OZ ISN’T SO WONDERFUL IN “WICKED: FOR GOOD”
BY SOPHIA ROOKSBERRY PHOTO BY UNIVERSAL PICTURES
Last November, the film adaptation of a Broadway classic, “Wicked,” swept the world up in a magical tornado of pink and green. A year later, the second installment of the movie-musical — “Wicked: For Good” — crash landed right onto the Yellow Brick Road.
“Wicked” tells the origin story of Glinda the Good Witch and the Wicked Witch of the West, two driving characters in “The Wizard of Oz.” The first film takes us back to their days as Galinda and Elphaba, two sorcery students at Shiz University.
The dynamic between Galinda (Ariana Grande) and Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) as they find their way from enemies to friends, is one of the most charming parts of the first film. Raw and graceful performances from the two actresses made for a chilling ending, in which Elphaba evades the plot-twistingly evil Wizard and Galinda stays at his side.
The expectations set by the finale made the poorly-paced, blasé sequel of “Wicked: For Good” all the more disappointing. The film begins after a time skip, during which Glinda (having altered her name) is the face of the Ozian government and Elphaba has been dubbed a violent criminal. The next two hours are a frenzy of rushed storylines, plot holes and poorly-written additional songs.
The show’s original songwriter, Stephen Schwartz, returned to write the two new songs -– “No Place Like Home” and “The Girl in the Bubble” — but they are entirely unrecognizable as Schwartz’s work. They replace the whimsical, eccentric and Ozian sound of the original score with dull filler numbers that lack substance and plot-driven urgency.
Meanwhile, two of the most beloved songs from the original musical, “As Long As You’re Mine” and “For Good,” were awkward at best and boring at worst.
A directorial choice that separates Erivo and Jonathan Bailey (love interest Prince Fiyero) at their most intimate moment takes the audience out of the passionate “As Long As You’re Mine.” The film’s namesake, “For Good,” is the climactic goodbye between Elphaba and Glinda, and it does injustice to the moving song with a lackluster attempt.
The film isn’t without a few redeeming qualities, mostly those that carried over from the first film. The costume design, theatrical ensemble numbers and gilded pink and green color palette are all stunning, but not quite enough to warrant a runtime over two hours. The only thing truly saving the film is the performances from the leading characters.
Grande stuns in the role of Glinda, both as a singer and actress. Her chemistry between each of her scene partners is versatile and raw, and her vocal quality is buoyant and perfectly Glindafied. Erivo delivers a seminal and severe interpretation of Elphaba, who performs the most powerful rendition of “No Good Deed” to date. Bailey balances his multi-faceted character (within a love triangle, no less) with intention and humor.
Other supporting characters, such as Boq (Ethan Slater), Nessa (Marissa Bode) and Madam Morrible (Michelle Yeoh), all have their moments, but all feel one-note for the duration of their character arcs.
“Wicked: For Good” fails to deliver, for both its characters and its audience. The purpose of an adaptation is to improve upon existing material. Instead, “Wicked: For Good” weakened the musical with subpar additions and too much recapitulation of the first film. Credit where credit is due to the actors and the occasional moment of mastery from director Jon M. Chu, but future rewatches across the fanbase are sure to end at “Defying Gravity.”
2/5
