Wicked salvages 2024's musical cinema track record through grand visuals and moving performances

L. Frank Baum's Oz books have been intertwined with cinema since the medium's inception. Eight years after The Wonderful Wizard of Oz was published, directors Francis Boggs and Otis Turner adapted this magical world into a mixed-media cinematic experience. Further silent film adaptations would follow in 1910 and 1925 before a certain Judy Garland star vehicle took pop culture by storm. Ever since, rare has been the decade that didn’t see the release of a new Oz adaptation.

Similarly, I’ve spent my whole life as someone who loves musicals conscious of Wicked, the stage musical (adapted from Gregory Maguire’s 1995 novel) exploring the backstory of The Wicked Witch of the West. Every theatre class I attended in middle and high school had a Wicked poster or two. My musical-loving uncle had Wicked paraphernalia in his house and would constantly reference the show. Tunes like “Defying Gravity” and “Popular” were everywhere. Baum’s Oz realm has been omnipresent in cinema. So too has Wicked been similarly ubiquitous in the last two decades of both pop culture and my life.

That puts a lot of pressure on Jon M. Chu’s feature film adaptation of Wicked. We all know these songs and have traveled to Munchkinland and Oz so many times in other movies. Yet Wicked does something truly magical and worthy of that wizard’s reputation. It makes this realm feel new again. Chu’s 2015 adaptation of Jem and the Holograms left so much potential on the table. Now, he's gone in the opposite direction. Wicked is bursting with creativity in translating its source material to the silver screen.

Right away, Chu and cinematographer Alice Brooks hit things on a reassuring note as they instill an instantly bombastic visual quality to Wicked. In these early shots, the camera pulls out to reveal gloriously colorful fields of flowers surrounding Munchkinland. The land’s inhabitants also begin singing various lines without self-referential dialogue making fun of everyone talking in song. 2024 has seen so many subpar movie musicals. Titles like Emilia Perez and Joker: Folie a Deux were so self-conscious of carrying on the legacy of Little Shop of Horrors and Singin’ in the Rain. Wicked, meanwhile, immediately throws creative timidity to the wind to thrilling effect.

Those nascent sequences depict Munchkin’s reaction to the ending of The Wizard of Oz. The Wicked Witch of the West, she’s dead! Hooray! Glinda (Ariana Grande) descends from a bubble solely to speak to these denizens about the good news. However, before she departs, she’s asked if she knew this malicious figure once upon a time. It turns out she did back in her days at Shiz University. It was here that she befriended Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo), a societal outcast from Munchkinland everyone despises. Whether it’s her father, other kids, or adult strangers, Elphaba’s green skin makes her a pariah. She’s the total opposite of the young spoiled Glinda, a popular girl with confidence and material possessions to spare.

As Elphaba and Glinda so entertainingly bounce off one another in these academic confines, I could already feel feathers getting stuck between my teeth. Looks like I’d be eating some crows after years of declaring it was stupid to split Wicked into two movies. The impulse behind that decision was, 110%, purely commercial. There’s no way this maneuver wasn’t made via a Universal executive wishing they could wring even more money out of Wicked after it spent so much time in development hell. In execution, though, turning Wicked’s first act into a single movie works like gangbusters. All the High School/college drama is fun enough to sustain a single narrative. It helps that it all hinges on the enjoyable rapport between actors like Erivo, Grande, and Jonathan Bailey (playing handsome Winkie prince Fiyero Tigelaar).

Wicked nicely balances not rushing things and also not pulling a Breaking Dawn - Part One in spinning its wheels before Part Two gets to the real narrative. Much of that comes from screenwriters Winnie Holzman and Dana Fox giving Elphaba a clear character arc over just this feature’s 160-minute runtime. By the time the metaphorical curtain closes on Wicked, Elphaba can still go to other places as a human being. However, if you stopped your Wicked experience here, you’d still be satisfied with her growth. In other words, Wicked is much more The Fellowship of the Ring than Mockingjay in multi-movie adaptations.

It doesn’t hurt that Wicked’s runtime is packed to the gills with the visual spectacle crowdpleaser musicals should have. That potentially daunting 160-minute length just flies right by in Chu’s hands. Say farewell to the creepy imagery of Cats, the half-hearted commitment to melodies of Joker: Folie a Deux, or the tedious lyrics of The Prom. Wicked is here with musical numbers that pop and sizzle. Thank goodness Chu and cinematographer Alice Brooks, and editor Myron Kerstein aren't afraid to capture numbers like "Dancing Through Life" in soaring lengthy wide shots. There’s breathing room on the screen letting one soak in every inch of the radiant dance choreography and practical sets. It takes a village to make any kind of movie, but especially one with as many moving parts as a musical. Like with Steven Spielberg's marvelous West Side Story, everyone's artistry really shines in Wicked's expansive filming style. You can appreciate how so many people's talents come together to create something special when the images are wide enough to encompass lots of dances and ornately designed sets!

The various backdrops to these tunes also excitingly lean into visuals that just wouldn’t be possible in Wicked’s original Broadway confines. Animals singing about their increasingly troubled plight in Oz in “Something Bad,” for instance, is told through shadow puppets. Then there’s the finer details behind the execution of “The Wizard and I.” This tune sees Elphaba initially singing in deeply cramped interior confines on the Shiz University campus. As the song proceeds, her surroundings gradually become more and more expansive until she concludes by belting out the final verse in an open sunny field. The future is as open with possibilities for Elphaba as the endless field she’s signing.

