Wicked: No One Mourns The Wicked Awesome

Gravity isn't the only thing Elphaba plans on defying when she sings the song at the end of Act I. It is both a literal and figurative declaration (and can now be seen as a bit of a meta-reference); when her spell creates a magic flying broomstick, she defies gravity to escape her captors, but she also intends on taking on a government intent on bringing her down. And looking at the show's success, it can be said that Wicked defied everyone's expectations. Who would think that a show that both cynically and lovingly turns an American classic on its head could be so successful. Who knew that there was so much story to tell about Oz before Dorothy showed up?

After the intermission, we see that the representatives of the Wizard have been so successful in their campaign to smear Elphaba's name that all of Oz lives in fear of her. We never see her interact with the public after being declared as "wicked", and I believe that this is meant to emphasize the fact that Elphaba is not truly wicked. The people of Oz believe something because their government tells them its so, even though there is no evidence. Instead, Elphaba's green skin is seen as a mark of her evil ways, and the belief in her wicked ways causes her actions to be viewed by the Ozians through a skewed lens. Benign actions like flying around on her broomstick are seen as "lurking".

The only person who still actively believes that there is any good in Elphaba is Fiyero, the new Captain of the Guard in the Wizard's army. Glinda is seeing her dreams come true before her eyes, and while she probably deep down believes in Elphaba's innocence, she chooses to go along with the lie to retain her place as "Glinda the Good". She is loved by the populace, is a sorceress in service of the Wizard, and is engaged to Fiyero. She thinks that she couldn't be happier, but silently admits that there was a cost for her happiness.

Meanwhile, Elphaba is struggling to get by. She wants to save Oz from the Wizard, and, in a sense, itself. They are wrapped up in the lie of the Wizard, and she thinks that they need someone to snap them out of their blind allegiance. The play isn't nearly as political as the book, but it is during these scenes where the brilliant satire of the show shines. More than a few veiled references to the Bush Administration are made, and there are a few priceless lines in the song "Wonderful", sung to Elphaba by the Wizard. It starts with him explaining that, in the place he comes from (our world), there is no black and white, only perspective. He tells her that few people are "at ease with moral ambiguities, so we act as though they don't exist". Wonderful.

Unfortunately for Elphaba, the Ozians don't want to be saved. Everything she does with good intentions backfires, and only causes people to resent her even more. Things finally go right for a change when she learns that her unrequited feelings for Fiyero weren't so unrequited after all. However, this drives the wedge between her and Glinda even farther, and the happiness is short-lived. The last straw for Elphaba comes when the Royal Guards torture their captain to get to her, and she decides that there is no hope left for Oz, vowing to truly become Wicked (after seeing Sweeney Todd, in which the title character sings a song about an epiphany he has about losing his faith in humanity, I can imagine this show going a lot darker, with Elphaba using her powers to do some serious damage).

At the same time, the citizens of Oz have become fed up with the Wicked Witch, and decide to get rid of her once and for all. With a little girl from Kansas in tow, a mob makes their way towards Elphaba's hideout. At the last minute, a shocking discovery brings Glinda to her senses, and the two of them reunite for the last time. Their final scene shows the tragic aspect of their relationship. They can never allow anyone to know that they remain friends, and they will probably never see each other again. The pair acknowledge that the other did in fact make the right decision for their journey in life, as well as for the current situation. Glinda's placement in the Wizard's inner circle will allow her to finish Elphaba's work of bringing him down, while Elphaba's active role in getting herself exiled showed Glinda that there are more important things in life than being popular.

Now, I want to talk about the final twist. I implore anyone who has not yet seen the show to skip this paragraph, since I don't want to ruin it, but I do want to discuss the end. Skip ahead to the next picture. Ok, let's go: Now, I thought that the show was going to end in tragedy, since the protagonist was doomed to die. There were even references to the fact that she couldn't get wet earlier in the play. Therefore, I was surprised and delighted when Elphaba revealed that she was alive to none other than Fiyero, who had become the Scarecrow (remember his song about being brainless?). I later realized how brilliant those "references" to Elphaba's hydrophobia were. The first was when Madame Morrible gave her an umbrella, telling her that she doesn't want to get wet. The audience thinks that Morrible is trying to keep her from melting. But how many people have said, "You don't want to get wet" to a friend who is going out into the rain? It is not an uncommon expression, since people don't like walking around in the rain without an umbrella. You get cold. It sucks! Morrible wasn't afraid she'd melt, she was looking out for her health (probably the one good act Morrible does in the whole play). The other reference is made by a random Oz citizen who is repeating a rumor about how Elphaba's soul is so unclean that water will melt her. Fiyero hears this and is disgusted that people could believe such bullshit. But these two comments do their job, and remind us that our hero is doomed. This state of mind makes her survival all the more rewarding to see.

