6 Interesting Facts You Do Not Know About “The Wicked”

Here is the six interesting facts about “The Wicked” musical:

1. Stephen Schwartz came up with the idea for the musical being on holidays. It took place in Hawaii in 1996. Schwartz’ friend mentioned in passing the name of the book “Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West”. This was the moment when the idea dawned upon him. Once he came back from the holidays he called his lawyer to handle juridical issues concerning the copyrights.
2. The role Elphaba had another owner before Idina Menzel. It is impossible to imagine not Menzel in the original cast of “The Wicked”. However, there was Stephanie Block before the opening night. In the end, Block was replaced by Menzel. At that time Idina already was a nominee for a Tony. Stephanie premiered in the role of Elphaba after all in the first national tour in 2005.
3. The musical covered all the expenses too early! As a rule, it takes about 2-3 years to regain spent money through subsequent profits. “The Wicked” is not the case. It needed only 14 months to gross $14 million.
4. Critics didn’t raise both hands in full agreement. Acid comment such as “the yellow road has a few bricks missing”, or “Dorothy isn’t the only one who thinks there’s no place like home” made the creatives re-do the performance before it hit Broadway.
5. Idina Menzel got an injury at the eve of the final play. The Murphy’s law. The day before the showtime turned out to be ominous. Idina fell off a trap door and was immediately taken to hospital being still green made up.
6. The performance needs a lot of electricity to be staged daily. The amount of power it consumes would be enough for 12 houses. Each show gets so much electricity every day! In addition to it, 250 pounds of dry ice are needed to make the fog each day as well.

Find tickets to Wicked musical here.

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