Something Wicked This Way Opens In AustraliaThis evening, the fourth international production of
Wicked finally opens in Oz! Taking the globe by storm, the eighth mounting of this decade's most popular new musical opens at the
Regent Theatre in Melbourne, Australia's second largest city.
While the creative team behind
Wicked remains the same as for the original Broadway production, including
Joe Mantello at the helm, the cast is very Aussie.
Amanda Harrison stars as Elphaba opposite
Lucy Durack as Glinda. The rest of the cast includes
Rob Mills as Fiyero,
Rob Guest as the Wizard,
Maggie Kirkpatrick as Madame Morrible,
Anthony Callea as Boq,
Rodney Dobson as Dr. Dillamond and
Penny McNamee as Nessarose.
Advance ticket sales Down Under
have been estimated at Australian $10 million (roughly on par with U.S. dollars), so strong that
AussieTheatre.com notes:
Wicked is likely to remain in Melbourne for 18 months, and while no tour has been confirmed yet, it is expected to be in Sydney either late 2009 or early 2010, depending on the box office performance of its premiere season.
In fact, another 60,000 tickets are going on sale for
Wicked Down Under on Monday.
With tonight's opening, there are now a total of eight
Wicked mountings playing throughout the world on four continents playing to a global audience of over
13 million people. The
worldwide gross box office has been about $1 billion -- more than the
take of all but three films: "
Titanic," "
The Lord Of The Rings: The Return Of The King" and "
Pirates Of The Carribean: Dead Man's Chest." Not bad for a little stage show.
Of course, there's the
Broadway production, which first opened at Rialto's Gershwin Theatre in October 2003.
Then, on March 8, 2005, the first
North American tour began at Toronto's Canon Theatre, and is currently playing
Shea's Performing Arts Center in Buffalo through tomorrow before moving on to Michigan State University's
Wharton Center in East Lansing on Thursday. A
second touring company of
Wicked will begin performances on March 7, 2009, at Fort Myers' Barbara B. Mann Performing Arts Hall.
Then in June 2005, the
second sitdown production began at Chicago's Oriental Theatre after first hosting the tour. Having broken all box office records for any show in the history of Chicago theatre, this incarnation of
Wicked is now slated to close on January 25, 2009 after playing its 1,500th performance and raking in more than $210 million. The musical will depart Chicago while ticket sales are still very strong, so it may, as producer
David Stone says, "Go out with a bang."
The
third U.S. sitdown production began at Los Angeles' Pantages Theatre on February 21, 2007. This production has been featured on television's "Ugly Betty" and "Deal Or No Deal." While it's been announced that this mounting will close on January 11, 2009 after 791 regular performances,
news broke shortly after that the entire production would migrate up the California coast to San Francisco's
Orpheum Theatre for the City by the Bay's own sitdown production.
Wickedphiles will know that this was the city where the musical first took flight in previews during June 2003, albeit at the
Curran Theatre.
Wicked's
first international production was launched in London on September 27, 2006 at the Apollo Victoria Theatre where it continues to play (
I caught a performance there the following April). The second international production and first in another language began on June 17, 2007 as
ウィキッド - The Broadway Musical Wicked at Tokyo's Shiki Theatre, where performances continue (
I saw this Japanese language version last December). The third international production and second in another language began on November 15, 2007 as
Wicked - Die Hexen Von Oz at Stuttgart, Germany's Palladium Theatre (
I saw this German language mounting last November).
As if all this
Wickedness thrust upon us weren't enough, a
Dutch language version of the show is scheduled for The Netherlands in 2009. Personally, I'm hoping for versions in French and Italian, not to mention Spanish, so I can keep my globetrotting going.
And speaking of globetrotting, two weeks from Sunday, I'll be sitting in Melbourne's Regent Theatre with my favorite mates in Australia seeing this latest production. You can bet I'll have an SOB Revisit sometime thereafter. See you in Oz!
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here for Wicked (Melbourne) tickets.Related Stories:Wicked To Finally Land In Oz During 2008 (May 16, 2007)
Labels: Australia, First Word On New Show, Joe Mantello, Melbourne, Musical, Opening Night, The Netherlands, Wicked, Wicked Die Hexen Von Oz
Something Wicked This Way Comes...In The MailIt's not unusual for American collectors of original cast recordings to buy London versions of their favorite shows. But have you ever purchased a cast recording in another language?
If you're a regular reader, you know by now how much I enjoy -- OK,
love -- the Broadway musical
Wicked. I saw the original production on the Great White Way just two days after it opened and have since seen it at the
Gershwin Theatre at least another three times. I've seen its sitdown incarnation in
Chicago another four or five times (with another viewing coming there in April), as well as the North American
tour in both Chicago (prior to the city's sitdown) and Minneapolis.
