‘Wicked’ may take place in the land of Oz, but it feels very real to our current world

Twenty minutes into the screening for Wicked, the highly anticipated film adaptation musical theater nerds have been waiting for, a cinemagoer seated in front of me motioned for me to come closer. She nearly turned her entire body around, clearly awestruck at the performance that Cynthia Erivo, the Oscar-nominated powerhouse who brought abolitionist superhero Harriet Tubman to life in 2019’s Harriet (whether most of y’all thought she should have or not), was giving.

Her words were muffled underneath her face mask, so she had to repeat herself twice. She looked at the screen once more at the already clear masterpiece that was on the 50-foot screen, taking in the pink and green glamor that the film offers, and this time pointed toward Erivo.

“Is that Jennifer Hudson?”

And thus began a two-hour-and-42-minute journey into the overt politically-dripped journey that we all get to experience in a film that will most likely be awarded – heavily – this season.

So does Wicked masterfully translate to the silver screen as so many had hoped?

It does.

But it delivers much more than what’s promised, and what’s promised is a rather tall order – powerhouse vocals pouring over a twisted version of The Wizard of Oz, a time-honored story that has everyone who consumes it questioning who is inherently good and who is actually wicked.

On Broadway when this play originated with theater queens Kristin Chenoweth starring as Glinda, a privileged witch, blond, hair-tossing, and seemingly blind-to-the-world-around-her and Idina Menzel as Elphaba, the raven-haired, cast-aside budding sorceress who is rejected by her father, dismissed (eventually) by her sister and bullied by the world around her because of the color of her skin – it’s green.

Like Kermit said, ain’t easy being green.

But in this take by director Jon M. Chu, he gifts us with Erivo, her microbraids and full lips give us a more robust take on the outcast who wants to change the world for the better. It’s hard not to know her Black skin is underneath all of that green and the pain of what that additional layer of otherness represents is what makes this version even better than it should be.

In the film adaptation, which hit theaters Nov. 22, we see the uncomfortable dynamics of what happens when a disruptor enters the chat and how the world around her rejects her ideals – and what she looks like – in response. Especially when she doesn’t want to play the game.

Especially when she isn’t willing to essentially – are you ready for this? – shut up and dribble.

Sound familiar?

The status quo is not acceptable. The world is not peaceful. An othered community is being snatched up, caged up and their inalienable rights are being stripped away.

We’re still talking about Wicked.

Here’s what so brilliant about this film: nothing about this take on Wicked is new. This is the same record-breaking production that marveled Broadway and traveled around the country since 2003, it’s the same story of a stage musical that crossed the $1 billion mark in total Broadway revenue in 2016, which placed it in a unique company with longtime Broadway staples The Lion King and The Phantom of the Opera as the only shows to do so. And today? It’s the second-highest grossing musical of all time, behind Disney’s The Lion King.

But Erivo’s Elphaba is perhaps a sharper representation of otherness – there’s no missing it.

And she wants to use her developing power for the good. The problem is that the world she lives in – this wonderful musical world which is filled with hopes, manifestations and dreams – only wants her to either be hidden or, as we learn via evildoers, use her powers to oppress others who also are, well, othered.

In the aftermath of the 2024 election – the election millions thought would end up coronating the first female president and first Black and Asian president – many of us needed an exhale.

Still do. It’s raw. And it’s early. And the fallout from the national election is still very much ever present and will be for a while. The headlines are sharp and scary. Neo Nazi’s openly marching in midwestern streets. Antisemitic demonstrations outside of a Diary of Anne Frank production. And anti-Black rhetoric – sadly – abounds.

This is when great art is created and amplified.

This is when the world that we live in is interpreted and repacked for creative consumption. 

When art is done well, when it’s truly at its best, it’s a reflection of the times. It’s the thing that helps mark history – even if it’s told from a fictional fantasyland that in some ways recycles itself to draw its inspiration from our very real-life experiences.

Wicked is loosely based on a 1995 book that was inspired by L. Frank Baum’s 1900 novel The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, which is of course the film adaptation of Baum’s book for the 1939 movie that young Judy Garland helped bring to life.

When Baum’s novel first arrived, it was the telling of a fantasy world that was initially crafted by the author for children – and later adults – of a world that is being essentially tortured by a tyrant of a witch they all want freedom from. The story was an early success and ultimately the Library of Congress declared the tale to be “America’s greatest and best-loved homegrown fairytale.”

By the time 1939 arrived, the world was three years removed from track and field athlete Jesse Owens becoming the first American to win four gold medals in one Olympics. His athletic victory was a direct dismissal of Nazi party leader Adolf Hitler’s beliefs in Aryan supremacy. Not that they held off the inevitable. After Owens’ victorious laps, Germany invaded Poland in September 1939, which marked the beginning of World War II.

On U.S. soil, 1939 also marked the release of Gone With the Wind, which is an adaptation of the Civil War-era novel that in many ways, glorifies slavery.

There is no Elphaba in Gone with The Wind – there’s no note-for-note antihero to root for who is willing to risk everything to uproot the system as it exists. But for the world outside of that movie, there is a Hattie McDaniel who became the first Black person to win an Oscar, and eventually that film served as a major changing point for how Black Americans were depicted in cinema.

In Wicked, we are able to see a familiar story – one that we know inside and out, one that is so rooted in our experience as humans that it’s like family.

We know good. We know wicked.

And because the world has changed so much, we are endowed with the other side of the fantasy story that’s rooted in so much of what we all experience.

Because stories with universal truths clearly connect with millions of people. As they should.