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Monday, March 14, 2011

WICKED!!!!!!

AAHHHHMAAAAAAZZZZZIIIIIIIIIIINNGG!!!!!!!!!!!!!! (The title is the name of the play, FYI) This play was indescribably beautiful and heartfelt and everything else you would want to feel while watching a broadway musical!!! The pure talent and realness of the acting was what got me misty-eyed. And I NEVER cry at anything acting related. But this time, I think I even forced myself to cry a little bit just to enhance the whole marvelous experience. It felt good to cry about it. I just about clapped my arms off at he end of every musical number. However, the people next to me disagreed with my opinion of the musical. They never clapped. And during the encore and the standing ovations, they left. Just left. I was like, people, you have got to be kidding me. Even if it was a cruddy play (although it was truly far from it) you just clap because it's a polite thing to do. What morons.

Anyway, there was one obvious sign of extreme talent in this show: the humor. Of course, there are no subtleties in broadway. Despite this obstacle, the cast made it work so, so, so well. What with the giddiness of Glinda and her oh-so-popular self-absorbedness, and Fiyero with his unnecessary, embarrass-others honesty, everything was perfect. The retorts between Glinda and Elphaba were truly clever and you could feel the vibe that the fighting between them was all in good nature and would not last long. It was the truest, realest, form of friendship I have ever seen portrayed on stage. The sister-like relationship between the two perfectly fit the theme of opposites attract. Plus, the relationship was like none I had ever experienced in a play, movie, song, TV show, etc. Yet, the way it was acted out was so completely not fake and totally believable. Glinda being the popular, boy-crazy ditz, at first loathing and then suddenly connecting with the introverted, miserable, and, well, quite green Elphaba.

