Wicked (movies)

[scenicdesign71]

Not having kept up with it for almost a year, I had missed the news this past April: Wicked will be broken into two movies, set for Christmas releases in 2024 and 2025, with Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba and Ariana Grande as Glinda.  Also Jonathan Bailey (Viscount Bridgerton in the eponymous Netflix series; Jamie in the 2016 London Last Five Years; another Jamie in Marianne Elliott's 2018 London Company), as Fiyero.

https://variety.com/2022/film/news/wicked-movie-two-films-1235241189/

After almost two decades, I still haven't seen the show.  (Yes, I know. The Lion King, either.  Ever since Broadway reopened, I've been thinking a little more seriously than usual about finally rectifying these omissions -- and more seriously still, now that the eternal Phantom has announced its closing: a reminder that nothing runs literally forever).

But, at least in theory, I can see a certain sense in making the film a two-parter.  Onstage, it runs two and a half hours (not including intermission), and director Jon M. Chu claims that cuts sufficient to bring that down to conventional feature length seemed too painful.  I can't agree or disagree without having studied the show's libretto or seen it onstage.  But in terms of screen adaptation, the Maguire novel -- and indeed the whole Oz universe -- offers fantasy-worldbuilding opportunities that I can imagine neither Chu himself nor Universal wanting to skimp on.  (It was Universal's theatrical division that developed the stage musical in the first place, presumably with a potential film adaptation in mind -- though they couldn't have realized that, whether in spite or because of their stage version's unpredictable once-in-a-generation blockbuster success, the movie(s) would end up taking 20+ years to get made).

[scenicdesign71]

Part One will now premiere a month sooner than previously announced -- Thanksgiving (instead of Christmas) 2024:

https://variety.com/2023/film/news/wicked-movie-release-date-thanksgiving-1235553635/

The article also includes complete casting; rehearsals began last summer, and filming has been underway since December in the UK.

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[scenicdesign71]

I'm not even a particular fan of the show (again, based on its OBCR and a smattering of full and partial YouTube "slime tutorials"), but now that the movie is well into production, Facebook keeps feeding me tidbits about it.  Here's a look at some of Wicked's Nathan Crowley-designed exteriors:

https://www.vulture.com/2023/04/wicked-movie-set-photos-behind-the-scenes.html

...In other news, Mr. Chu has signed on to direct a movie version of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat for Amazon.  I take this as welcome proof that, notwithstanding a worrying industrywide slowdown since last fall and a writers' strike potentially beginning next month, the "streaming bubble" has not in fact burst just yet.  Especially post-Cats, the idea of anyone greenlighting a cinematic Joseph seems to me a reassuring indicator that we're still not past Peak Content Glut, where pretty much anything can still get made.

[scenicdesign71]

Part One will now premiere a month sooner than previously announced -- Thanksgiving (instead of Christmas) 2024:

https://variety.com/2023/film/news/wicked-movie-release-date-thanksgiving-1235553635/

Wicked, Part Two (now subtitled For Good) has also now been pulled forward a month, to Thanksgiving (instead of Christmas) 2025:

https://playbill.com/article/both-wicked-movies-are-hitting-screens-earlier-than-first-announced

Part 1:  November 27, 2024
Part 2:  November 26, 2025


(Because I know we're all on tenterhooks).

[scenicdesign71]

This is a few days old, but I suppose I should put it here...

[scenicdesign71]

Trailers are trailers, and this one does its job — including its generous length, which, at risk of spoiling many eye-popping visuals and quite a bit of plot, serves up a gluttonous helping of what the show's fans have presumably been hungering for.  In any case, despite my own relatively mild appreciation for the source material, this does look grand:

Plus a little behind-the-scenes love-fest with Chu, Erivo and Grande:

[KathyB]

I saw this today and thought it was worthy of sharing:

[scenicdesign71]

I haven't seen it yet — maybe an early matinée Monday or Tuesday, like early early, 8 or 9am, when cinemas are emptier (specifically of theatre brats who can't wait for Christmas to sing along).


This looks like ridiculously thrilling fun:

and also, obviously, incredibly hard work, even for the seemingly superhuman Ms. Erivo:

[Leighton]

Have you been holding space for the lyrics of Defying Gravity though?

[scenicdesign71]

Have you been holding space for the lyrics of Defying Gravity though?

I haven't personally, but as a New Yorker I think a sliver of our local taxes is earmarked for their care and upkeep.  (Allegedly they're warehoused here for spaceholding on behalf of all city residents).

[Full disclosure: I originally responded to your post with a quizzical huh?; then decided you'd maybe been referring facetiously to the singalong phenomenon, and replaced my huh with some ramblings on private-vs.-communal spectatorship.  Then, earlier today, I finally, belatedly twigged your reference when I stumbled across this.  I had actually watched the interview in question a week or more ago, registered what little there was to register (maudlin unseriousness distilled into buzzy word-salad — hardly a late-breaking innovation in the world of movie junkets or of pop culture more generally, but if folks find this an especially exquisite specimen, I'm not saying they're wrong)... and then deleted it from my brain within seconds.  I'm torn between frank relief at not being online-enough to have clocked its viral moment at all, and mild sheepishness at having missed your point so thoroughly as a result.]

