Well before it became the 2024 hit film co-written by Dana Fox, it was a musical written by Winnie Holzman in collaboration with the renowned composer, Stephen Schwartz, and well before that, it was a novel by Gregory Maguire. From page to stage to film, “Wicked” has seen a lot of adaptations, but through it all, Fox and Holzman made sure to keep the spirit of what makes “Wicked” wickedly good.
Even when the musical first hit Broadway, Holzman knew it would one day be adapted into a film because Universal Pictures was one of their producers. So when Jon Chu, the film’s director, and Fox, became attached to the project back when the world was still in lockdown, Holzman already had a precedent for what they needed to do to make a film adaptation worthwhile – by bringing in more. Not only was this done by splitting the stage musical into a two-part film, turning a 45-minute second act into a two-hour and 10-minute theatrical blockbuster, a decision they were wary about at first, but Holzman pointed to specific examples of how they used the filmic medium to expand on what they loved about the original story.
Holzman said the musical score, composed by Schwartz and John Powell for the film, was something they couldn’t trim down, but needed to expand upon. Another major plot point she said she was eager to expand on was the animal rights subplot. Whereas in the play this arc is only articulated through the goat Dr. Dillamond, in the film, Holzman said they were able to expand the world through showing how animals all over Oz have been affected by the political propaganda. A sly remark to today’s political climate got a laugh from the crowd, but emphasized Holzman’s point about effective additions layered throughout the film. Fox talked about how the film allowed the viewer to empathize more with Elphaba, played by Cynthia Erivo in the film, through close-ups and spending more time with her as a child. One moment Fox noted as extremely impactful is the scene where, as babies, Elphaba and her sister hold hands – just that image of the little green hand embracing her sister’s sells the audience on how meaningful their relationship is. These glimpses, Holzman said, also worked to show how much faith Elphaba put in the Wizard from such a young age.
When Elphaba got to Shiz, not only was she not supposed to be there, a change from the stage production Holzman said she thinks worked for the better, but they made Madame Morrible, played by Michelle Yeoh in the film, more of a maternal figure than she’s traditionally portrayed. By allowing Morrible and Elphaba to relate to each other and for her and the Wizard to represent the parents she never had, making their betrayal hit all the harder.
On honing these emotional components, Fox and Holzman went into each scene with the mindset of knowing how Elphaba and Glinda, played by Ariana Grande, were feeling in every given scene. During early production, Holzman said she, Fox, Chu and Schwartz would have hours-long Zoom meetings where the director would pick Holzman and Schwartz’s minds about what went into every little detail, down to the names of the songs. When it came time to craft the scenes, Holzman said Chu had color-coordinated Post-it notes — green for Elphaba, pink for Glinda — with bullets notating what each of them was feeling as a means of fully realizing the emotional weight every interaction carried.
This emphasis on emotional response especially came into play during the finale after Elphaba is given everything she wants, Holzman said. Despite being given the deal of a lifetime by the Wizard, Fox said anyone else in that situation would have sacrificed their morals just a bit to get what they’ve always wanted, but Elphaba didn’t. For Fox, she said it was important for everyone, from the writers to the audience to Erivo herself, to understand where that decision came from. Conversely, when Glinda takes the deal, Fox and Holzman said we had to sympathize with her choice as well.
Maintaining this emotional duality between the two leads was actually a struggle going into the second film, Holzman said. Where in the musical, Elphaba and Glinda don’t reunite until “For Good,” if that were to happen in the film, Holzman said it would have been hours not spent with the relationship that made part one of “Wicked” such a phenomenon. Before Fox cut her off as to not spoil the yet to be released “Wicked: For Good,” Holzman ended it by saying how they needed to incorporate ways to have these two interact throughout the run time.
After the trailer for the second film was shown to an eager audience, Fox reflected on the legacy she has since become a part of. Having been an adoring fan of the franchise before she even met Holzman, she knows the resonance it has with people, reflecting on all the kids from small towns who empathize with Elphaba’s journey — a journey Fox helped bring to life. On reflecting upon the past 20-plus years of her career, Holzman said that through working on both the musical and film as well as collaborating so closely with Schwartz over the many years, has changed her “for good” — an unintended reference that got an “awwww” from the audience.
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Featured Image Courtesy of Austin Film Festival