‘Wicked Part One’ Is Partially Wonderful with Erivo and Grande Well-Worth Seeing ⭐️⭐️⭐️

Can a Grammy Award-winning pop diva Ariana Grande (styled Grande-Butera in the film credits) and a Tony and Grammy Award-winning, Oscar-nominated British actress find harmony in director Jon M. Chu’s two-part adaptation of Stephen Schwartz (music and lyrics) and Winnie Holzman’s (book) musical? Vocally, Erivo and Grande-Butera are a lovely pairing and Paul Tazewell’s costume design is sublime in “Wicked Part One.” What makes this production less than wickedly wonderful is the lighting and visual design.

Grande-Butera isn’t just a pop singer. Before Grande-Butera became got her Grammy, she was in the original Broadway cast of “13” as Charlotte (and understudy for the role of Patrice) from 5 October 2008 to 4 January 2009. That was after “Wicked” opened on Broadway with Idina Menzel (Elphaba) and Kristin Chenoweth (Glinda). Grande-Butera returned to Broadway in 2022 as a member of a team of songwriters/lyricists for “& Juliet.” That was a year after Grande-Butera won a Grammy for Best Pop Duo/Group Performance with Lady Gaga for “Rain on Me.” In 2016, she portrayed Penny Singleton in the NBC television special “Hairspray Live!”

The musical stage production of “Wicked” is an adaptation of Gregory Maguire’s 1995 novel, “Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West.” That novel’s success spanned a series, “The Wicked Years.” Maguire takes the 1900 L. Frank Baum book, “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” and the 1939 film and gives us the background of the Wicked Witch of the West.

In the 1939 film, Dorothy Gale gets caught in a tornado when it lifts her and her dog Toto up into the air, out of Kansa. The house finally plops down, completely intact, but on top of the Wicked Witch of the East in some strange, but colorful land. With the Wicked Witch dead, the people (Munchkins) of this strange place, Munchinkinland, to celebrate.

All we see is the witch’s legs and her wonderful shoes–ruby red slippers in the film, but silver slippers in the original book. The good witch Glinda magically takes those shoes and puts them on Dorothy’s feet. The Wicked Witch of the East has a sister, the Wicked Witch of the West who wants those slippers, but her magic doesn’t work in Munchkinland. Glinda advises Dorothy to see the Wizard of Oz in Emerald City because he can help her get home to Kansas.

During her journey, Dorothy will pick up traveling companions–a Tin Man (without a heart), the Cowardly Lion, the Scarecrow (without a brain), and be terrorized by flying monkeys. Yet Dorothy will eventually kill the Wicked Witch of the West by splashing water on her. Dorothy will eventually kill the Wicked Witch of the West by splashing water on her.

The film “Wicked” begins here, with the death of the Wicked Witch of the West. She’s only a puddle of water with her black pointy hat now. The people celebrate, but when someone asks Glinda if she knew the Wicked Witch of the West, the film flashes back. The WWW was the product of an illicit affair between her mother (Alice Fearn) with an unknown stranger. At birth, the WWW horrified both of her “parents” (Adam James as the man who believe’s he is her father) when she is born totally green. Named Elphaba, she never finds favor in her family. Her father dotes on her younger sister, Nessarose (Cesily Collette Taylor as the younger version and Marissa Bode as the older), who is confined to a wheelchair. Sometimes, when she’s enraged, Elphaba is able to move objects, a power she cannot control…yet.

Elphaba accompanies her father when her sister, Nessarose, enters Shiz University. Although her father bids her to stay and make sure Nessarose settles in, Nessarose wants to be more independent and the legendary headmistress of the school, Madame Morrible (Michelle Yeoh) takes a special interest in Elphaba after witnessing her powers.

Morrible’s interest in Elphaba upsets the plan of the pampered pink-clad Galinda (Grande-Butera). Arriving the same day as Elphaba and Nessarose, Galinda has been assured a private room which she needs for her high pile of pink luggage. Galinda inadvertently volunteers to share her room with Elphaba. While Galinda quickly makes friends, including besties Pfannee (Bowen Yang) and ShenShen (Browyn James), Elphaba only finds favor with Morrible and Doctor Dillamond (Peter Dinklage voices), a talking goat.

As one might expect with young people away from their parents, lust and love come into play. Munchkin Bon falls in love with Galinda; Galinda falls in love with the popular boy, Fiyero (Jonathan Bailey), a prince who has been expelled from other schools and encourages the students to break the rules in an imaginative prance through a magical library. What better way to entice the students to stray from studies than to party in a forbidden zone?

While there’s some petty womanly warfare between roommates Elphaba and Galinda, when Galinda masks a malicious act of cruelty as kindness, Elphaba reciprocates with kindness. Touched, Galinda reaches out by using her influencer caché and joining Elphaba on the dance floor, eventually convincing the other to join.

Yet there are dark days ahead. Through Dillamond, Elphaba realizes that there is a growing prejudice that is working to silence the talking animals of this land. In an attempt to save one, Elphaba finds an ally in Fiyero. Elphaba is called on to see the Wizard of Oz and takes Galinda with her, but she’ll be disappointed in what she finds there and be forced to flee.