This play is incredible, but what about its source material? I fell in love with the play. It was subversive and political, but was also sweet without being over the top. So I wanted to read the book. Unfortunately, I think that my love of the show hurt appreciation of the book. They started similarly enough, but then branched off dramatically around the time Elphaba and Glinda went to meet the wizard for the first time. After that, I kept thinking to myself, "If [current event] is happening now, how will [future event] later?", which really took me out of the story being told. And the story in print is much darker and more political than the story on the stage. Elphaba is much angrier in Maguire's book, while the Wizard is full-blown evil dictator. In the show, he is not a good person, but he does have the Ozians' best interests at heart (well, except for the Ozian Animals). The book's Wizard is more Hitler or Stalin, while the play's Wizard is George W. Bush. The play can be enjoyed by children and adults, by people looking for a fun story or people looking for a subversive one. The book is NOT for children, and it is extremely dense and slow-paced, especially when Elphaba is hiding out with Fiyero's family (Fiyero is extremely different as well). But what I liked least about the book is that it does not have as much fun with the mythos of Baum's world as the play. The play gives incredible origin stories to Dorothy's three companions on the Yellow Brick Road, Elphaba calls attention to the absuridity of Glinda traveling by bubbles, and the fact that the Wizard is seen as "wonderful" is believable (I don't know how or why a coup has not taken place in the book, since everyone detests the Wizard).

To end, here is the performance by the original Broadway Elphaba and Glinda, Idina Menzel and Kristin Chenoweth, singing "Defying Gravity" at the Tony Awards. They are introduced by Joel Grey, the original Wizard.



If you've never seen Wicked, you absolutely must. Everything about it is wonderful, from the story to the songs, the effects and the set (I did not mention that I find the steampunk-esque set in Chicago extremely beautiful). It did not win the Tony for Best Show (that honor went to Avenue Q, which is also incredible, and is coming up soon), but I believe it should have.

Up next: Island girl...

Wicked: Defies Gravity

I don't really like the film version of The Wizard of Oz. When I was young, I liked it (but the Wicked Witch of the West scared me a little), but as I grew older, I could not understand why it was such a classic, except for the fact that the colored scenes were so revolutionary. But that is something completely separate from its worth as a film, if the only thing it has going for it is the effects (sounds like a debate that we'd have on films today, doesn't it). I've never read the books by L. Frank Baum, and I don't have too much of a desire. I respect the fact that he wrote them as political satires, with the Yellow Brick Road representing the gold standard, the Cowardly Lion a stand-in for presidential hopeful William Jennings Bryan, and the SILVER slippers holding the meaning of the silver standard. It is for these reasons that I didn't have a huge desire to see Wicked.

By the time the show came to Chicago, it was already a smash hit on Broadway. I still didn't want to see it. My parents and sister went to see the show with a choral group she was a part of and asked me if I wanted to go, and I declined. There seems to be a rule in my family stating that whenever we see a musical play, we are obligated to buy the soundtrack. And that is what got me into the audience a few weeks later. The CD did not get removed from our car for at least 4 days, and the music hooked me. Interestingly enough, I never seemed to hear anything after about the 9th track, "One Short Day", meaning that I was fairly unfamiliar with the song that would go on to become my favorite of the show.

I went in not knowing quite what to expect. From the music that I'd heard and the spoilers that had been told to me by my sister, I thought that it was going to be a light-hearted re-examination of why the Wicked Witch of the West was considered wicked. I thought the witch, named Elphaba in the play (and the book that spawned the play, which is interesting, but, in my opinion, far inferior to the show), had simply run afoul of the Wizard of Oz and was the innocent victim of a nasty smear campaign by the Wizard.

Sort of. It turns out that the show I thought was going to be light and "cute" was exceptionally deep and thought-provoking. The Land of Oz as shown in Wicked is not too different from our world. People go away to college, class warfare exists, and people spontaneously break out into song. Wait, that last one doesn't happen. But the other two are things that we didn't see in Baum's version. However, these two things have their Ozian twists. One of the available majors at Shiz University is sorcery, and the lowest class in Oz is the Animals. Animals are animals who are sentient and possess the ability to speak English (as opposed to animals, which are like the animals of our world). Unfortunately, one of the downsides of the fact that this show must fit in to an allotted run time, there are numerous aspects of the Animals' struggle with the Wizard that are glossed over and forced to be run through in a brief song, called "Something Bad" (one of the less-impressive numbers of the show). However, at the show's heart, this is Elphaba and Glinda's story.