Similarly inspired in its visual impulses is “Popular.” Whoever decided to realize this iconic Wicked ditty as as a makeup/fashion montage soaked in pink and quasi-lesbian overtones, give them a raise. I’d give them the deed to my house if I could ever afford to own one. “Popular” is already such a fun song. It’s a great addition to the pantheon of show tunes like “The Nicest Kids in Town” with bouncy melodies masking cutting lyrics. It would take Dennis Dugan, Robert Iscove, or Tom Hooper to make it bad on the silver screen. However, Wicked’s inspired execution, from the camerawork to the lighting to Grande’s physical acting (like when she’s “swimming” on her back on the floor of her suite) is something special. It's also delightfully gay that "Popular" is performed through Grande's Glinda romping around in a pink nightgown physically interacting with Erivo's Elphaba like they're part of a goth/femme romantic fan-fiction that's suddenly come to life. I don't care what galaxy you're from, that's cinema, folks.

This whole set piece encapsulates how Wicked takes something so full of potential and doesn’t just rest on its laurels. Even having heard so many of these songs for decades of my life, Wicked's specific creative impulses made it like I was hearing these ditties for the very first time. Tangible craftsmanship is evident on the screen making conceptually familiar lyrics fresh once more. Unfortunately, one key visual impulse left a bad taste in my mouth: the designs of the CG animals. Characters like goat professor Doctor Dillamond (Peter Dinklage) are realized here as just realistic digital critters wearing human clothing. This design approach is strange on several levels. For one thing, Wicked so heavily utilizes practical sets and costumes that fully CG characters stick out like a sore thumb. Couldn’t puppets or animatronics be used instead?

Meanwhile, opting to realize Dillamond and his animal cohorts as ultra-realistic creations robs them of their humanity. A shot focusing on Dillamond reacting in horror to anti-animal vandalism (“ANIMALS SHOULD BE SEEN NOT HEARD”) should instill immediate sorrow in one’s soul. Instead, Dillamond’s largely lifeless super-authentic face can’t communicate proper shock. Opting for more anthropomorphizing on Dillamond and other critters would’ve made them fit better in the otherwise confidently outlandish world Chu has concocted. Similarly all-digital creations, such as the magical book known as the Grimmerie, are also puzzlingly realized. Again, were there not practical solutions for those elements?

Such unimaginative extensions of modern fantasy cinema visual impulses (where everything must look real in worlds meant to accentuate the unreal) are, thankfully, the exception and not the norm in Wicked. Production designer Nathan Crowley's various sets, for instance, look outstanding. Places like Shiz University look properly lived-in and he isn't afraid to embrace bold colors in domiciles like the glistening watery roof of an underground dance club. Implementing Brutalist architecture into the Wizard of Oz's grand palace is an especially fantastic touch. Paul Tazewell's costumes are also a sumptuous treat to watch on-screen.

At the heart of this visual extravaganza is a bevy of tremendously involving performances. Sometimes, one can break down why an actor’s work on-screen is superb down to a cellular level. Other times, it’s the simplest surface-level interpretation that solidifies why a performance works. Erivo and Grande bring lots of rich details to their respective turns. However, what clinches the excellence of their incarnations of Elphaba and Glinda, respectively, is simply how much fun it is to watch them interact. The duo shares such great, effortless chemistry that makes their enemies-to-besties arc so captivating. Just watching them holding hands or being there for one another made my often cynical heart smile wide!

Not to be one of those “I liked them BEFORE they were big” people, but as someone who was so entranced by Erivo six years ago in her Bad Times at the El Royale and Widows performances, it’s such a delight to see her ace Elphaba. Her emotional conviction and absorbing aura haven’t wavered over the last few years. She lends a denizen of Oz as much gravitas and commitment as she does to her more grounded film and television performances. Playing opposite Erivo is Grande’s Glinda, whose exceptional comedic gifts are a thing to behold. There’s a moment just before “Popular” where Grande depicts Glinda stomping away and tossing her head onto her bed that alone had me collapsing into giggles. She’s a joy on her own merits and emotionally gripping working in tandem with Erivo.

As many of the recent live-action Disney remakes can attest, you can take some of the best songs in the world and still make a middling musical out of them. Howard Ashman’s lyrics will live on eternal as masterful, yet that didn’t help 2017’s Beauty and the Beast one iota. It takes more than a legacy to make a satisfying movie, musical or otherwise.

Wicked, thankfully, arrives with enough pomp and circumstance to dazzle even the most hardened moviegoer. No autotune or clumsy Greatest Showman editing to get around actors not being able to dance. This is a movie musical unflinchingly embracing harmonizing, performers tapping their toes, and grand sweeping emotions. Like classic musical movies, it's got visual confidence and actual style to spare, not to mention talented gay af actors playing heteros. Even with those clumsy CG animals and some peculiarly dim lighting choices, Wicked's greatest musical sequences left my mouth agape and my hands clapping with glee. After a year of musical cinema so petrified of being seen as musicals, how wonderful to see something like Wicked unafraid to defy gravity.