"Wicked" trailer drops

Fun fact: The trailer for #Wicked coming out today is not just any occasion, the date was specially chosen to come out on the birthday of the creator of the book “The Wizard of Oz”. 🤩

Looks subtle

Flop.

It looks amazing and magical. This attention to detail is rarely seen in movies today. The sets are said to be the largest built for a motion picture since Ben Hur and Cleopatra. They planted 9 million real tulips on the path to Munchkin Land.

All that CGI money and none of the magic.

Are they still doing Part I and Part II?

The trailer is much better than expected. I still don't see why it needs to be two films, but if they must do it that way they should release the second within a month or two of the first. Theatres can do back-to-back showings of the two parts. Waiting a year for the conclusion is rather anticlimactic -and totally betrays the point of doing two films in the first place.

Johnny's playing Fiyero? I had no idea, he looks so good!

The villains-as-misunderstood-heroes trope is so tired. Back in the day, villains were just bad. The wicked witch was just wicked. And she loved being wicked and didn’t need her wickedness explained away. Somehow, people understood that there are bad seeds in the world that need to be defeated, not empathized with.

Now, every villain has to have their origin story told in a way that makes them relatable, and at the same time, we’re meant to understand that the characters who appeared good — the more pleasant and attractive characters — were bad (or at least misguided) the whole time.

This is part of the reason why we have kids on college campuses simping for terrorist groups and shrilling for the abolition of prisons.

This. Looks. Awful.

Mainly because Bowen Yang's in it.

It’s Adele Dazeem!

[quote]Back in the day, villains were just bad.

I don't know, I kinda wish someone had told me "no one is inherently bad" when I was growing up and listening to all those fairy tales. That's a better way to teach life lessons as it's truer to life. And just because something was back in the day and simpler, doesn't mean it was more justified or the right way to approach a story. They did all sorts of bad shit "back in the day", like hunting homos for sport.

I hate Cynthia Erivo and would like nothing better than for her to have another flop. But it's Arianna who looks like she just doesn't have it.

Looks great. I love the show though.

[quote]I kinda wish someone had told me "no one is inherently bad" when I was growing up and listening to all those fairy tales.

I hate to break it to you, R12, but "no one is inherently bad" is a lie. There are inherently bad people out there. There are people who take pleasure in harming others and are irredeemable. Believing otherwise is the real fairy tale.

You type old, r9.

Looks better than the first trailer (not saying much) but that last note she (doesn’t) hit still sucks.

I could do without Ariana's baby girl speaking voice.

Who did Bowen Yang fuck to get a role in the movie?

[quote]I could do without Ariana's baby girl speaking voice.

Yes, r18, it should be more deeply sonorous...like Chenoweth or Billie Burke.

The sound people do seem to be Chenoweth-ing Ariana's singing voice.

Musicals don’t sell.

“Wicked” is one of the worst musicals I’ve ever had the displeasure of seeing. It’s third rate childish fanfic.

And they aren't disguising that it's a musical.

It’s a beautiful looking trailer, but Elphaba has ONE job, and that is to hit the F in Defying Gravity. Which she didn’t.

[quote]Which she didn’t

...in the trailer

To be fair, Maguire was ahead of the misunderstood villain trend as Wicked was published in 95. I quit the book halfway through though I loved his other books. I feel as though I should give them another try -- I think the Wicked series is 4 books total. Did anyone read them?

I think Erivo looks good in this. I was criticizing her casting because of her age but the green makeup distracts from it. This will be a very appealing movie to see in a theater. It should do well.

I didn't see the stage show but the movie looks Potterfied.

^I was thinking that too - that it looked like the American version of Hogwarts. That said, it looks entertaining and big spectacle movies are always kind of fun at the holidays when you need a break from your family. Looks better than that Wonka crap they rolled out last year.

I agree with everything that Matty Maggiacomo says in this video. This will be The Sound of Music for our generation.

so all of the white people are against the black girl? Is that what this is about?

I don't know musicals. Looks like "hidden figures" or something.

The show itself is terrible. I saw it with the original Broadway cast and it was just meh even with Joel Grey as the Wizard. The movie will end with "Defying Gravity" just like act one of the show. Act 2 was slow. For some reason the songs just don't resonate. When it opened in San Francisco pre Broadway it was 4 hours long. The book is so different and worth a read. The sequels have gay content too. Elphaba was a terrorist and the wizard was a dictator and caused genocide with the animal people and the munchkins. In the books Glinda is barely a character on the periphery. Joe Mantello has been collecting a big paycheck all these years so he can have his twinks.

