MandySomething Wicked This Way Comes
October 28th 2009 01:42
Long before Dorothy dropped in, two other young girls were meeting their destinies in the land of Oz. One, the fair and beautiful, was named Galinda. The other was as green as a froggy, ferny cabbage, and her name was Elphaba. Wicked tells the story of their remarkable odyssey and how these two unlikely friends grew to become Glinda the Good and The Wicked Witch of the West.
Wicked itself has an odyssey to tell. The musical is based on Gregory Maguire’s 1995 novel, which sold more than three-quarters of its four million copies only after the musical clobbered Broadway in 2003. Far from its humble beginnings in a tiny San Francisco auditorium, Wicked has made a concerted attempt to conquer the theatre-going world. It is estimated that seventeen million people across the globe have seen the eighteen million-dollar production. This year, Wicked celebrated its sixth year as Broadway’s centrepiece and has spawned eight international productions, with companies enjoying success in Tokyo, London, Germany, North America, and the newest stop on the yellow brick road, Sydney.
The Sydney production has been finely-tuned thanks to thirteen whirlwind months spent at Melbourne’s Regent Theatre, where the story of Wicked Australia begins. When Dorothy dropped her house into Munchkinland in The Wizard of Oz, the citizens of the city worshipped her with lavish devotion. A similar phenomenon occurred when Wicked first touched down in Melbourne in July, 2008. The show’s first Australian destination was an obvious choice, coming on the heels of Melbourne theatre success stories such as The Lion King, The Producers, The Phantom of the Opera, Miss Saigon and Spamalot.
“Melbourne has long been recognised as the cultural centre of Australia,” said Arts Minister Lynne Kosky in a press release for the 2009 Helpmann Awards, which recognise artistic achievement and excellence in Australia’s live performance sector, and of which Wicked took out six awards including Best Musical. Ms Kosky went on to say that the state government was committed to supporting Victoria's artists and arts organisations, providing new opportunities for audiences and developing the arts sector across the state. But Wicked, with its multi-million dollar mechanical sets, elaborate light and sound set-ups, and intricately detailed costumes, is one of the most costly shows in the world. What made co-producer John Frost so confident that Wicked would succeed in Australia? “It comes with all the blockbuster bells and whistles, certainly. But three things set this show apart.
“Musical theatre lovers adore Wicked. It’s musical entertainment with wit and warmth and spectacle and a wonderful score, but it also has other, surprising dimensions. And it brings in people who’ve never been to the theatre, people who never thought they would go. They come out of the theatre spellbound and wanting to see the show again.
“They all spread the Wicked word. Wicked grows by word of mouth in a way and to a degree unlike any show I know. And Wicked, unlike almost any other show, maintains and builds on its advance sales.”
Indeed, before the show even opened, Australia’s musical theatre community was already buzzing in anticipation. Seventeen hundred of our finest performers auditioned for the eight leading roles in the show, and the most hotly contested roles were those of Galinda and Elphaba. These parts come with a set of physical and vocal requirements; Galindas are blond, girlish, and must be trained as sopranos, the highest female voice, while Elphabas are fit, dark-haired and possess a more flexible mezzo-soprano voice. Out of a shortlist of ten, casting director Barbara Leane described to Ozemag the difficulties in choosing the perfect pair of witches. “I was very cross-eyed as they were very, very long days. I was doing 12-hour days. So we went through all the agencies—yes, yes, yes, no, no, no and that went on. Everything went in piles. We had them all... the good, the bad and the ugly.” In the end, Lucy Durack won the part of Galinda and the top-billed part of Elphaba went to Amanda Harrison. “In a nutshell they were the best. Lucy Durack walked into the room and she woke the room up. And Amanda Harrison has played the lead in huge productions [Miss Saigon, Leader of the Pack], she will be a big star.”
“I always wanted to be a musical theatre star,” Harrison told Channel 7 shortly after opening night in Melbourne. “That was something I had always thought of, not so much as a child, but once I’d started working in the industry it was something I worked towards. But I’m not sure if I ever thought about being green.”
The two leads, though on the rise in the Australian musical theatre community, were mainly unknown, so the producers decided to follow a tried-and-tested strategy and complete the playbill with marquee names to entice the general public. “I always like to work with name actors because people identify with them and having them just steps a show out into the limelight—it's easier to get media attention with a name attached,” says John Frost.
