Wicked, Sacramento, June 7, 2012
My mom and I went down to Sacramento last month to see Wicked. She saw the San Francisco production a few years ago; I knew almost nothing about it except that it's different from the book (which I haven't read anyway) and that it's femslashy.
The plot is roughly as follows: Elphaba is hated and maligned because she's green, but her father sends her to school so she can look after her sister. Galinda is blonde, perky, and popular. (Keep in mind that Galinda is Kristen Chenowith's signature role.) Galinda and Elphaba end up as roommates. They're enemies for a bit, then friends. In the meantime, there is violence against animals who can talk, including Elphaba's favorite professor, and a boy (whose introductory song is all about how shallow he is) comes to the school. The boy is perfect, so of course Galinda sets her sights on him. The professor is arrested, and the person who takes his place brings in a captive lion cub. Elphaba and the boy rescue the cub and have a moment. Then Elphaba and Galinda go to meet the Wizard, where they discover that he is behind the persecution of animals who can talk. Elphaba ends up with a book of spells, and in their attempts to escape, she makes a broomstick that can fly. The showstopping number in the musical is this song, "Defying Gravity," which closes the first act. In the second act, Elphaba is on the run. A lot of things happen that you can tell I didn't care about because I only sort of remember them. The key points are that Galinda, who now goes by Glinda, and the boy get engaged (which is wholly Glinda's doing), the boy chooses to help Elphaba escape instead of going along with Glinda, Elphaba gets the flying monkeys, a house falls on Elphaba's sister, Elphaba and Glinda sing a song about how they've been changed by knowing each other, and Elphaba fakes her own death so she and the boy can run away together.
The production values are outstanding. I can see how Kristen Chenowith is the perfect Galinda, but the actress in the production we saw was great, as was the rest of the cast. There are a handful of fantastic special effects, although I'm very much over the use of smoke effects, and the costumes are also a lot of fun.
I was completely irate with the story, particularly the first act. (Which is not to say that the second act solved my complaints, only that by the second act I was both used to it and drawn in by the phenomenal nature of "Defying Gravity.") What I can't understand is why the story isn't explicitly about how Elphaba and Galinda fall in love in college but end up with different lives afterwards. The boy should have been dropped or made just a friend. My mom says the story needs him to father the child in the sequel, but there's magic; surely Elphaba or Elphaba and Galinda could have made a child that way. She also said that she would be interested to know if the show has changed or if it's only her perceptions that have changed, because she didn't remember the Elphaba/Galinda subtext being quite so strong - and she went with a group that included a gay couple and a lesbian. As irritating as I found the heteronormative nature of the plot, I was very much drawn in, both by "Defying Gravity" and even more so by Elphaba and Galinda's last duet, "For Good," in which they sing about how they've been changed by knowing each other. It made me cry, which was just about the last thing I would have expected from the play, and it made me mildly irritated that Elphaba lived - I thought it might have been even stronger if she'd died.
I know there's fic out there, although I keep forgetting to go look for it. Is there a good, epic, magicless Elphaba/Galinda college AU? Because that was what I really walked away from the show wanting.
The plot is roughly as follows: Elphaba is hated and maligned because she's green, but her father sends her to school so she can look after her sister. Galinda is blonde, perky, and popular. (Keep in mind that Galinda is Kristen Chenowith's signature role.) Galinda and Elphaba end up as roommates. They're enemies for a bit, then friends. In the meantime, there is violence against animals who can talk, including Elphaba's favorite professor, and a boy (whose introductory song is all about how shallow he is) comes to the school. The boy is perfect, so of course Galinda sets her sights on him. The professor is arrested, and the person who takes his place brings in a captive lion cub. Elphaba and the boy rescue the cub and have a moment. Then Elphaba and Galinda go to meet the Wizard, where they discover that he is behind the persecution of animals who can talk. Elphaba ends up with a book of spells, and in their attempts to escape, she makes a broomstick that can fly. The showstopping number in the musical is this song, "Defying Gravity," which closes the first act. In the second act, Elphaba is on the run. A lot of things happen that you can tell I didn't care about because I only sort of remember them. The key points are that Galinda, who now goes by Glinda, and the boy get engaged (which is wholly Glinda's doing), the boy chooses to help Elphaba escape instead of going along with Glinda, Elphaba gets the flying monkeys, a house falls on Elphaba's sister, Elphaba and Glinda sing a song about how they've been changed by knowing each other, and Elphaba fakes her own death so she and the boy can run away together.
The production values are outstanding. I can see how Kristen Chenowith is the perfect Galinda, but the actress in the production we saw was great, as was the rest of the cast. There are a handful of fantastic special effects, although I'm very much over the use of smoke effects, and the costumes are also a lot of fun.
I was completely irate with the story, particularly the first act. (Which is not to say that the second act solved my complaints, only that by the second act I was both used to it and drawn in by the phenomenal nature of "Defying Gravity.") What I can't understand is why the story isn't explicitly about how Elphaba and Galinda fall in love in college but end up with different lives afterwards. The boy should have been dropped or made just a friend. My mom says the story needs him to father the child in the sequel, but there's magic; surely Elphaba or Elphaba and Galinda could have made a child that way. She also said that she would be interested to know if the show has changed or if it's only her perceptions that have changed, because she didn't remember the Elphaba/Galinda subtext being quite so strong - and she went with a group that included a gay couple and a lesbian. As irritating as I found the heteronormative nature of the plot, I was very much drawn in, both by "Defying Gravity" and even more so by Elphaba and Galinda's last duet, "For Good," in which they sing about how they've been changed by knowing each other. It made me cry, which was just about the last thing I would have expected from the play, and it made me mildly irritated that Elphaba lived - I thought it might have been even stronger if she'd died.
I know there's fic out there, although I keep forgetting to go look for it. Is there a good, epic, magicless Elphaba/Galinda college AU? Because that was what I really walked away from the show wanting.