Nobody’s shocked that “Wicked: For Good” is poised to be Queen of the Box Office this weekend. It’s the blockbuster sequel to a best picture Oscar nominee that grossed more than $700 million worldwide. Success was so obvious that the Munchkins wouldn’t even bother to come out, come out and sing a happy song about it. But, 22 years since Elphaba first defied gravity onstage, what many forget is that “Wicked” the musical didn’t start off as a surefire juggernaut that was destined to gross $6 billion. Its yellow brick road was full of hazards from the very start. Back in 2003, during the “Wizard of Oz” riff’s tryout in San Francisco, Calif., the musical by Stephen Schwartz and Winnie Holzman was ripped by critics. “Ding, dong, the witch’s prognosis is uncertain at this stage of ‘Wicked’,” sniped Variety, then the most important out-of-town review. “The problem lies less in the production. than with a mediocre book, trite lyrics and largely generic music.” And your little dog, too! At the time, The Post’s Michael Riedel reported that out west, Schwartz and director Joe Mantello were at such a boiling point, the two stopped speaking to each other. You can imagine the fights. “If you only had a heart!” “If you only had a brain!” Producer David Stone chalked up the theatrical fisticuffs to “natural creative tension.” Schwartz, by the way, appears to have natural creative tension with a lot of his collaborators. He infamously butted heads with Bob Fosse during “Pippin,” and, I’m told, has with others since then. “Schwartz has power, and his his-way-or-the-highway attitude was definitely on display,” a source said of his working style during the panned new Broadway show “The Queen of Versailles.” But for “Wicked,” he made necessary changes. Love interest Fiyero’s song called “Which Way’s the Party?” (“abysmal,” said Variety) was scrapped and replaced with “Dancing Through Life.” And the book was extensively rewritten by Holzman to make witchy Elphaba less of a womp-womp victim. By September, the $14 million production had built a so-so $3 million advance in New York, and opened on Broadway to yet more critical shrugs. “This is basically a kid’s show with aspirations,” wrote The Post’s Clive Barnes in a 2 ½-star review. In The Times, Ben Brantley adored Kristin Chenoweth as Glinda, but called the musical around her “bloated” and said its “oddly colorless” main character played by Idina Menzel was “all furrowed-brow sincerity and expansive power ballads.” Worst of all, eight months later Goliath (“Wicked”) lost the best musical Tony Award to David (“Avenue Q”) a prediction nobody made. Earlier that night, when Schwartz also lost the best score Tony to the writers of the filthy puppet comedy, he reportedly bolted out of Radio City Music Hall. There’s no place like home, indeed. Setbacks aplenty. But none have mattered. Today, “Wicked” is the fourth longest-running Broadway musical of all time after something called “The Lion King,” and has productions all over the globe. Never underestimate the strength of “Oz.” But the show also initially benefited from debuting when millennials, then teens, had a hankering for singable pop melodies and empowerment stories. Two decades later, those same audience members who went with their parents now have that ever bankable combo of wallets, nostalgia and ennui. They’re still packing the Gershwin and, this weekend, movie theaters. “For Good” is estimated to open to $228 million globally, which would be the highest opener for a Broadway musical film adaptation ever. See? No one mourns the “Wicked.”.
https://nypost.com/2025/11/22/entertainment/wicked-on-broadway-was-ripped-by-critics-and-then-became-a-global-hit-worth-billions/
‘Wicked’ on Broadway was ripped by critics — and then became a global hit worth billions