The roles of The Wizard and Madame Morrible went to theatre luminaries Rob Guest and Maggie Kirkpatrick, while Australian Idol alumni Anthony Callea and Rob Mills were cast as Boq and Fiyero, the witches’ male counterparts. Both Callea and Mills spoke of how being a part of such a prestigious musical was beyond what either of them had imagined. “I’ve seen a couple of musicals and I thought I might like to be in one. But being part of [Wicked] now, I realise it’s a lot of hard work,” laughed Anthony Callea during an interview with Channel 7. Rob Guest, a household name thanks to his seven-year star turn in The Phantom of the Opera, told Channel 7 of his enthusiasm for the show. “You will be taken to another place, and you will remember things from The Wizard of Oz, but at the end of the day, hopefully you’ll walk out of the door and say ‘I’ve gotta go buy another ticket because I didn’t see half the stuff that was up there’, because there’s so much to see.”
No expense has been spared for this production, and the audience is immersed into the world of Oz with the movable set which extends out to the front row. The show features an array of technical wizardry, from an enormous red-eyed dragon which bellows smoke across the stage, to actors dressed as flying monkeys zooming over the heads of the audience. With eight shows a week, there is never a dull moment for the technical production team.
“I am at every single show,” says assistant stage manager Lauren Edwards, who has been with Wicked since its Melbourne premiere and recently celebrated her five-hundredth show. “I start one and a half hours before show time. We check cast are in the building, run warm-ups, and do any spacing or teching before opening the house at the half hour call. I love my job but it’s hard sometimes. To be in this industry, you have to really love what you do to be able to sacrifice so much.” During show time, a crew of seventy-nine people is necessary to keep things running smoothly, but there are countless others working behind the scenes to create the magic of Wicked. As many as two hundred and fifty artisans and craftspeople work behind the scenes to keep the scenery, lighting, sound and costuming in pristine condition. Each production of Wicked requires one hundred and eighty unique costumes, all of which are worked on by hand with embroidery or beading, and it takes approximately four hundred and twenty four hours per week to maintain the actor’s dazzling wardrobes of dresses, tunics, shoes and wigs.
“It’s awe-inspiring,” said star Maggie Kirkpatrick in an interview with Channel 7. “The technical design, for a start, all those external things that all come together to assist our performances are just thrilling.”
Everything came together for the Melbourne premiere on July 12, 2008, with ticket pre-sales reaching ten million dollars, and twenty-seven percent of that from interstate buyers. “Major events give people a compelling reason to visit a city, and hosting shows like Wicked adds to the rich tapestry of cultural events on offer to Victorians and visitors to our state,” said Victorian Premier John Brumby in Wicked’s official press release. “The advertising and marketing in Melbourne was outstanding,” adds Lauren Edwards. “There were trams completely decked out in Wicked advertising and painted green all over, they turned all the street lights in Collins Street green, and our cast schedules, to this day, are still filled with many publicity calls, radio interviews and TV appearances.”
The premier saw the Regent Theatre floodlit in green as the who’s who of Melbourne traversed the green carpet, everyone from Neighbours starlets and the cast of Kath and Kim to Marc Platt, the producer of the original Broadway version of Wicked. Critics and audiences alike responded to the show with equally gleeful endorsements. Cameron Woodhead of The Age believed that the “dazzling entertainment more than justified the hype”, saying “thanks in large part to an outstanding cast, [the show] will doubtless compare favourably with its international counterparts.”
“I thought it was fantastic how it tied into storylines from The Wizard of Oz and talked about characters who didn’t have large parts in that movie,” says Nicky Paterson, a fan who flew in from Brisbane to see the show. “You find out that the Wicked Witch isn’t really evil, she just made some bad choices and was judged unfairly. I liked thinking about the characters having a different side to them. The show itself was big, bright, impressive and really has to be seen to be believed.”
The rest of Australia felt similarly. The rush for new tickets broke box office sales records for any Melbourne theatre as Wicked took 1.5 million dollars in a single day, bringing advance sales to thirteen million dollars and prompting the release of a further sixty thousand seats. “The fantastic critical reaction and overwhelming audience excitement for Wicked in Melbourne exceeded our wildest expectations,” says John Frost. “We always felt there was a huge audience for Wicked in Australia.”
