals, including “The Sound of Music” (“That was on all the time in our house”) and “Singin’ in the Rain.” An early viewing of “Yankee Doodle Dandy,” the 1942 George M. Cohan biopic, inspired the young fan to start signing his name “Jon M. Chu,” in tribute.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 113 Shares189 Views

      in Theater

      ‘Wicked’ Review: Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande in Oz

      by

      Cynthia Erivo is the strongest draw in this splashy, overly long movie, which is the first installment in a two-part adaptation of the Broadway show.With its flying monkeys and magical shoes, oh my, the story of the Wizard of Oz has been lodged in the popular imagination for over a century. It is, after all, an archetypal American myth: an epic of good and evil, the comfort (and dreariness) of home, the draw (and freedom) of the road, the perils of power and the yearning for transformation. The 1939 film with Judy Garland, in particular, is so embedded in the American cinematic DNA that it’s inspired everyone from Martin Scorsese to David Lynch, Spike Lee and John Waters, who once called (accurately!) the wicked witch “every bad little boy’s and girl’s dream of notoriety and style.”I wonder what Waters will make of “Wicked” and its green-hued, deeply sincere heroine, Elphaba, a ready-made meme machine played by Cynthia Erivo in what becomes a showstopper of a performance. Both the character and the actress are the strongest draws in this splashy, largely diverting, tonally discordant and unconscionably long movie, which is the first installment in a two-part adaptation of the Broadway show “Wicked.” That juggernaut opened at the Gershwin Theater in 2003 and shows no signs of (ever) closing; it will presumably still be raking it in when “Wicked Part Two” is set to open in November 2025.Like the stage musical — Stephen Schwartz wrote the music and lyrics, while Winnie Holzman wrote the book — the movie centers on Elphaba and Glinda, short for Galinda (Ariana Grande, fiercely perky), witches from the enchanted Land of Oz. Written by Holzman and Dana Fox, it opens right after Elphaba, a.k.a. the Wicked Witch of the West, is declared dead. (Dorothy is nowhere to be seen.) Glinda, a.k.a. Glinda the Good, floats in to belt the catchy “No One Mourns the Wicked,” and subsequently goes down memory lane to relate her and Elphaba’s tale, focusing on their tenure at Shiz University, a campus populated by a hardworking ensemble and anchored by a waterfront, Disney-esque turreted castle.“Wicked” is based on Gregory Maguire’s 1995 novel “Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West,” and the big surprise in each work is that Elphaba isn’t as bad as her reputation. Hers is a classic saga of misunderstanding retooled for contemporary sensibilities, a chronicle of alienation and belonging, inchoate desire and heavy-handed moralizing that, onscreen, begins in Munchkinland when her father was the governor, her mother was a cheat and Elphaba the inconvenient result. At some point, her mother dies, as they do in fairy tales, and Elphaba grows into a sober, bespectacled child the color of farm-fresh asparagus (Karis Musongole) and, in short order, a serious, very talented melancholic.The director Jon M. Chu opens “Wicked” big and only goes bigger, at times to a fault. His credits include “Crazy Rich Asians” and the musical “In the Heights,” but “Wicked” is a horse of another color and it’s filled with huge sets, some dozen musical numbers and many moving parts that generations of fans know intimately. From the start, Chu gives “Wicked” an accelerated pace, amping it with restless, swooping camerawork and overloading it with a surfeit of everything, with ceaselessly moving bodies and eye-popping props. There’s much to ooh and ahh over, be it Elphaba’s eyeglasses with their seashell spiral or her beautiful Issey Miyake-style pleats, but Chu’s revved-up maximalism doesn’t leave much room to savor it.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 88 Shares129 Views

