Wicked: Part One (2024) – Green With Envy

Released: 1st August
Seen: 24th November

On October 30th 2003, the Gershwin Theatre presented the opening night performance of a little musical about a woman with green skin battling adversity and learning her true power through friendship with a hyperactive floating Barbie… that show was Wicked and to this day that show has captured audiences around the world. As of writing this sentence, it’s the second highest-grossing Broadway musical of all time, the fourth longest-running show in Broadway history and has been toured around the world so many times that it would be impossible to calculate just how many people have seen the show. It is a genre-defining artwork, one that has been talked about being turned into a movie since approximately 47 seconds after a movie producer heard Idina Menzel sing Defying Gravity for the first time and knew that this show needed to be captured on film… it’s taken them 20 years, it’s not the cast that they expected to get and it’s split a 2-hour-long stage show into two movies of 2+ hours each, but it looks like they absolutely nailed it.

Wicked (Part One) begins where The Wizard of Oz ends, with the Wicked Witch dead and a bunch of short people singing joyfully about how awesome it is that she’s really most sincerely dead. This celebration is presided over by Glinda (Ariana Grande-Butera) who reveals that she was once friends with the now-dead Wicked Witch. We then go back in time to see how the Wicked Witch, real name Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) came to be what we know her as. Turns out she wasn’t always wicked, though she was always green, and was actually somewhat of a revolutionary who kept trying to stand up for those who were othered by society. She also has some serious powers which she tries to control with the help of Madame Morrible (Michelle Yeoh) who thinks that Elphaba has a chance to do something great and possibly even meet the Wizard (Jeff Goldblum), which Elphaba definitely needs so she can help those who are suffering like her.

To be absolutely honest, there was a ton of trepidation going into Wicked. A 20-year production cycle is always concerning but then you factor in that it’s a modern adaptation of a hit musical that’s breaking the show up into two separate films. It’s got so much going against it that the expectations were lowered and yet, from the moment the film begins with a sepia-toned credit that’s reminiscent of the 1939 classic Wizard of Oz you can tell that there’s something special at work here. By the time the munchkins are done singing about how no one will mourn the wicked, any fear about the film quality is alleviated and you’re just left with 150 minutes of pure joy and wonder as this brilliant cast and expert filmmakers transport you to Oz and give you the ride of your life. Let’s be clear, this is easily one of the best musical films of the last decade and given time it might even be possible to put it on a list of the greatest of all time. It’s stunningly good.

A lot of why Wicked works is down to the expert direction by Jon M. Chu who, at this point, should just be given the job as the only person allowed to adapt Broadway musicals to film. Three years ago he directed In The Heights which was easily the best movie of that year (even if no one saw it) and somehow he has topped himself with Wicked: Part One. Here is a film that’s unabashedly a musical, joyfully high energy and plays everything at a 10 at all times because it’s a goddamn musical so there’s no point in aiming for realism. Everything is immaculate, from the perfect sets to how the choreography is captured to the way we transition between scenes. It’s a wild visual spectacle that really elevates the material, which is good considering that Wicked is kind of the ultimate example of a spectacle musical that is meant to push the limits of what can be shown on stage so it makes sense the film version does the same thing with the cinema screen.

There’s also just so much reverence for the source material here, both the Broadway show and the 1939 film that everyone knows and loves (if you say you don’t love the 1939 Wizard of Oz… you’re wrong, you do, stop lying). Wicked knows what put it here and why it exists and isn’t afraid to point that out and play with it in a way that’s great for fans to enjoy but also subtle enough that if you’re somehow going to this without knowing anything about this franchise (HOW?!) then you won’t be overwhelmed by the references. It’s a perfect blend of its own thing while also being reverent to what should be revered. I’m sure the second it’s on home media there will be a dozen videos pointing out all 150 easter eggs that are hidden throughout, but you don’t need to know those for the film to work.

Of course, the film can be pretty and great to look at but for it to be truly great it needs to have performances that elevate the material… So if I had my way the two main women in this film would both be taking home Oscars next year and I will be genuinely pissed if one of them isn’t at bare minimum nominated for Best Actress. That one is Cynthia Erivo who is truly perfect in every way. This is a performance that took some of what Margaret Hamilton did in the ‘39 film, blends it with some of Idina Menzel from the stage play and flavours it with that special magic only Cynthia Erivo has to create something incredible. Vocally this version of Elphaba is beyond compare, a true powerhouse who blasts the doors off with a single note but that’s combined with a truly captivating performance that works on so many levels. A single eyebrow raise can push a joke over the edge, a twinkle in the eyes sells an emotional beat more than any monologue. Frankly, this should be the Oscar-winning performance of the year but if she isn’t nominated, I will burn down the Dolby Theatre in protest.

The other performance that is obviously great is Ariana Grande as Glinda, her comic timing is genuinely incredible and she manages to sell the complexity of Glinda as a girl who wants to be considered good by those in power. There are so many layers to her performance and it shows that this pop icon is also just a glorious actress who can pretty much do anything thrown her way. She manages to pull off this high-energy performance and make it believable, you get why the students at Shiz University would be obsessed with her and why she seems to think that her entire life must revolve around being popular. It’s also a performance that’s probably gonna be on a shortlist for an Oscar, but I won’t be as mad if she doesn’t get a nomination. I won’t set as many fires, but I’ll certainly be thinking about it should she not get the nod.

The supporting cast is also doing some incredibly heavy lifting here to make sure that this film lives up to its potential. Michelle Yeoh as Madame Morrible is able to thread the needle between being a kindly teacher and an eventual antagonist (The play has been about for 20 years… spoilers mean nothing here). Jeff Goldblum is absolutely brilliant as the Wizard of Oz himself and delivers the whimsy and unnervingness one expects from the character. Ethan Slater and Marissa Bode, as Boq and Nessa respectively, deliver film debut performances that make it clear that they are future superstars in the making. Lastly, there’s Jonathan Bailey who swoops in as Fiero and has an intense, undeniable sexual chemistry with every single cast member (seriously the entirety of the Dancing Through Life number may as well be a sizzle reel of Bailey’s ability to look like he’s romantically interested in literally anyone) and delivers possibly the third best performance in a film already full of truly powerhouse performances. 

Now the one big downside that this film has is that it’s only the first half of the show, we all know there’s a second act coming and on the stage, you would be getting that act right away to complete the story. While the ending of this part still works, the producers were not kidding when they said that it would be literally impossible to directly follow it up with anything other than an intermission and since movies are cowards and don’t do that anymore, we have to settle for this. It does mean that I will now spend the next year going “Fuck that first part was great, but will the second part live up to it” instead of just enjoying a single whole film but it’s also possibly the best option considering the undeniable raw power of the Defying Gravity sequence. 

On the whole, Wicked: Part One is a truly great example of how to adapt a musical in a way that works for the screen without losing what made it special. It’s unafraid to be a musical, embracing the heightened reality of a world where people break into song and dance and still imbuing every fame with the core message of standing up to fascists (because holy shit this film is political as hell, it’s not even subtle about it and I respect the hell out of that). It’s a rollercoaster ride that turns the action up to an 11, lets its stars belt out some of the best songs written for the Broadway stage and delivers something magical. If it manages to stick the landing next year with part 2, this could be an all-time great set of films and that is truly exciting to realise.