Last year, I even went so far as to travel to
London,
Stuttgart and
Tokyo to see the first three international stagings of the show. And I already have my tickets to see
Wicked when it finally touches down in
Melbourne, Australia in July.
I've already worn out two of my original cast CDs and am now on my third. So when I learned that the German cast would come out with their own recording, how could I resist? A couple months ago, I ordered my copy from the German-language version of
Amazon, and once I had translated everything from German into English (courtesy of
this site -- the same one I used to maneuver through the German ticketing site to get my front-row seats for
Wicked - Die Hexen Von Oz), I was all set.
Over the weekend, I began to wonder if I'd ever actually receive the CD. But then when I arrived home last evening, I had a real thrill. There it was in its plain brown
Amazon.de wrapping.
Without missing a beat, I immediately put the disc on, feeling a bit like a little kid at Christmas. When I listened to the absolutely breathtaking vocals from its two stars,
Willemijn Verkaik (Elphaba) and
Lucy Scherer (Galinda), I found myself soaring yet again. To see what I mean, click on the
site and tell me if you're not impressed when listening to "Heißgeliebt" ("Popular") or "Frei und schwerelos" ("Defying Gravity").
What do I care if I don't exactly remember the German I learned in high school? With this CD, I just might learn it all over again.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Related Stories:Wicked - Die Hexen Von Oz (The SOB Revisit) (December 2, 2007)
Some Of The Names May Have Been Changed To Protest Das Wicked (November 15, 2007)
Labels: Australia, Broadway, Germany, Japan, London, Musical, Original Cast Recording, Wicked, Wicked Die Hexen Von Oz
ウィキッド - The Broadway Musical Wicked (The SOB Revisit) - Shiki Theatre, Tokyo, Japan 東京
*** (out of ****)Some couples have their song. For the love of my life and me... well, let's just say we have our
musical.
If you're a regular Steve On Broadway reader, you've probably already guessed that it happens to be
Wicked. It was one of the very first tuners we saw as a couple -- our first time taking it in was just two days after the theatrical phenomenon opened on Broadway back in October 2003.
Whether it's our affinity for its ingenious inside-out twisting of "
The Wizard Of Oz" fable we grew up on, or our hope from its message that different can be a virtue, or our love of its clever and often soaring tunes,
Wicked has truly become "our musical."
So in that spirit, we traveled last week to our third international city this year --
London and
Stuttgart came earlier -- to see the production in a third language.
On Christmas Eve, we saw
ウィキッド - The Broadway Musical Wicked at Tokyo's
Shiki Theatre. As in London and Stuttgart, I was amazed at how faithful to the original this incarnation is in staging, orchestrations, choreography and design. And while I don't speak a lick of Japanese (except to say "good afternoon," "good evening" and "thank you"), I was captivated by Miyuki Numao and Megumi Hamada, the duo originating the Japanese version's roles of Glinda and Elphaba, respectively.
Unlike in Germany, where I couldn't help but rethink the political allegories and how they were evocative of the Third Reich, I sat back and soaked in Tokyo's
Wicked (although it wasn't lost on me that within one month's time, I was seeing this musical in the two primary nations that we fought in World War II).
As one of the most homogeneous societies on earth, the modern Japanese culture remains steeped in ancient tradition. With that in mind, I couldn't help but wonder whether the themes of
ウィキッド - The Broadway Musical Wicked might well be viewed as a clarion call to be more accepting of other peoples and other cultures. Ironically, in this tightly knit society, an outlandish individual like Glinda with her platinum blonde coiffure would be nearly as unique in Japan as the green girl Elphaba would be everywhere.
Since
Wicked is ultimately about looking at things -- especially other members of the human race -- another way, I was interested in measuring the extremely polite audience's response. With laughter and applause kept to a minimum level that would surely have had
Stephanie Zimbalist seeing an oil painting, I was surprised to see more curtain calls for this staging of
Wicked than any other I've ever seen before -- six curtain calls, plus an "encore" of "White Christmas" that finally brought the entire audience to its feet. Sharing this communal experience with a Japanese audience was certainly half the fun.
If you've never before seen one of your favorite Broadway shows in another language, you just might want to give it a try -- you'll likely come away thinking as I did about how they went about translating an entire show into another language and whether they were able to retain the same spirit, if not altogether the same trademark humor. Needless to say, in this
Wicked, it appeared that many key laughlines were likely lost in translation, yet I couldn't help but be impressed at the arduous task this show's creators had before them to replicate as best they could a uniquely American show for a much wider audience.