[Leighton]

Hah! Wonderful. I have been demolishing the ridiculousness that are their press junkets. It's like some sort of trauma cult

[scenicdesign71]

Well, I saw it this morning in a decent-size but relatively-empty theater, with maybe twenty other (mercifully quiet) viewers and a hundred vacant seats.  (Citywide, most showings seem to reverse these proportions, or sell out entirely, but a seemingly random handful of weekday-morning matinées have remained sparsely attended.  But I expect that may change over the long holiday weekend, which is why I roused myself to go see it today).

Dept. of Bad Planning:  Having downed an entire large soda by about ten minutes into the film itself (after a half hour of previews), I eventually had to make a quick trip to the loo, in the process reluctantly missing "I'm Not That Girl" in its entirety.

The movie has its strengths and weaknesses, though its delirious ambition sometimes makes it hard to say exactly which is which.
It's a lot.  (By comparison, Chu's In The Heights looks like a model of even-keeled restraint).
But I was never bored, I look forward to seeing Part 2 next year, and I'll probably watch Part 1 again at least once before then.

Grande is very good — indeed, the whole cast is excellent — but it's Erivo's film, and she holds it together better than ought to be possible given the material's tonal whiplash, to which Chu and his team commit so zealously that, again, it kind of becomes both a feature and a bug.  (Some have opined that the show's weaker second act may make the second film a bit of a slog, but I wouldn't be surprised if its more-consistent darkness ends up suiting me fine).  On the other hand, I remain grateful for his abiding interest in pulling as much emotion from smaller, quieter moments as from blow-the-roof-off anthems.

I won't say more now; only that I enjoyed it quite a bit, but I don't feel in imminent danger of becoming a superfan, which is fine.

[scenicdesign71]

Off-topic, but I've been having an unusually rewarding Thanksgiving week for beautifully-made, new-old-fashioned award-bait-type movies: Wicked on Wednesday morning, followed by The Piano Lesson on Netflix last night and Blitz on Apple TV+ tonight.

Blitz is as visually spectacular (in its own head-swimmingly darker register) as Wicked, and more immersive; but while it has received mostly respectful reviews, I was surprised by how mixed many of them are.  Only the NYT and Vanity Fair seem to me to properly appreciate writer-director Steve McQueen's accomplishment: his aesthetic and narrative instincts have never been sharper, and the cast expertly inhabits a sweet spot between the understated intimacy of McQueen's dialogue and the epic sweep of his mis-en-scène.

The Piano Lesson is smartly adapted, gorgeously performed by a brilliant ensemble, and beautifully staged and photographed, all on a satisfyingly intimate scale.  I imagine August Wilson would have been proud — producer Denzel Washington and his gifted offspring (director and co-adaptor Malcolm Washington, actor John David Washington, EP Katia Washington) certainly must be, and I'm more eager than ever to see the remaining seven works from Wilson's Century Cycle make the leap to film under their stewardship.

In this company, obviously, Wicked stands out as by far the blockbuster-fluffiest of the three (the others are both sober historical dramas).  At the other end of the scale, Piano Lesson is by far the most modest (the other two all but demand a big screen).  And Blitz is the only one of the three that has no magical/supernatural element (the others are rife with sorcery and ghosts, respectively).

All three incorporate music and singing as a structural or thematic element, and all three examine racial discrimination, inherited trauma, and social or familial breakdown in the context of their respective, wildly-different but vividly-explored worlds.  All three are directed by men of color whose artistry could be described as symphonic.  All three boast flawless casts led by extraordinary women (Erivo and Grande in Wicked; Saoirse Ronan in Blitz; Danielle Deadwyler in The Piano Lesson) who might all plausibly reap Oscar nominations for their respective performances.

And I might very well re-watch all three at some point over the remainder of the holiday season.

[scenicdesign71]

As part of their "Read the Screenplay" series,  Deadline has published Winnie Holzman and Dana Fox's movie script, which can be read online for free:

https://deadline.com/2024/12/wicked-movie-scirpt-read-the-screenplay-winnie-holzman-dana-fox-1236203154/

The series includes dozens of other recent screenplays, going back at least as far as 2020's The King of Staten Island.  I recently read Scott Beck and Bryan Woods's script for Heretic and Coralie Fargeat's for The Substance (and while I'm still a bit squeamish about seeing the latter film especially, at least now its over-the-top shocks may be blunted by knowing more or less what to expect).  Up next:  Justin Kuritzkes's Queer and Challengers, Clint Bentley and Greg Kwedar's Sing Sing, Peter Straughan's Conclave, and on and on...