Wicked Musical

Wicked

July 3rd, 2009

Tony Award-winning Broadway and West End musical Wicked is an excited adaptation of  the best-selling novel Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West by Gregory Maguire and a parallel novel of L. Frank Baum’s classic story The Wonderful Wizard of Oz from the perspective of the witches of the Land of Oz. Wicked the musical is not Wicked the novel. While the novel is its source, the wicked san diego musical presents only pieces of it, in a much simplified form, and often diverging wildly from the novel’s narrative.

One might be tempted to think all this destroys the work; but in the end it improves it, shining a bright light on the story’s numerous ironies and interlaced levels of social commentary.  But the score of musical is heavily thematic, bearing in some senses more resemblance to a film score than a traditional musical score.

The musical debuted on Broadway on October 30, 2003. It was produced by Universal Pictures and directed by Joe Mantello, with musical staging by Wayne Cilento. Choosing from the 38 speaking characters in Wicked the novel, the authors of Wicked the musical show decided to focus their show on eight key characters plus a few others and the ensemble. Current San Francisco Cast principals are:

•    Kendra Kassebaum as Glinda
•    Tim Talman as Witch’s Father
•    Neka Zang as Witch’s Mother
•    Fiama Fricano as The Midwife
•    Teal Wicks as Elphaba
•    Deedee Magno Hall as Nessarose
•    Eddy Rioseco as Boq
•    Patty Duke as Madame Morrible
•    Tom Flynn as Doctor Dillamond
•    Nicolas Dromard as Fiyero
•    Tim Talman as The Ozian Official
•    Lee Wilkof as The Wonderful Wizard of Oz
•    Everth Lopez as Chistery

wicked cleveland tells the story of Elphaba born with emerald-green skin, smart, fiery and misunderstood, the future Wicked Witch of the West and her relationship with Glinda, the Good Witch of the North, beautiful, ambitious and very popular. Their friendship struggles through their opposing dispositoins and viewpoints, rivalry over the same love-interest, their reactions to the Wizard’s corrupt government, and, ultimately, Elphaba’s public fall from grace. Their buddy story is only one of several storylines and subplots in a carefully constructed, surprise-filled musical adventure.

The music and lyrics are birilliantly selected and presented by Stephen Schwartz. Wicked is a truly heartfelt story of friendship and love. As Richard Zoglin of ‘Time Magazine’ put it, “If every musical had a brain, a heart and the courage of Wicked, Broadway really would be a magical place!”

Wicked topped the nominations counts for all Broadway shows with a total of ten nominations and was Tony-award winner in three of them: Best Performance by a Leading Actress in a Musical - Idina Menzel; Best Scene Design - Eugene Lee. The musical garnered the most nominations and Drama Desk awards of any show this season. Wicked’s final awards announced May 16, 2009 was:

•    Oustanding Musical - Wicked,
•    Outstanding Lyrics - Stephen Schwartz,
•    Outstanding Book - Winnie Holzman,
•    Oustanding Costume Design - Susan Hilferty,
•    Oustanding Set Design of a musical - Eugene Lee
•    Oustanding Director of a Musical - Joe Mantello

At the end of January 2009, Wicked began showing in San Francisco. A second Wicked tour of the United States and Canada started on March 7, 2009 at the Barbara B. Mann Performing Arts Hall in Fort Myers, FL. Now the tour continues trough Memphis, TN, Tempe, AZ, Tulsa, OK, San Diego, CA, Austin, TX, Seattle, WA, Nashville, TN,  wicked des moines civic center, IA, Denver, CO, Wichita, KS, Kansas City, KS, Cleveland, OH, Schenectady, NY, Providence, RI. Others cities will expect Wicked in 2010: Philadelphia, PA, Syracuse, NY, Greenville, SC, Dayton, OH, Miami, FL, Richmond, VA, Durham, NC, Toledo, OH, St. Louis, MO.

Entry Filed under: Broadway Shows