150 Word Review: 'Wicked: Part One' (2024)

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Nov 29, 2024

There's lots of dancing—the choreography is inventive!—in Wicked, director Jon Chu's lavish adaptation of the Tony-award-winning Broadway smash based on the bestseller by Gregory Maguire. Big, fancy sets, too. Then there's Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba, the super-powered, green-skinned misfit. She is vulnerable and stubborn, with a bright voice as big as the sky. Ariana Grande is hilarious as Glinda, an ambitious, blonde semi-mean girl.

It shocks me how much Harry Potter owes to Wicked: wizards, revisionist myths, boarding schools. But Rowling stole none of the book's weirdness, politics, or sexuality. Pity. At least in the movie, Maguire's message endures: don't trust the man behind the curtain.

Wicked works best when the camera sits like an audience and smiles. It is weakest when it forgets it's a musical and tries to deliver a big-budget blockbuster. The showstopping number 'Defying Gravity' is constantly interrupted by CGI action. Let them sing!