In the end, that audience half a world away from home ultimately seemed equally impressed, further demonstrating the transcendent appeal of
Wicked's tale.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here for ウィキッド - The Broadway Musical Wicked Tokyo ticket information.Related Stories:Wicked - Die Hexen Von Oz (The SOB Revisit) (December 2, 2007)
Wicked To Finally Land In Oz During 2008 (May 16, 2007)
Wicked (The SOB Revisit) - London (April 17, 2007)
Wicked World (March 19, 2007)
Jaaku or Neikan? Wicked Set for Japanese Translation (July 24, 2007)
Labels: Broadway, Musical, Tokyo, Wicked, Wicked Die Hexen Von Oz, ウィキッド
Wicked - Die Hexen Von Oz (The SOB Revisit) - Palladium Theater, Stuttgart, Germany**** (out of ****)"Are people born wicked, or do they have wickedness thrust upon them?"
So begins Glinda's explanation near the beginning of
Wicked on why evil occurs.
Last week, I journeyed all the way to Stuttgart, Germany to hear that same answer provided in the German language version of the world's biggest, new musical hit of the past five years.
Now, I don't profess to remembering much of the two years of German I learned during my high school years. But having seen the English language version of
Wicked so many times that I practically know it by heart, I could still easily understand what was transpiring on the Stuttgart stage.
And what I understood was downright chilling and transforming, starting with my pondering of that line of Glinda's and then considering a host of others in
Wicked - Die Hexen Von Oz ("The Witches of Oz") all while
in the land that as recently as 63 years ago was ruled with an iron fist by
Adolph Hitler -- the man
Time magazine described in
last week's cover story on "What Makes Us Good/Evil" as "the Nazi dictator (who) instigated World War II, engineered the Holocaust and still mystifies scholars studying the human capacity for savagery."
During each of my earlier viewings of the original English language version, I was always a bit amused at the musical's ingenious tweaking of the Bush Administration, whether picking on the president's propensity for garbled syntax or alluding to his finding an enemy in
Saddam Hussein.
I've always thought in this regard, the tuner was way ahead of its time. In those heady days shortly after the war in Iraq began, few other pop cultural touchstones dared question the Administration or its actions without risking public wrath. Yet there was
Wicked,
all the way back
in 2003, offering its critique ever so subtly to great effect.
But when seeing the German version in Stuttgart, I found myself associating the show's artfully drawn elements in a much more uncomfortable, yet obvious new application. My thoughts were instead turned to that darkest personification of evil, Adolph Hitler, who pitted neighbor against neighbor and instilled fear all while diabolically labeling Germany's Jewish people as the scapegoats for most, if not all, of the nation's hardships.
My paradigm shift for the way I viewed this show came during the scene in
Wicked when Dr. Dillamond -- the talking goat of a professor -- is teaching his students, "Food grew scarce, people grew hungrier and angrier. And the question became 'Whom can we blame?' Can anyone tell me what is meant by the term 'Scapegoat'?"
"My God," I was thinking. "This is
exactly what happened here in Germany..."
As I was sitting there in my front row seat at Stuttgart's Palladium Theater, the allegories to Nazi Germany were suddenly striking me like thundering lightning bolts between the eyes.
But that's apparently as it should be. I learned upon my return home that
Gregory Maguire, who wrote the 1995 novel upon which
Wicked is loosely based, had
said in an interview:
I was living in London in the early 1990's during the start of the Gulf War. I was interested to see how my own blood temperature chilled at reading a headline in the usually cautious British newspaper, The Times of London: Sadaam Hussein: The New Hitler? I caught myself ready to have a fully-formed political opinion about the Gulf War and the necessity of action against Sadaam Hussein on the basis of how that headline made me feel. The use of the word Hitler -- what a word! What it evokes!
When a few months later several young schoolboys kidnapped and killed a toddler, the British press paid much attention to the nature of the crime. I became interested in the nature of evil, and whether one really could be born bad. I considered briefly writing a novel about Hitler, but discarded the notion due to my general discomfort with the reality of those times. But when I realized that nobody had ever written about the second most evil character in our collective American subconscious, the Wicked Witch of the West, I thought I had experienced a small moment of inspiration.
With my own epiphany on Maguire's deeply-rooted meaning (when so little else of the book resembles the stage show), right there in the heart of Bavarian Germany, I experienced the rare kind of chills I get when something theatrical cuts to the quick of my soul.
This
Wicked - Die Hexen Von Oz makes for an enormously electrifying evening of theatre, thanks in no small part to those allusions to Germany's dark past. Just as the truth for an American audience is inherently tied to our actions in Iraq, so, too, must the truth for its German audiences be what occurred during those savage years starting in 1933 when Hitler seized power as chancellor. It's as
Wicked's Wizard proclaims, "The truth is not a thing of fact or reason -- the truth is just what everyone agrees on."