Oh my goodness! I apologize. You probably don't really know what I'm talking about here. Well, here's tue background info: Elphaba is the wicked witch of the west. She was born green and teased about it her whole life, but that's not real important. In this story, no one is truly bad or good. They are just characters, having their faults and their attributes too. Elphaba is an animal lover on a world that treats them like dirt (note: the animals in the story are spelled with a capital A, distinguishing Animals from just animals. The Animals speak, and the animals don't). I have pretty much already summed up Glinda in the first paragraphs but for further information she becomes the "good" witch of the north. Fiyero is a rich, hot guy who begins school at the Shiz academy and goes steady with Glinda (more commonly known as "Galinda" - her preferred pronunciation). However, after the only Animal teacher in the school, gets fired, and the new teacher comes in with a lion cub in a cage, Fiyero takes sides with Elphaba and releases the lion into the wild. During this time, they bear but a touch of each others' hands and silent eye contact, and secretly, unknowingly, fall for each other. Oh, plus there is a highly esteemed professor of sorcery at the Shiz academy, Madam Morrible, who recognized Elphaba's powers and gets thinking about how she could use the little girl to her evil advantages. We later find out that she is on the side of he wizard, who is truly a complete loser and a nobody who just wants someone to look up to him and think of him as something. So, Madam Morrible and the 'wizard' are together to take the gift of speech from all Animals. Morrible pretends to be all over Elphaba and her gifts in sorcery, when she takes her to see the wizard and they have her decipher the language of a spell book. She reads it easily, but she is unaware that they have tricked her into casting a horrible spell. She feels betrayed and poses the wizard as her enemy. You see, the point of this story is that she was not evil at all, nor truly "good" - just a girl who is different and has her own deep cares and priorities. Yet she is forced to be thought of as the enemy, since everyone listens and looks up to the wizard and thinks he's the end-all be-all. And what the wizard is saying is that everyone must go and find this evil "witch", and they shouldn't listen to a thing she says because she lies and lies and lies (when, in fact, it is the other way around). But the wizard isn't a bad man either - he's just basking in the glory of having all citizens of Emerald City think of him as Mr. Wonderful. He never had a very good life before that - no family, no respect. As he says, he's a "sentimental" man, and quite eccentric in a goofy sort of way. Oh, and before I go any further - Elphaba has a sister, who later becomes Wicked Witch of the East. Nessarose, her wheelchair-bound little sister, is embarrassed to have a green and awkward sister such as Elphaba. However, her cruel father, being disgusted by Elphaba, forces her to care for her at all times, and she is very protective of her. Nessarose falls for a munchkin guy, Boq, who is actually in love with Glinda. Glinda suggests he ask Nessa to the dance, so he does. But her ends up in a relationship that he brought himself into only to make the love of his life happy. So, married to the governor of Oz, Nessa, disabled Nessa, he is miserable. Elphaba, after being in hiding away in the woods (after she sings "Defy Gravity" - so beautiful :D) comes back to secretly visit her sister. Nessa demands she use her powers to get her out of the wheelchair and make Boq love her, not Glinda. She casts the spell on Boq, and since the request for the spell was  "for me to have his heart and not Glinda!" (quote of Nessa, speaking figuratively in the context of love), literally his heart goes to Nessa, and so he becomes heartless, therefore becoming the tin man. Clever, right? Oh, and so while Elphaba is off being the innocent fugitive somewhere alone, Fiyero and Glinda get engaged, when in fact, Fiyero is on love with Elphaba, just after that one say they spent together in school releasing the lion cub (who actually becomes the cowardly lion later on). Meanwhile, the wizard and Morrible are plotting to lure Elphaba back to the city so they can capture her. They have a house fall on Nessa, killing her, and of course Elphaba gets wind of this and runs to her side. This is where the loathing between Dorothy (who is actually a tiny fraction of this story with no speaking part) and Elphaba. Dorothy's house landed on Elphaba's beloved sister, 'wicked witch of the east'. Then Dorothy takes the ruby slippers, a prized possession of Nessa, Elphaba, and their dead mother. There is no power to the slippers, only sentimentality and memories attached. Elphaba only kidnaps Dorothy and demands she hands them back for that reason only. Meanwhile, Elphaba and Glinda meet again after first meeting each other once before for the first time in years, then they fought during that time, then there they are again, just as Glinda directed Dorothy down the yellow brick road (honestly, I was really impressed by the ditsy humor portrayed by Glinda). They are fighting, but it's just their usual "blah blah blah you said she said" etc. Then I thought this was a pretty funny part:
Glinda: Well, all you do is ride around on that filthy old thing! (referring to Elphaba's broomstick)
Elphaba: Well, so sorry, not everyone can travel by bubble!
 So there was that, and then the guards of Oz enter, find Elphaba, and capture her. Then Glinda whines in her nasally, high-pitched, popular-girl voice (after the guards yank Elphaba away from the girls' fight using sticks) "Let her go, I almost had her!". Then Fiyero busts in and tries to fight away the guards, while explaining to Glinda that he loves someone else. Guards take him away and hang him to a post in a field. Elphaba casts a spell going something like this: "Don't let him be hurt, let him feel no pain, let him LIVE!". This therefore makes Fiyero the scarecrow, all full of straw and unable to feel physical pain. They sing a beautiful harmony love song. Then Elphaba captures Dorothy and takes her away to her tower and locks her in a room, all te while cursing and calling Dorothy a greedy, whiny brat for not giving up the slippers. Then Glinda appears, trying to convince Elphaba to let go of the shoes, saying "oh, God, they're just SHOES!" (which is ironic, because earlier she was raving about how important the perfect pair of shoes are and bragging about her expansive collection of footwear). They make up, as usual, and it touches the heart, as usual. As they hear guards coming up the stairs, they sing "You Changed Me for Good" as this would be their last time seeing each other, for they both believe Elphaba will surely die. The guards arrive, and believing in one of the rumors they have heard about the Wicked Witch of the West, they dump a bucket of water on her. You see nothing at this point since this all happens behind the curtain, all you see is a shadow. An I will leave it at that if in case you ever wish to see this play for yourself! Which you seriously should. This acting group was top-rated of the year and they sure as hell deserved it! So you better go see it. Sooooooooo worth it. Even if you sit in the nosebleed section like I did (row X, as a matter of fact lol). Ugh! And you cannot understand how it kills me that I can't describe the miraculousness of this masterpiece of broadway in words fit for the true feeling you get or the way every hug & giggle between Glinda and Elphaba lifts your heart. Not to mention that the love between Elphaba and Fiyero is extremely passionate. And not just in that sappy, Nicolas Sparks kind of way. This is FOR REAL, and whoever acts out the frustrated and relentless love for Fiyero, damn, she sure did it good! Oh, and Glinda had some pretty extreme talent too. The cutesy, bubbly, slightly shallow personality of her character appeared to be her own in real life (minus the shallow) once you heard her give her mini speech about their acting group's goal to raise X amount of money for research of AIDS. And I still can't get over the beauty of the gorgeous and pristine ring of every voice in that cast. I seriously suggest you take my advice and get tickets as soon as you can. these people are frickin' amazing!

Oh, and one more thing: I got my photo taken with the hot guy who plays Fiyero! (for a large price of $20. Oh, well. It's all for a good cause, right? ;)

Once again, I apologize that I could not describe the true incredibility of the show to you in this post. But, please promise me, you mustn't  base your decision on whether to see on not see this play on what I write. I just felt the need to get out there whatever (not so) awesome descriptions that came to my mind at the time. For the last time, this is sleepinl8 signing off, I ORDER YOU TO SEE THIS PLAY!!!!!!!!
~sleepinl8

2 comments:

  1. I know, I know. It was my third time, and loved it even more than the first two times. Next time you need to go to the stage door and meet the actors. I had a great conversation with Jackie, the woman who plays Elphaba in this production. I am going to be blogging about it soon. I can't wait to go again. I'm sure you feel the same way.

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  2. Totally! It still frustrates me to this moment that I could not properly describe the awesomeness of the play. I hope this same actinggroup comes around again next year.

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