Tragedy struck, however, when Rob Guest passed away due to a sudden stroke in October, just three months after the premiere. In accordance with showbiz tradition, the show went on that night with Guest’s understudy, followed by heartfelt speeches from the cast and a standing ovation from the audience. “It was really painful,” says Frost, who had to break the news to the cast. “There were genuine tears and prayers.” It was announced in November that television legend Bert Newton would fill the role of the Wizard in future performances. While he was thrilled to be a part of the show, Newton told The Herald Sun that it was “an unusual feeling” to fit into a cast and crew who were still mourning their colleague. “I think I’m going into a very brave company,” he said. “Rob was such as fantastic performer and a great bloke.”
The show did go on, dedicated to Guest’s memory, and spent an astonishing thirteen months at the Regent Theatre—its longest season ever. After four hundred and sixty-four performances attended by half a million people, Wicked packed up its paraphernalia and got on the road headed for Sydney’s Capitol Theatre. Such a mammoth task involved months of preparation and organisation. “There were countless difficulties, but nothing that was not manageable,” says Lauren Edwards. “It is such a well-organised and well-oiled machine and I think it was probably easier to recreate it here in Sydney because we have already faced any problems that came up.” While Sydney did not go to such enthusiastic lengths as Melbourne, Wicked still held ten million dollars in advance tickets sales on the eve of its premiere on September 12 this year.
It was far from the glamorous event that greeted Wicked’s Melbourne premiere, but after a slow start the show is being embraced by Sydneysiders and fans across the country. It has broken all previous weekly box office records for a musical at the Capitol Theatre, grossing 1.4 million dollars last week alone. “I’m thrilled that Sydney has fallen in love with this wonderful production,” says John Frost. “Wicked is unique, a phenomenon, quite unlike any other musical. Its success around the world proves it is one of those rare shows that touch people deeply, as well as entertain them; a show for all ages from 8 to 80.”
With its open-ended lease at the Capitol, the future of Wicked in Australia is unlimited; it may even venture to a third state. “There are rumours of it coming to Brisbane but nothing definite,” says Lauren Edwards. “They're working on the feasibility of possibly touring, but that will take a lot of planning and money. It might pack up after Sydney and go to Korea! Who knows!”
Wherever the yellow brick road leads, the charmed life of Wicked seems to guarantee its success.
Wicked itself has an odyssey to tell. The musical is based on Gregory Maguire’s 1995 novel, which sold more than three-quarters of its four million copies only after the musical clobbered Broadway in 2003. Far from its humble beginnings in a tiny San Francisco auditorium, Wicked has made a concerted attempt to conquer the theatre-going world. It is estimated that seventeen million people across the globe have seen the eighteen million-dollar production. This year, Wicked celebrated its sixth year as Broadway’s centrepiece and has spawned eight international productions, with companies enjoying success in Tokyo, London, Germany, North America, and the newest stop on the yellow brick road, Sydney.
The Sydney production has been finely-tuned thanks to thirteen whirlwind months spent at Melbourne’s Regent Theatre, where the story of Wicked Australia begins. When Dorothy dropped her house into Munchkinland in The Wizard of Oz, the citizens of the city worshipped her with lavish devotion. A similar phenomenon occurred when Wicked first touched down in Melbourne in July, 2008. The show’s first Australian destination was an obvious choice, coming on the heels of Melbourne theatre success stories such as The Lion King, The Producers, The Phantom of the Opera, Miss Saigon and Spamalot.
“Melbourne has long been recognised as the cultural centre of Australia,” said Arts Minister Lynne Kosky in a press release for the 2009 Helpmann Awards, which recognise artistic achievement and excellence in Australia’s live performance sector, and of which Wicked took out six awards including Best Musical. Ms Kosky went on to say that the state government was committed to supporting Victoria's artists and arts organisations, providing new opportunities for audiences and developing the arts sector across the state. But Wicked, with its multi-million dollar mechanical sets, elaborate light and sound set-ups, and intricately detailed costumes, is one of the most costly shows in the world. What made co-producer John Frost so confident that Wicked would succeed in Australia? “It comes with all the blockbuster bells and whistles, certainly. But three things set this show apart.