“Wicked, Part One” is two hours and forty minutes (160 minutes). The run time of the full musical stage production is about two hours and 45 minutes, including a 15-minute intermission. There’s obviously been a lot of material added.

For the Broadway stage musical, Schwartz and Holzman changed Maguire’s story, simplifying it and making it more of a crowd-pleaser than a brooding examination of the nature of evil, propaganda and terrorism. How Holzman and Dana Fox (“The Wedding Date”) are going to shape this two-part musical fantasy film is hard to say. The film ends with “Defying Gravity,” the song that comes just before the stage production’s intermission. The film has expanded and developed some of the characters and given time to appreciate all of the costumes, a little nostalgia with an appearance by the two Broadway legends who originated the roles (Idina Menzel as Elphaba and Kristen Chenoweth as Galinda).

Erivo and Grande-Butera’s voices blend beautifully. While some have commented that Grande is imitating Chenoweth on the “Popular” sing-along video released for the film on YouTube, I know from watching Jimmy Fallon that if Grande wanted to mimic Chenoweth, she could do it. Yet that isn’t what she’s doing here in the film. For “Popular,” Grande-Butera gives a lighter, airier vocal styling than Chenoweth’s. That fits with her characterization of Galinda. Chenoweth’s Galinda had an irritating voice and you don’t really believe her when she sings that she’s going to teach Elphaba to be good at sports. It’s an empty promise. With Grande-Butera’s athletic swinging from the light fixtures and her slim hard figure, you don’t doubt it for a moment.

Grande-Butera’s Galinda often has a vacant stare. She’s not stupid, but too used to getting what she wants when she wants too easily. She can see Elphaba’s pain when other’s like Fiyero cannot, but she has never been forced to dig deep into her emotional cellar or forge a rigid backbone to standup to authority.

As Morrible, Yeoh is a regal presence, well styled by both costume and hair and makeup design, but her singing voice is weak. Jeff Goldblum who plays the Wizard of Oz, also has a weak voice and has a hard time seeming ordinary since he’s so tall, particularly in comparison to Erivo and Grande-Butera. Yeoh (Malaysian), Goldblum (Jewish), Erivo (Nigerian British) and even Grande-Butera (Italian American) bring diversity to “Wicked” in front of the camera. Yet the casting of a person of Nigerian descent and the hairstyling for the “Popular” scenes give an added nuance. Similarly, the performances of Brittney Johnson as Galinda (with Lindsay Pearce as Elphaba) on Broadway brought a different twist to the song “Popular.” Johnson, like Chenoweth, gives her Galinda a physical awkwardness that makes you wonder how their Galindas will teach their respective Elphaba’s to be “good at sports.”

Hair flipping by White women has been a topic of discussion, too. Not only on Quora, but ABC News picked up the story in 2001 (“Can Racial Sensitivity Go Too Far?” 20 July 2011).

Chu is working with cinematographer Alice Brooks (“In the Heights,” 2021, and “tick, tick…BOOM!” 2021 as director of photography). While I love the color and detail of the production design and the beautifully detailed tailored costumes that can suggest conformity amongst the students while still noting diversity and individuality, the frequency of light flare bothers me.

Not all light flare is bad. Sometimes photographers and cinematographers (plus their directors) choose to have light flare. A well-placed starburst flare can make a photo. Veiling flare can be used to create mystery or a soft romantic feeling.

For my taste the anamorphic flare, horizontal streaks of lights, do not create a sense of depth or dimensionality. Rather it distracts from the action and overall composition of the scene, even, at times, obscuring the face of the actors. To a lesser degree, the circular flare appears, marring an image with circles of light.

When veiling flare is used in backlit scenes too often the actors’ faces were left dark for no discernible reason. During those scenes, I often wished the faces were brightened by reflected or fill lights so the audience could see their facial expressions better.

This particular image doesn’t bother me.

Rewatching “In the Heights,” there is light flare (anamorphic) in the first five minutes, but more, particularly in the dancing on the walls scene (“When the Sun Goes Down”).

While the light flare may be a choice, I don’t think it works for a musical. I also wonder if our expected intermission of one year is too long. “Wicked Part One” opens in the US on 22 November 2024. “Wicked Part Two” is scheduled for 21 November 2025. The longest intermission at a theatrical performance that I’ve attended was a full dinner for a full day of theater. For a musical, the power of “Defying Gravity” will be lost. Will we rejoicify? I’m sure the PR people are working hard to make that happen. Yet I am still looking forward to seeing Erivo and Grande-Butera. “Wicked Part One” is a triumph for Erivo and Grande-Butera and the costume and set designers, but for me, suffers from too much light flare to be a complete triumph for the director and cinematographer.

If you want to become of a student at the fictional Shiz University, visit the official website. I tried it with my dogs who as collies have long noses, but it didn’t work. There is a definite prejudice against animals in Oz.