Any film that has its ending air a year later isn't worth it. Just release it with an intermission and make it a movie-going spectacle. Dragging it out is an insult to the audience, and turns me off to the whole experience.

[quote] I feel as though I should give them another try -- I think the Wicked series is 4 books total. Did anyone read them?

The first one is terrific--it starts slowly but it really builds up in meanings and becomes hard to put down as you go. When Dorothy appears in the 2nd half of the book (after only appearing in the prologue before that), she's pretty much sidelined from the plot, but she becomes more and more important as it goes on, until finally when she's captured and then throws the bucket of water at Elphaba ("Oh, will this nightmare never end?" Dorothy wails) it feels so inevitable given everything that's gone on before. And the novel doesn't have the same (unconvincing) ending the musical has.

The second and third books are not very good (the third is pretty bad), but i read them all. The fourth book in the series is much more fun--Dorothy comes back, and she's no longer the grave, serious six-year-old of the first Baum book, but has grown up into the silly chatterbox of the later Baum books. Her character brings a levity that is much appreciated. All the subsequent books are not as good as the first one was, though--the first one was genuinely brilliant. I re-read it about every five years now.

[quote]the first one was genuinely brilliant.

Agreed, r34. It's very dense and you have to be willing to give it time to sink in. It deserves a mini-series. I understand their reasons for making the musical what it is...they wanted it to run, which it certainly has.

It looks fine. Might even be great. I’ll see it.

No matter how good it may be though, R3 and R22 are probably spot on. Musicals are rarely successful these days.

Making the focus of the show almost entirely about the relationship between Elphaba and G(a)linda is the result of extensive notes given based on an early workshop by none other than DL Fave and Broadway’s Biggest Cunt (quite a title), Arthur Laurents. He wasn’t wrong given the material that Schwartz, Holzmann and Mantello had concocted even at that early stage, and, no doubt, it’s a big part of the reason it resonates with audiences (read: tween girls) and became one of the biggest hits ever.

[quote]Musicals are rarely successful these days.

This is Wicked, r36. It'll do fine.

Oscars for everyone!

the reviews are going to be wicked

[quote]the reviews are going to be wicked

They were for the Broadway show and it didn't win Best Musical...didn't matter.

In the grand tradition of In the Heights, West Side Story (2021) and The Color Purple (2023)

then again R41 there was The Producers a smash Broadway success and a major flop of a film

and don't forget Rent which flopped as a film

And "Jersey Boys."

[quote]In the grand tradition of In the Heights, West Side Story (2021) and The Color Purple (2023)

None of those (Producers included) were Wicked..in terms of runs or built in audience.

Yet again they refuse to actually show much of people singing in the trailer. You hear the singing, but don't see many people actually singing.

Phantom of the Opera was the longest running show on Broadway and the film flopped! R46

I never miss a Gerard Butler musical.

Cats ran for 18 years, and the movie was disastrous

Chorus Line was a movie flop based on a show that ran for 15 years

Does anyone really care anymore? The movie is 30+ years too late. And the two female leads are way too fucking old.

Alternatively, I don’t believe either Sweeney Todd nor Into The Woods recouped on Broadway, though perhaps after the tours they ultimately did, yet both films were successful and got multiple Oscar nominations. That said, the less said about A Funny Thing… and A Little Night Music film adaptations, the better.

[Quote] I never miss a Gerard Butler musical.

and I never miss a two-part film starring Ariana Grande

I see the future

I've seen hundreds of Broadway shows, and "Wicked" was the most boring by a country mile!

I couldn't believe how long and dull it was!

wait till you see the movie R56

[quote] This is Wicked, [R36]. It'll do fine.

No it won’t.

The fact that this is a two-part movie is insane. Money right down the drain.

Erivo looks……unfortunate.

You ARE old, R16.

Yep, R25, the key of Defying Gravity is lowered, which a big surprise.

The post on vocals are done already R26. It’s one of the first things they do in a movie musical. It’s recorded and finished. She sang the song transposed down. They won’t be raising the key.

I am, r61....but I don't type it.

Is this the first of two movies?

It looks like a fun film.

Yawn. It looks like Harry Potter set in Oz. Erivo looks too old to be Arianna's sister; her mom, maybe.

Shiz University looks like a fantasy of what the Bellagio wishes it were.

I don't have the strength to endure what looks to be a tragic collision of overwrought CGI, amateur facial photoshopping, bad acting, and forced vocalization.

So for those of you who know the story, can anyone tell me how the wicked witch becomes wicked? Because based on this trailer, she looks to be a perfectly nice green lady.

r68, she falls afoul of the Wizard's political schemes because he wants to exploit her magical powers since he has none. She resists, and so he makes her the enemy of the state, and spreads propaganda she is wicked and deserves to be destroyed.

