Wicked

For our first show on our program, we all went and saw Wicked on tuesday night. My experience as far as plays/musicals go is somewhat limited. I think I have seen three others in my lifetime: Fame and The Producers in London, and Avenue Q when it was on broadway a few summers ago. All of them were great, but I think I liked Avenue Q the best. Maybe that just has something to do with my sense of humor.

We all remember seeing Wizard of Oz when we were kids. In fact, all of our grandparents probably do as well. It came out in 1939 and immediately transformed the film industry. Most movies didn’t start coming out in color until thirty years later, so Wizard of Oz was a pretty big deal. I should note that Wicked is not the Wizard of Oz in play form; rather, it is the story of what made the Wicked Witch of the West so wicked to begin with. The concept is intriguing and I had always wanted to see it. It is sort of like a prequel to the film.

I won’t go into details of what Wicked is about here, because that can easily be looked up and I don’t want to spoil it. However, it was my first show in a few years and I thought it was a great experience. I was captivated from beginning to end, and found myself really connecting with the characters. We all know what it is like to feel different or to be picked on, and this witch, for lack of a better term, really got the worst of it throughout her life. We can easily see what impact that had on her as a person, and this probably rings true in many real world situations as well.

The best part of the show though probably came afterwards, when we got a backstage tour from a former Elon alum who graduated about seven years ago, I believe. She gets to play the witch in some of the shows, and she showed us all the behind the scenes stuff: the set design, how everything is organized, and what the life of a broadway performer entails. It was a great night.