The long-awaited film adaptation ( Part One ) of the hit Broadway musical Wicked , about the backstory of The Wizard of Oz ’s Wicked Witch of the West, is a candy-coloured, fantastical treat. It joyfully expands on the source material with extended musical numbers and astute childhood flashbacks in a combination that will delight committed Ozians and newcomers alike. We begin at the end, with an event in which Wizard of Oz fans will be familiar.
The Munchkins are celebrating the death of the Wicked Witch by bucket of water, and Glinda the Good ( Ariana Grande ) arrives in a giant pink bubble to assure them that all is now right with the world. But one local wonders: “Didn’t you know her, the Wicked Witch?” And back we go to the past. Like Glee or Harry Potter , the far-reaching appeal of Wicked is thanks to its exploration of how outcasts find their place in a world geared towards convention.
Before she was the Wicked Witch, she was Elphaba ( Cynthia Erivo ), who has been shunned since birth because of her green skin and strange powers. As a young woman she finds herself at Shiz University (a place brought to life here as a whimsical cross between Venice and Disneyland), where she has accompanied her sister (Marissa Bode), who is in a wheelchair, to keep an eye on her. Grande is terrific as Galinda, the future Glinda the Good, decked out in pink tulle and adored by all; she is the opposite of Elphaba, who has no friends of her own – and to start with, she’s also h.