      in Movies

      Singing ‘Wicked’ Fans Are Anything but Popular

      by

      Some fans who have attended early screenings of the film adaptation of the hit Broadway musical have treated it as a singalong. Not everyone is thrilled.Angela Weir went into a screening of “Wicked” on Monday night ready to be transported to the Land of Oz. But when Glinda (Ariana Grande) began to sing “Popular,” one of the musical’s early numbers, she was not the only one singing.“It started slow. Then people heard each other — it was like they encouraged each other,” Weir said on Tuesday. “It was a beautiful scene, and then you’re taken out of it.”As anticipation builds for the film’s release on Friday, some fans who have attended early screenings have ignored theater norms to sing right along with their favorite characters, much to the chagrin and annoyance of other “Wicked” enthusiasts. Many have taken to social media to issue a strict edict: Shush.As a debate grew on TikTok and Reddit, a possible solution emerged this week: For those who want to join in on the duet “What Is This Feeling?” between Grande and Cynthia Erivo, who plays Elphaba, more than 1,000 theaters across North America will host singalong screenings starting on Christmas Day.A representative for Universal said the company would not comment on the debate, and the off-key serenades have continued in the meantime.Weir, 35, said the singing at a screening in the suburbs of Charlotte, N.C., was particularly distracting during the movie’s finale, when Elphaba belts out the show’s most famous ballad, “Defying Gravity.”

      @arweirr i did like it tho #wicked #pleasedontsing #oscars ♬ original sound – Angela 🙂↔️

      @jordycray Time and place! #fyp #foryou #wicked #wickedmovie #arianagrande #cynthiaerivo #musical #popculture #popculturenews ♬ original sound – jordycray We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares109 Views

      in Movies

      ‘Barbenheimer’ Ruled the Box Office. Can ‘Glicked’ Recapture the Magic?

      by

      “Wicked” and “Gladiator II” both open Friday, and some fans hope to rekindle the excitement that greeted last year’s simultaneous openings of “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer.”The summer of 2023 was all about “Barbenheimer” — when “Barbie” and “Oppenheimer” opened the same day, capturing the public imagination and bringing crowds back to movie theaters that had struggled since the pandemic.This fall, some fans are hoping to recapture a little of that excitement with a buzzy new movie face-off with its own catchy portmanteau: “Glicked.” (Sorry, “Wickiator.”)“Wicked,” the first installment of the onscreen adaptation of the beloved Broadway musical, and “Gladiator II,” a swords-and-sandals epic directed by Ridley Scott that picks up more than two decades after the first installment, will both be widely released in theaters on Friday. Seeing the potential for another odd pairing at multiplexes, select corners of the internet have dubbed it “Glicked Day” (pronounced glick-id).Can they make “Glicked” happen? Will Elphaba green replace Barbie pink? Here are four questions to get you up to speed.Are the stars of ‘Wicked’ and ‘Gladiator II’ rooting for ‘Glicked’?Yes. Two movies that open on the same day are typically viewed as competitors, but some hope that, like “Barbenheimer,” this unlikely pairing will pique the interest of moviegoers, which could help both succeed at the box office.“If it has a similar effect to what it did for ‘Barbie’ and ‘Oppenheimer,’ it would be amazing,” Paul Mescal, who stars as Lucius in “Gladiator II,” told Entertainment Tonight. He added that “the films couldn’t be more polar opposite, and it worked in that context previously, so fingers crossed people come out.”We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares189 Views

