It's been a while, and I apologize if you have missed my wit and utter awesomeness.
In other news, my blog has gotten over 1,000 views. That's super cool, and it makes me really excited. Thanks for being awesome, people.
And now for what I've got to say today.
So I don't know if
it's possible to watch a DVD so much that it stops working, but I'm pretty sure
that's what will happen to my copy if they ever make Wicked into a movie.
Disclaimer: there's
bound to be spoilers galore to the completely AMAZING play Wicked in this post,
so if you don't want to see them, stop reading.
If you're one of those
people that doesn't like Wicked, I encourage you to keep reading, because I'm
hoping I can change your mind.
First of all, I'm just
so ready for somebody to make it into a movie (preferably someone who knows
what they're doing). I know I'd see it no less than three times in the
theater, I'd pre-order the DVD and be there first thing to pick it up, and I
would watch my DVD no less than 1,000,000 times. That is, assuming the movie
does the play justice.
I've seen the play
three times (once a year since 2012), and it never fails: every time it's over,
I'm always ready to immediately see it again.
I fell in love with
Wicked the first time I heard Defying Gravity on my best friend's phone, and
that love just grows every time I see it or listen to the soundtrack (which is
quite a few times. Wicked has its own playlist on my Spotify).
I first saw Wicked on
Broadway, and that just of course makes it so much cooler. I remember sitting
there through the first Act, listening to Dr. Dillamond, and laughing at
Elphaba and Glinda as they loathed each other, and wishing I could meet Fiyero
and have him sing beautiful music to me. I remember watching Elphaba singing
Defying Gravity, then seeing the curtains close and house lights come on as I
sat there wondering, "what just went on." The second Act shook me up
even more, and after the play my group walked down the streets of New York as I
remained in shock thinking, "what just happened. Is this real life? Like,
what?"
It intrigued me, and I
loved it.
I loved it so much
that I convinced my parents to drive five and a half hours to St. Louis to see
it again. We ended up taking a small posse of people. Wicked should be shared with
the masses.
And then, oh goodness,
I found out that it was coming back to Memphis. I'm not really sure why I
didn't see it the first two times it was there. I feel kind of dumb for being
so obsessed with it and missing the first two showings in Memphis. Anywho, one
day I found out Wicked was coming back to the Orpheum, and I about lost myself,
"WICKED IS COMING BACK TO MEMPHIS."
My mom basically knew
we would have to go see it. I mean, it would be here around my birthday, so why
not?
And so it totally
happened. I drove home from college on my birthday, bringing along my boyfriend
and my roommate, to go see Wicked with about fifteen other friends and family
members. It had already been a fantastic birthday, and seeing Wicked just made
it about 5,000 times better.
I mouthed the words to
every song (I knew the folks around me would have rather heard the actors sing
than me, so I was considerate), and I freaked out over the clarinet player.
Tears started forming
in my eyes when Elphaba and Glinda sang my most favorite song on the planet,
For Good.
And when it was over,
after the cast had all taken a bow, and the curtains had closed, I wanted to
stay there and watch the whole thing over again.
Like most books and
movies, I always catch more each time I see the play. This time I noticed small things that
actually said a lot about the play, its characters, and the themes it develops.
And as I sat in the
Orpheum noticing all the literary aspects of the play, I laughed at
myself. I would always joke with my high
school English teachers about how they over-analyze everything, always looking
for themes and foreshadowing and characterization and metaphors. Yet there I was, doing exactly that.
However, I realized
that it was the literary aspects of Wicked that make it so great, so deep and
intriguing. There’s such a greater
meaning to every part of the play, and the way it all works together to not
only develop the plot of the play but also relate it to the Wizard of Oz just
makes me sit in awe of the writers.
First of all, I love
the characterization. I love how Elphaba
is portrayed as not the Wicked Witch, but as a girl who just wanted to belong
somewhere, who wanted someone to appreciate her and her quirkiness. Sure, she does eventually embrace her “wickedness,”
but it’s not out of spite. It’s her way
of proving to herself and all of Oz that she doesn't have to change to belong
or be accepted; when she acts like herself and stands firm for what she
believes, sure, some people won’t agree, but the ones that do, the ones that
want to associate with her, will support her and accept her, and there’s
nothing like that feeling of belonging.
The foreshadowing – both witty and serious – are super brilliant. “But I swear someday there’ll be, a
celebration throughout Oz, that’s all to do with me!” In the context of the song (The Wizard and
I), Elphaba means a good celebration – one where everyone will be happy,
including her. But if you’ve seen the
play you’ll realize that the “celebration” she was talking about is actually
the one that the people of Oz are having at the opening of the play – the one
celebrating her death. In the same song
she sings, “I’d be so happy I could…melt!”