“Musical theatre lovers adore Wicked. It’s musical entertainment with wit and warmth and spectacle and a wonderful score, but it also has other, surprising dimensions. And it brings in people who’ve never been to the theatre, people who never thought they would go. They come out of the theatre spellbound and wanting to see the show again.
“They all spread the Wicked word. Wicked grows by word of mouth in a way and to a degree unlike any show I know. And Wicked, unlike almost any other show, maintains and builds on its advance sales.”
Indeed, before the show even opened, Australia’s musical theatre community was already buzzing in anticipation. Seventeen hundred of our finest performers auditioned for the eight leading roles in the show, and the most hotly contested roles were those of Galinda and Elphaba. These parts come with a set of physical and vocal requirements; Galindas are blond, girlish, and must be trained as sopranos, the highest female voice, while Elphabas are fit, dark-haired and possess a more flexible mezzo-soprano voice. Out of a shortlist of ten, casting director Barbara Leane described to Ozemag the difficulties in choosing the perfect pair of witches. “I was very cross-eyed as they were very, very long days. I was doing 12-hour days. So we went through all the agencies—yes, yes, yes, no, no, no and that went on. Everything went in piles. We had them all... the good, the bad and the ugly.” In the end, Lucy Durack won the part of Galinda and the top-billed part of Elphaba went to Amanda Harrison. “In a nutshell they were the best. Lucy Durack walked into the room and she woke the room up. And Amanda Harrison has played the lead in huge productions [Miss Saigon, Leader of the Pack], she will be a big star.”
“I always wanted to be a musical theatre star,” Harrison told Channel 7 shortly after opening night in Melbourne. “That was something I had always thought of, not so much as a child, but once I’d started working in the industry it was something I worked towards. But I’m not sure if I ever thought about being green.”
Lucy Durack and Amanda Harrison (photo from www.dancelife.com.au)
The two leads, though on the rise in the Australian musical theatre community, were mainly unknown, so the producers decided to follow a tried-and-tested strategy and complete the playbill with marquee names to entice the general public. “I always like to work with name actors because people identify with them and having them just steps a show out into the limelight—it's easier to get media attention with a name attached,” says John Frost.
The roles of The Wizard and Madame Morrible went to theatre luminaries Rob Guest and Maggie Kirkpatrick, while Australian Idol alumni Anthony Callea and Rob Mills were cast as Boq and Fiyero, the witches’ male counterparts. Both Callea and Mills spoke of how being a part of such a prestigious musical was beyond what either of them had imagined. “I’ve seen a couple of musicals and I thought I might like to be in one. But being part of [Wicked] now, I realise it’s a lot of hard work,” laughed Anthony Callea during an interview with Channel 7. Rob Guest, a household name thanks to his seven-year star turn in The Phantom of the Opera, told Channel 7 of his enthusiasm for the show. “You will be taken to another place, and you will remember things from The Wizard of Oz, but at the end of the day, hopefully you’ll walk out of the door and say ‘I’ve gotta go buy another ticket because I didn’t see half the stuff that was up there’, because there’s so much to see.”
No expense has been spared for this production, and the audience is immersed into the world of Oz with the movable set which extends out to the front row. The show features an array of technical wizardry, from an enormous red-eyed dragon which bellows smoke across the stage, to actors dressed as flying monkeys zooming over the heads of the audience. With eight shows a week, there is never a dull moment for the technical production team.
“I am at every single show,” says assistant stage manager Lauren Edwards, who has been with Wicked since its Melbourne premiere and recently celebrated her five-hundredth show. “I start one and a half hours before show time. We check cast are in the building, run warm-ups, and do any spacing or teching before opening the house at the half hour call. I love my job but it’s hard sometimes. To be in this industry, you have to really love what you do to be able to sacrifice so much.” During show time, a crew of seventy-nine people is necessary to keep things running smoothly, but there are countless others working behind the scenes to create the magic of Wicked. As many as two hundred and fifty artisans and craftspeople work behind the scenes to keep the scenery, lighting, sound and costuming in pristine condition. Each production of Wicked requires one hundred and eighty unique costumes, all of which are worked on by hand with embroidery or beading, and it takes approximately four hundred and twenty four hours per week to maintain the actor’s dazzling wardrobes of dresses, tunics, shoes and wigs.
“It’s awe-inspiring,” said star Maggie Kirkpatrick in an interview with Channel 7. “The technical design, for a start, all those external things that all come together to assist our performances are just thrilling.”