Fortunately, if the prolonged standing ovation by its audience -- along with three curtain calls -- is any indication, this German language version of the musical also entertains extraordinarily. It is an exceedingly faithful and excellent translation of the original.
Oh sure, there were minor nuances I caught. There was the frequent use of the word "hexen" in lieu of "wicked." There was the decision to skip minor winking nods to the film like the lines, "lemons and melons and pears" in tandem with "Oh, my!" -- I guess that humor simply could not translate. There were the slightly different character names -- Moq instead of Boq and Dr. Dillamonth rather than Dr. Dillamond, along with the latter "maaaaa"-ing rather than "baaaaa"-ing.
But the rest of the show made
Joe Mantello's trademark direction, eclectic choreography by
Wayne Cilento and glorious designs by
Eugene Lee (sets),
Susan Hilferty (costume),
Kenneth Posner (lighting) and
Tony Meola (sound) all seem shiny and new, feeling fresh as ever.
Most importantly, it has a remarkable cast whose sheer talent and flawless performances translate into one spine-tingling moment after another.
With a voice that makes "Defying Gravity" seem easy and an 11 o'clock cackle that would make
Margaret Hamilton proud,
Willemijn Verkaik is a forceful presence as Elphaba.
Lucy Scherer not only imbues her Galinda with all the freewheeling giddiness one would expect, but she floats to the pinnacle of vocal heights with ease as Glinda.
In the supporting roles,
Mark Seibert makes for a dashing Fiyero,
Nicole Radeschnig is appropriately needy as Nessarose,
Carlo Lauber offers deceptively simple charm as Der Zauberer von Oz ("The Wizard of Oz"),
Angelika Wedekind is marvelously menacing as Madam Akaber (Madame Morrible),
Stefan Stara is perfectly nerdy as Moq ("Boq") and
Michael Günther is a great goat as Dr. Dillamonth.
But ultimately, it's the fact that by seeing
Wicked - Die Hexen Von Oz in Germany, I had a fresh opportunity for "looking at things another way." To paraphrase a line from Glinda, that's what makes this show "so nice."
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here for tickets.Related Stories:Some Of The Names May Have Been Changed To Protest Das Wicked (November 15, 2007)
Wicked World (March 19, 2007)
Labels: Broadway, Die Hexen Von Oz, Germany, Musical, The SOB Review, The SOB Revisit, Wicked, Wicked Die Hexen Von Oz
Some Of The Names May Have Been Changed To Protect Das WickedThe
original that started it all may be temporarily sidelined thanks to a
little kerfuffle in the Big Apple.
But this evening -- approximately 4,000 miles and just a little more than four years away from its Broadway opening --
Wicked takes yet another major step toward global domination as its third international incarnation opens in Stuttgart, Germany.
And while familiar characters like Elphaba, Glinda and Fiyero will be on hand, albeit speaking German, some character names have been slightly altered, no doubt to fit the world's most guttural, back-of-the-throat language.
Wicked - Die Hexen Von Oz (or "The Witches of Oz") stars
Willemijn Verkaik as Elphaba,
Lucy Scherer as Glinda,
Mark Seibert as Fiyero and
Nicole Radeschnig as Nessarose. Featured among the character names that have been changed in the German language musical are
Carlo Lauber as Der Zauberer von Oz ("The Wizard of Oz"),
Angelika Wedekind as Madam Akaber (Madame Morrible),
Stefan Stara as Moq ("Boq") and
Michael Günther as Dr. Dillamonth ("Dr. Dillamond").
To get a taste of this
Wicked - Die Hexen Von Oz, check out the video to hear "Defying Gravity" as sung in German. Verkaik definitely has one amazing set of pipes to be reckoned with:
Currently, aside from the temporarily closed
Wicked on Broadway, there are two sitdown productions in the United States (
Chicago and
Los Angeles), one
North American touring company (currently playing in Hartford, CT), the
London West End version, a
Tokyo production, and now this one in Stuttgart. Next July, the
Australian version opens in Melbourne.
One week from tomorrow, I'll be far from the lights of Broadway as I journey to Stuttgart, taking in this latest translation. Even though I'm a bit rusty on my German, I have a feeling I'll be able to understand what's happening quite easily. You can bet I'll be reporting shortly thereafter, too.
This is Steve On Broadway (SOB).
Click here for tickets.
Related Stories: Wicked World (March 19, 2007)
Labels: Broadway, Germany, Musical, Opening Night, Wicked, Wicked Die Hexen Von Oz