Did anyone catch that? Melt? HAHA.
There are plenty more reasons why Elphaba is just the best, besides the
fact that she’s just as green as yours truly.
So green.
When you actually
think about it, Glinda is actually a lot deeper of a character than most people
probably give her credit for being. At
the surface, she’s a pompous, self-absorbed girly-girl, but she’s so much more
than that. Think about your comfort
zone, the place, attitude, and people with whom you are the most comfortable. Glinda’s comfort zone is being the center of
attention, the one who everyone looks to for all the latest fads, the one who
always seems to have it together. Merely
being friends with Elphaba forces Glinda to leave that comfort zone. Elphaba isn’t exactly caught up in the latest
trends, and so merely talking to Elphaba could easily be a blow to Glinda’s
reputation, and she knew it. But since
the two were forced to room with each other, Glinda couldn’t just ignore
Elphaba’s presence, no matter how much she wanted to. I think the greatest thing, though, is that
Glinda and Elphaba’s friendship begins in an ironic manner. Glinda received a new hat, but to her dismay
and those of her group of girlfriends, it wasn’t the prettiest of hats (in
their opinion). As a cruel joke of
sorts, Glinda decided the best and easiest way to get rid of the hat would be
to give it to Elphaba. And so with the
kindest of tones and fake intentions, Glinda gave Elphaba the hat, and Elphaba
believed that “cheery disposition” to be genuine. So Elphaba went to the head of the magic
program and asked her to let Glinda into the program in addition to
herself. The head of the program tells
Glinda that she is now in the program, also letting her know it was Elphaba’s
idea. Boy, does that have to shake up
Glinda’s conscience.
I think it’s in that
moment, as she’s standing at the dance with her newly received magic wand,
watching Elphaba awkwardly dance as the whole school stood there, watching her
and judging her, that Glinda saw that something was wrong with her life. While her comfort zone was just that,
comforting, it wasn’t right.
That pang of guilt
pushed her to go join Elphaba in her awkward dancing.
In that moment, Glinda
left her comfort zone. She left it for a
girl she thought she loathed, yet had done such a nice thing for her after
Glinda had been nothing but rude to her.
You have to appreciate this bold move on Glinda’s part. She didn’t have a cold heart that had pushed
her to be rude to Elphaba, she just did it because it kept her in her comfort
zone, and that was all she had ever known.
We all have our
comfort zones. I know it takes a very
special person or event to get me to leave mine.
Glinda continues to struggle with her comfort zone
throughout the second act. The Wizard
offers her a powerful position in Oz that she’d always dream of, but she had to
speak out against her best friend. Her
other option? Fight on Elphaba's side. But that meant leaving the exalted spotlight,
embracing the life of an outcast, basically doing everything she had tried so
hard to avoid her entire life.
She chose her comfort zone, the easier, but not
necessarily less painful, choice.
Because you can sense her unhappiness as she sings “Thank
Goodness.” The song is dripping with
irony, because as Glinda sings the words, “I couldn’t be happier,” you know she,
in fact, could be happier. She would
love to have both her comfort zone and her best friend, but that just isn’t an
option. And so she’s not satisfied.
But the thing I love is that by the end of the play,
Glinda understands that in order to stand up for what you believe in, you many
times have to leave your comfort zone. No
one forces someone to make that choice, but if and when they do, it speaks
volumes about them and their character.
You won’t always be applauded or celebrated, like
Elphaba, but if you’re truly confident, you’ll be satisfied with yourself and
your actions.
I think that’s the motivation Glinda had in telling
the citizens of Oz the real, complete, untainted story of Elphaba. She wanted the citizens of Oz to see the
confident, supportive, wonderful woman that Elphaba had become, and that all
she had done was truly remarkable.
I’ll be the first to argue with you that Glinda
changed Elphaba’s life. I mean, the
whole Popular scene was a turning point for Elphaba.
But I’ll also argue that Elphaba changed Glinda’s
life. She showed her more about morals,
goals, self-esteem, and confidence in a few short years than I think Glinda had
learned her entire life before that.
Elphaba was always confident. But Glinda, she was confident for all the
wrong reasons, and Elphaba changed that.
It makes the song, “For Good,” just all that much better.
Wow, I've said a lot. I hope you enjoyed my…um…literary analysis of
sorts of Wicked. It’s just that I love
the play so much, because every time I see it, it motivates me in so many ways,
and it gives me hope for the world. It
makes me appreciate my best friends even more, those girls that really have
changed me for good. Those girls who
taught me more about myself and life and just everything.
I’m thankful for them and for everyone that has
changed me for good.
So have a great day, and remember: Everyone deserves
the chance to fly.
Mo