In the Gregory Maguire novel, she begins to become different from her younger idealistic self because she gets twisted by the evil portrait of her the Ozites think she is (prompted by state propaganda) and because of her need to resist the Wizard. By the time she holds Dorothy hostage in the Castle of the Vinkus (or Winkies, in the L. Frank Baum stories), she's almost entirely lost sight of her original ideals.

Rent and The Producers were sold out for years on Broadway and tickets were hard to get with people lining up at the theater BO at 10am. When they became films, you couldn't give the tickets away

Whatever, r70, I still think it will do just fine.

I went to a reading by Gregory Maguire in 2007 at Bank Street College. I had him sign my first edition of “Wicked” which I bought in 1995 when I read a small sidebar about the book in maybe “Entertainment Weekly” or “OUT”. The show had already been playing for almost 4 years by then. Maguire was very nice.

I had mentioned a book with a somewhat similar premise - 1992’s “WAS” by Geoff Ryman. Maguire lit up and said he loved “WAS” and because of the premise of the “behind the scenes of Oz” story, (the very sad and very fictional story of the “REAL” Dorothy Gael whom Baum uses as inspiration to write his book), Maguire almost didn’t write “Wicked”.

Does the Dragon Time Clock fit into the musical at all?

Thank you, R69.

So does the story end happily or tragically?

Only about 2+ M views so far. That might be alarming to Universal. I believe some upcoming big releases have over 10M views at the same period.

R74, I am not R69 but it ends ambiguously.

Did the witch ever come back?

“Not yet.”

[Quote] I still think it will do just fine.

good for you Ariana

call it The Color Green

Fun fact: Both Margaret Hamilton and Cynthia Erivo were 36 years old when portraying the Wicked Witch.

No R73 Maybe it did in early out of town tryouts but on Broadway its nothing.

This looks like a flat out ball.

it's a shame about the cast.

Who would you have cast, r82? In the long run it doesn't matter because the show is the star. Like Mamma Mia! or Chicago.

Wicked to feature prominently at the Paris Olympics this summer, according to Universal head, Donna Langley.

That evil isn't real was a big idea in the 70s. Of course it is real, Trump is proof of that.

Already planning a night with my husband, sister, and niece to see at our Cinebistro. We'll have a ball. I'll eat a gummy but no one else will. Then we'll have cocktails and too questionable food. Who gives a fuck if the movie is okay, good or great. I'll go to appreciate the creativity that went into it from so many people.

This girl is spilling facts! It will be the best movie musical of our time.

Kristin Chenowith was 35 when Wicked opened, Idina Menzel was 32.

Cynthia Erivo is 37, Ariana Grande is 30. I’m not getting that they’re too old for the roles.

The distance of the stage is more forgiving, r88.

Then she gets taken out undramatically by that bitch Dorothy with a bucket of water.

[quote] That evil isn't real was a big idea in the 70s.

Despite the fact that Bonnie Franklin was starring in a popular television show!

Was Bonnie an Elpheba or a Glinda?

Eviro and Shrek. Separated at birth?

Looks great!

Stephanie J. Block shares her excitement over the new ‘Wicked’ trailer

She notably portrayed Elphaba in the early readings of Wicked, originated the role on the First National Tour, and played the role on Broadway. SJB is a true icon in the show’s history

Is Stephanie going to give Cynthia six pages of notes?

R72- at one point there was a musical of WAS. I can’t remember if it got past workshops. It might’ve.

I wish Broadway musicals were filmed onstage with the original casts and shown in theaters like England's National Theatre does. Very few have so we'll never get to watch some iconic performances. The studios wouldn't end up spending 200M on a flop and those interested would gladly pay to watch their favorites in the roles that made them or the show famous.

I feat the subtext will be slathered right on top with a very heavy hand.

In the US, R98, producers believe that such filmings are bad for box office on Broadway, and cut into any future film profits -but the UK figures show that the opposite is true. When people get to see a good representation of the stage show, they go out to the theatre to see it live.

[quote] "Who did Bowen Yang fuck to get a role in the movie?"

James Corden's manager, it seems, R13.

I wonder what they're going to do with the second movie once the first part bombs. There's no way this is going to be a hit. I'm sure they'll be making excuses and trying to fudge the numbers.

Two questions: is it possible the vocal arrangements for the trailer are specific to the trailer? Because there was a lesson from Jennifer Hudson's Memory that doesn't appear to have been learned here.

Second, is this thing getting hyped too soon?

What’s with Ariana’s speaking voice in this? It doesn’t sound like her.

She’s green, she’s discriminated based on skin color… a little on the nose.