The show starts at the end, with Glinda showing up in her bubble, acting just like we'd expect the Glinda the Good of the film and book to act. She reassures the Ozian citizens that the dreaded Wicked Witch of the West is dead and now life can go back to normal. When she is about to leave, a random man accuses Glinda of once being friends with the witch. Glinda begins to explain, and the story begins. Elphaba and Glinda (then called Galinda) met at Shiz and were instant enemies. Galinda was a spoiled blonde airhead who was adored by her fellow students, while Elphaba was a green introvert whose cynicism developed after years of resentment makes it nearly impossible for her to make any friends. Her peers are off-put by her looks, her father can't stand her, and her sister is often embarrassed by her outspoken nature. Amazingly, it takes an act of cruelty on Galinda's part to bring the two together. One day, a dashing young prince named Fiyero arrives at Shiz. Known for being a troublemaker, he is immediately accepted by his fellow students, especially Galinda. He decides to have a party at "the most swankified place in town", and everyone who's anyone will be attending. A young Munchkin boy named Boq asks out Galinda. The poor boy is so infatuated with her that he agrees to ask Nessarose, Elphaba's sister, to the dance as a favor to Galinda, when Galinda tells him that she would see whoever did so as a "hero". Nessa is in a wheelchair, and Galinda tricks Boq into believing she cares about Nessa's happiness. At the same time, Galinda receives an ugly hat as a gift from her aunt. It is black and pointy (sound familiar), and when Elphaba shows up to thank Galinda for getting Nessa included, Galinda convinces Elphaba to attend as well and wear the hat, claiming it is very fashionable. In return, Elphaba convinces her sorcery professor, Madame Morrible, to include Galinda in the extremely exclusive class. Galinda is stunned by this, and when Elphaba does show up wearing the hat, thinking that Galinda was being sincere, Galinda realizes the error of her ways, and feels sorry for Elphaba when everyone else starts laughing at her. It also causes Fiyero, who sang a song about the benefits of being ignorant and shallow when he was introduced, to display a greater depth than he originally let on when he notices something extraordinary in Elphaba.

Galinda and Elphaba's friendship becomes both epic and tragic. The two of them realize that they have similar ambitions in life; both wish to meet the Wizard and become trusted advisors. Galinda has always dreamed of being a magic advisor, which promises being among the elites of Ozian society, while Elphaba believes being with the Wizard will finallyallow her to be accepted and liked. Elphaba's tragic home life draws sympathy from Galinda, and Elphaba's inquisitive side starts to rub off on Galinda, who begins to understand that she shouldn't judge anyone by their looks or accept things at face value. They do have some unresolved jealousies, though. Elphaba begins to pine for Fiyero. She sees a much better side of him when the two of them rescue a young Animal being tortured by a strange man (these acts are what eventually lead Galinda to change her name to Glinda, which has to do with the disappearance of their one Animal professor at Shiz). Meanwhile, Elphaba is a natural sorceress, while Glinda is struggling to get through. When the Wizard invites Elphaba to the Emerald City to meet him, she invites Glinda to come along. It is here where Elphaba's life, as well as her friendship with Glinda takes an unexpected turn.

Elphaba and Glinda learn that the Wonderful Wizard of Oz is not so wonderful after all. He is responsible for violence against the Animals, and he has no power at all. He is nothing but a fraud who uses a mechanical head to instill fear in those in his presence (they pay no attention to the man behind the curtain, or, in this case, throne). Glinda is willing to go along with the charade, if it means that she is guaranteed place and power in the world. She rationalizes her actions by believing that she can cause more change by working from the inside. But Elphaba won't have any of it. She is outraged to learn that her hero, the man who could "de-greenify" her, is a fraud, and she runs away. Fearing that she will reveal the truth to the public and destroy the Wizard's regime, the Wizard's representatives tell the crowds of the Emerald City that Elphaba is a Wicked Witch who seeks to undermine the Wizard. All of this goes on during the song "Defying Gravity", which ends the first act. This is the song I referred to above as my favorite of the entire show. Yes, it's a huge number meant to be a "showstopper", but it's so well done. The song moves the story forward by showing how Elphaba finally becomes the Wicked Witch, but is also a very personal look into the relationship between the two heroines. Though they at first cannot understand why the other is making the opposite decision, they come to understand the needs and desires of their friend, and wish each other good luck. They even do everything they can to assist the other, even though now, they are enemies.

I enjoy this musical number so much that I am going to put it in to both this and the next post, which will go over the second half and look more into the virtues of the storytelling this play employs. In this one, I will use a video taken from the Chicago production, using the original cast, including Ana Gasteyer (of Saturday Night Live) as Elphaba and Kate Reinders as Glinda. I feel fortunate to have seen these two in the leading roles; seeing Wicked is the closest I've come to seeing the original cast among the four shows I plan on talking about right now. It wasn't the original Broadway cast, but it was nearly the original Chicago cast (Ben Vereen was in town for a special engagement as the Wizard). Enjoy.



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