The Wicked Movie: Everything We Know About the Musical Starring Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo

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Get ready to defy gravity, witches: The Wicked movie (or at least, the first installment of it) is coming to a theater near you. It boasts a star-studded cast to be sure, but the leading ladies playing Glinda and Elphaba won't be the only A-listers you'll spot dancing around Emerald City.

Here’s everything we know so far about part one of the highly anticipated Wicked movie:

When is it coming out?

Filming started on December 7, 2022, and the two movies (yes, two) were originally slated for Christmas releases in 2024 and 2025. But the release date for Wicked: Part 1 was subsequently moved up to November 27, 2024, to take advantage of the Thanksgiving holiday weekend.

“It became increasingly clear that it would be impossible to wrestle the story of Wicked into a single film without doing some real damage to it,” Chu wrote on social media on April 26. “As we tried to cut songs or trim characters, those decisions began to feel like fatal compromises to the source material that has entertained us all for so many years.”

Who’s in the cast?

Back in November 2021, news broke that Ariana Grande will play Glinda and Cynthia Erivo will play Elphaba in the Wicked movie, which will be directed by In the Heights’ Jon M. Chu.

Grande has been manifesting this for years. The pop icon is a known Wicked superfan. Her 2018 cover of “The Wizard and I” is beloved, and she has openly raved about her passion for the show. When asked in 2019 about a potential Wicked movie, Grande said, “I would do anything. I don’t wanna talk about it ’cause I’m gonna cry. I would do anything…. I would stand outside the producers’ studios with coffees every morning waiting for them to acknowledge me and begging them [to let me] sing ‘Defying Gravity’ for them.”

Grande continued, “I love that musical so much. Whenever I’m nervous about anything, I listen front to back.”

“Dear Cynthia, honored doesn’t even begin to cover it. I cannot wait to hug you. See you in Oz,” Grande wrote to Erivo. And in a message to Grande, Erivo wrote, “Congratulations, Miss A. The part was made for you. I look forward to sharing this musical journey with you.” She also added “pink goes good with green,” an iconic Glinda line from the musical.

Michelle Yeoh will play Shiz headmistress turned Wizard press secretary Madame Morrible, Jeff Goldblum will take on the part of The Wizard, and Ethan Slater, who won rave reviews and a loyal fanbase after starring as Spongebob on Broadway, will play lovestruck munchkin Boq.

On December 9, it was revealed that Marissa Bode will be joining the cast as Elphaba’s sister, Nessarose. Deadline also announced Bowen Yang, Bronwyn James, Keala Settle, Aaron Teoh, and Colin Michael Carmichael are also on board. Yes, that Bowen Yang. Yang is joining the cast as Pfannee, one of Elphaba and Glinda’s classmates at Shiz.

Oh, you want to know about Fiyero? Bridgerton’s own Jonathan Bailey will be dancing through life in Wicked’s film adaptation.

What’s it about?

Presumably, the movie will closely resemble Broadway’s famed Wizard of Oz origin story: Two young witches, Glinda and Elphaba, meet at school, and through a series of events grow to become the Good Witch of the North and Wicked Witch of the West.

Is there a trailer?

For a long time, all we had was fan-filmed footage of Ariana Grande as Glinda and a snippet of “No One Mourns the Wicked.” Thankfully, a full-length trailer debuted during the 2024 Super Bowl, finally giving us our first look at the acting and singing chops of Grande, Erivo, Yang, Yeoh, and more.

To celebrate the trailer drop, Grande and Erivo even showed up to the game in Las Vegas wearing custom sequined tops emblazoned with their characters’ names. In the trailer, we get to see the leading ladies meet in character at school, where they initially dislike one another only to forge a powerful friendship.

Watch the first official Wicked movie trailer here:

We’ll update this post with more information as it comes in.

Originally Appeared on Glamour