      in Movies

      Mattel Mistakenly Lists Porn Site on Packaging for ‘Wicked’ Dolls

      by

      The site has a similar address to one that promotes a film adaptation of the hit musical. The toymaker apologized for the “unfortunate error.”All may be good in the Land of Oz, but the same can’t be said for the world of Mattel.The toy company’s latest dolls for the movie “Wicked” listed a porn website on its packaging instead of a very similar URL that promotes an upcoming film adaptation of the hit Broadway musical.Mattel, the manufacturer of Barbie and Hot Wheels, said in a statement on Sunday that it was aware of a “misprint” on the box for the dolls, which are primarily sold in the United States. The company said it had intended to direct consumers to the movie’s landing page, not to a URL for a website restricted to people 18 years of age and older.The doll is for children four and up.Mattel expressed deep regret, blamed the mix-up on an “unfortunate error” and vowed to take “immediate action.” But the company did not say how the error had occurred or what action it planned to take.It was not immediately clear early Monday how many of the mislabeled boxes had been distributed to stores. Mattel had not announced a recall or offered a refund to affected customers.The film, starring Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande, is scheduled for release on Nov. 22. Universal Pictures, its distributor, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.A doll from the ‘Wicked’ toy collection.MattelMattel isn’t the first company or public figure to publicly confuse one URL with another.Last week, Pope Francis appeared to paint himself as a New Orleans Saints fan by repeatedly using a hashtag that refers to the football team, not to the venerated disciples of the Roman Catholic Church.“We cannot become #Saints with a frown,” he wrote. “We must have joyful hearts to remain open to hope.”When the Saints beat the Atlanta Falcons on Sunday, breaking a seven-game losing streak, some of their fans saw the win as divine providence.The worlds of politics and media have seen their share of URL fumbles, too.In 2019, an Italian cartoonist known as Albo, whose work includes erotic images, said on Twitter that hundreds of people had mistaken him for Anthony Albanese, an Australian politician who was campaigning to be leader of the country’s Labor Party.Mr. Albanese won that election and is now prime minister. But he is still occasionally mistaken for Albo.In April, for example, Michael Rowland, a presenter for the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, apologized after he mistakenly attributed a comment about Elon Musk to the artist instead of to Mr. Albanese. More

    • 113 Shares99 Views

      in Movies

      The Most Anticipated New Movie Releases in Winter 2024

      by

      From life stories (“A Complete Unknown,” “The Fire Inside”) to animated tales (“Moana 2,” “Mufasa”), these are the films we can’t wait to see this season.November‘EMILIA PÉREZ’ Four actresses — Zoe Saldaña, Karla Sofía Gascón, Selena Gomez and Adriana Paz — shared a prize at Cannes for their performances in this unlikeliest of musicals, about the friendship between a Mexican cartel kingpin (Gascón) and a lawyer (Saldaña) hired to arrange the kingpin’s gender transition. Jacques Audiard directed. (Nov. 13; Netflix)‘HOT FROSTY’ Remember “Mannequin”? This sounds kind of like that, except instead of a mannequin coming to life, it’s a snowman (Dustin Milligan), and instead of Andrew McCarthy, it has Lacey Chabert. (Nov. 13; Netflix)‘ALL WE IMAGINE AS LIGHT’ This film from Payal Kapadia was the first Indian feature to compete at Cannes in 30 years; it won the Grand Jury Prize, effectively second place. It concerns two women (Kani Kusruti and Divya Prabha) in Mumbai. One has a husband living abroad; the other is navigating an interfaith relationship that she strives to keep quiet. (Nov. 15; in theaters)Karla Sofía Gascón, left, is the title drug kingpin and Zoe Saldaña is the lawyer helping arrange her client’s gender transition.Netflix‘ELTON JOHN: NEVER TOO LATE’ The rocket man himself recalls how he soared to stardom in this documentary, shot during preparations for his 2022 appearances at Dodger Stadium, purportedly his final North American concerts. (Nov. 15 in theaters, Dec. 13 on Disney+)‘GHOST CAT ANZU’ Anzu is a big, fluffy, animated talking cat whose antics give Garfield a run for his money in this anime favorite from the festival circuit. (Nov. 15; in theaters)We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 125 Shares149 Views

      in Theater

      A ‘Wicked’ Tearful Talk With Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande

