How popular is the musical Wicked in St. Louis? Twenty years after the show opened on Broadway, the national tour is playing at the Fox Theatre for the seventh time. Once again, the tour’s visit is four weeks long. No other show this season played here for more than two weeks.
A run of this length would not be possible without a base of fans who come to see the show again and again. All this group needs to know is that the current company lives up the lofty standards the national tour has set for itself. Joe Mantello’s direction, Wayne Cilento’s musical staging, and all the technical contributions are as impressive as ever. The splendid cast gives fresh, involving performances.
Leading the company are Lissa deGuzman as Elphaba and Jennafer Newberry as Glinda. In the principal supporting roles are Christian Thompson as Fiyero, Natalie Venetia Belcon as Madame Morrible, Timothy Shew as the Wizard, Tara Kostmayer as Nessarose, Kyle McArthur as Boq, and Boise Holmes as Doctor Dillamond.
The musical is an adaption of Gregory Maguire’s 1995 novel, also named Wicked, which offers a fresh take on the Oz mythology created by L. Frank Baum. The novel is the story of Elphaba, who becomes the Wicked Witch of the West. She is born with green skin that makes her an object of scorn and suspicion.
The musical’s creators, Stephen Schwartz and Winnie Holzman, freely adapted the novel. Holzman’s book focuses on the friendship between Elphaba and Galinda, who eventually becomes the good witch, Glinda.
Through an unlikely sequence of events, the outcast Elphaba becomes the college roommate and then the best friend of her complete opposite, Galinda, who is popular, blond, and beautiful.
Their friendship makes each woman a better person, but it is strained when they fall in love with the same classmate and when they are at odds over what to do about political oppression in Oz. In the end, their personal growth is enduring and inspiring.
Dorothy and Toto are not characters in Wicked. The Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Cowardly Lion do appear in the musical, but their histories are radically different from the familiar stories in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. The Wizard in Wicked is a fascist as well as a fraud. He’s responsible the persecution of Oz’s talking animals.
The book tellingly contrasts the plot thread about the witches’ friendship with the one about the rise of despotism. One story demonstrates the rewards of accepting difference. The other shows the consequences of demonizing difference. These lessons are as timely and stirring as ever.
Wicked continues through May 7 at the Fox Theatre, 527 North Grand Boulevard.
—Gerry Kowarsky
Photo by Joan Marcus
From the left, Glinda (Jennafer Newberry) and Elphaba (Lissa deGuzman) face off in Wicked.