Everything came together for the Melbourne premiere on July 12, 2008, with ticket pre-sales reaching ten million dollars, and twenty-seven percent of that from interstate buyers. “Major events give people a compelling reason to visit a city, and hosting shows like Wicked adds to the rich tapestry of cultural events on offer to Victorians and visitors to our state,” said Victorian Premier John Brumby in Wicked’s official press release. “The advertising and marketing in Melbourne was outstanding,” adds Lauren Edwards. “There were trams completely decked out in Wicked advertising and painted green all over, they turned all the street lights in Collins Street green, and our cast schedules, to this day, are still filled with many publicity calls, radio interviews and TV appearances.”
The premier saw the Regent Theatre floodlit in green as the who’s who of Melbourne traversed the green carpet, everyone from Neighbours starlets and the cast of Kath and Kim to Marc Platt, the producer of the original Broadway version of Wicked. Critics and audiences alike responded to the show with equally gleeful endorsements. Cameron Woodhead of The Age believed that the “dazzling entertainment more than justified the hype”, saying “thanks in large part to an outstanding cast, [the show] will doubtless compare favourably with its international counterparts.”
“I thought it was fantastic how it tied into storylines from The Wizard of Oz and talked about characters who didn’t have large parts in that movie,” says Nicky Paterson, a fan who flew in from Brisbane to see the show. “You find out that the Wicked Witch isn’t really evil, she just made some bad choices and was judged unfairly. I liked thinking about the characters having a different side to them. The show itself was big, bright, impressive and really has to be seen to be believed.”
The rest of Australia felt similarly. The rush for new tickets broke box office sales records for any Melbourne theatre as Wicked took 1.5 million dollars in a single day, bringing advance sales to thirteen million dollars and prompting the release of a further sixty thousand seats. “The fantastic critical reaction and overwhelming audience excitement for Wicked in Melbourne exceeded our wildest expectations,” says John Frost. “We always felt there was a huge audience for Wicked in Australia.”
Tragedy struck, however, when Rob Guest passed away due to a sudden stroke in October, just three months after the premiere. In accordance with showbiz tradition, the show went on that night with Guest’s understudy, followed by heartfelt speeches from the cast and a standing ovation from the audience. “It was really painful,” says Frost, who had to break the news to the cast. “There were genuine tears and prayers.” It was announced in November that television legend Bert Newton would fill the role of the Wizard in future performances. While he was thrilled to be a part of the show, Newton told The Herald Sun that it was “an unusual feeling” to fit into a cast and crew who were still mourning their colleague. “I think I’m going into a very brave company,” he said. “Rob was such as fantastic performer and a great bloke.”
The show did go on, dedicated to Guest’s memory, and spent an astonishing thirteen months at the Regent Theatre—its longest season ever. After four hundred and sixty-four performances attended by half a million people, Wicked packed up its paraphernalia and got on the road headed for Sydney’s Capitol Theatre. Such a mammoth task involved months of preparation and organisation. “There were countless difficulties, but nothing that was not manageable,” says Lauren Edwards. “It is such a well-organised and well-oiled machine and I think it was probably easier to recreate it here in Sydney because we have already faced any problems that came up.” While Sydney did not go to such enthusiastic lengths as Melbourne, Wicked still held ten million dollars in advance tickets sales on the eve of its premiere on September 12 this year.
It was far from the glamorous event that greeted Wicked’s Melbourne premiere, but after a slow start the show is being embraced by Sydneysiders and fans across the country. It has broken all previous weekly box office records for a musical at the Capitol Theatre, grossing 1.4 million dollars last week alone. “I’m thrilled that Sydney has fallen in love with this wonderful production,” says John Frost. “Wicked is unique, a phenomenon, quite unlike any other musical. Its success around the world proves it is one of those rare shows that touch people deeply, as well as entertain them; a show for all ages from 8 to 80.”
With its open-ended lease at the Capitol, the future of Wicked in Australia is unlimited; it may even venture to a third state. “There are rumours of it coming to Brisbane but nothing definite,” says Lauren Edwards. “They're working on the feasibility of possibly touring, but that will take a lot of planning and money. It might pack up after Sydney and go to Korea! Who knows!”
Wherever the yellow brick road leads, the charmed life of Wicked seems to guarantee its success.
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