      by

      “Excuse me,” Ariana Grande said, flagging down an imaginary waiter. “May we have one million tissues please?”It was midway through the fittingly witchy month of October, and Grande and Cynthia Erivo had convened at the Chateau Marmont in Los Angeles to discuss their new film “Wicked,” adapted from the long-running Broadway musical. With emotions riding high before its Nov. 22 release, both women teared up frequently while talking about what the movie means to them.On set, things had been no less emotional. “The tears would fall every single time,” Erivo said as she recounted shooting a fraught dance sequence with her co-star. “I didn’t have to try for them, they were always there.”“And I’d catch them,” Grande added.“Wicked” functions as a revisionist prequel to “The Wizard of Oz,” with the director Jon M. Chu’s film following Erivo’s green-skinned Elphaba long before she becomes the Wicked Witch of the West. As a young woman at Shiz University, Elphaba is forced to bunk with Grande’s Glinda, a rival-turned-friend who plots to make over her outcast roommate during the fizzy musical number “Popular.”“Wicked,” out Nov. 22, will be followed by “Wicked Part Two” next year.Universal PicturesBut as Elphaba learns the dark secrets that undergird Oz’s Emerald City, the disillusioned young witch finally steps into her own power and belts “Defying Gravity,” the showstopper that, onstage, is meant to bring down the curtain on the first act. Onscreen, the song serves as the climax of the two-and-a-half-hour movie: The rest of the story is saved for “Wicked Part Two,” which was shot in tandem with the first film and is slated for release next November.We are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More

    • 138 Shares129 Views

      in Theater

      The Wicked Witch of the West: A Heroine for Our Time

      by

      “Wicked,” which arrives to the big screen this fall, redeems the villain who is barely a character in L. Frank Baum’s classic novel.“And what, you may ask, are the reasons why?” Ray Bradbury asked in his foreword for the Kansas Centennial edition of L. Frank Baum’s classic novel. “‘The Wizard of Oz’ will never die?”More than 20 years after the musical “Wicked” became a Broadway megahit, the first part of big-screen adaptation, starring Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande, will arrive this fall. The second film comes out next year. It might be time to pose a related question: Why won’t the Wicked Witch of the West ever die?The character has grown in stature since she first appeared as the villain in just one chapter of Baum’s novel nearly 125 years ago. Every subsequent adaptation has made her more visible, more memorable and — in a twist — more heroic. Much like the Land of Oz’s symbolic meaning as a stand-in for the United States, her fate reflects our nation’s continuing debates about race, gender and who is and isn’t considered American.Narratively, her evolution has been striking. Barely present in Baum’s book as an enemy of Dorothy, the young Kansan on a journey through Oz, the witch emerged as a formidable green-faced foe made famous by the white actress Margaret Hamilton in MGM’s 1939 movie classic, “The Wizard of Oz.” In the 1970s, Mabel King played her as the cruel factory owner Evillene in the all-Black Broadway and movie versions of “The Wiz.” Her showstopping number, “No Bad News,” stole the spotlight from Dorothy and Glinda, the Good Witch. Two decades later, her transformation was complete when Gregory Maguire depicted her as the sympathetic, misunderstood, magically powerful, though still green-hued Elphaba in his 1995 novel, “Wicked.” That’s the version in the Broadway musical and now the forthcoming two-part film.Credited with writing the first great American fairy tale, Baum began Dorothy’s turn-of-the-century tour in the frontier state of Kansas. Though Baum was neither born nor lived there, his general interest in the region was reflected in his move from upstate New York to Aberdeen, a Dakota Territory town, in 1886. After opening a novelty store there, he started a newspaper, The Aberdeen Saturday Pioneer, in which he wrote editorials that ranged from advocating women’s suffrage to calling for the complete extermination of Indigenous communities.Margaret Hamilton, left, made an indelible witch opposite Judy Garland in the 1939 classic “The Wizard of Oz.”MGMWe are having trouble retrieving the article content.Please enable JavaScript in your browser settings.Thank you for your patience while we verify access. If you are in Reader mode please exit and log into your Times account, or subscribe for all of The Times.Thank you for your patience while we verify access.Already a subscriber? Log in.Want all of The Times? Subscribe. More