✅ Wicked: Part I Is Somehow Longer Than the Whole Broadway Musical. Allow Me to Explain.

The first thing you need to understand about the new movie version of Wicked is that, despite being only Part I of a two-part adaptation, it is in fact lengthier than the entire blockbuster stage musical on which it is based. At two hours and 40 minutes, it’s about 10 minutes longer than the original, two-hour-and-30-minute Broadway musical—the actual run time, if you exclude the show’s typical 15-minute intermission. The movie does not itself slot in time for such an intermission (this ain’t the ’60s), but it ends right at the plot point that serves as the musical’s famed Act 1 finale: “Defying Gravity,” the song belted by an unjustly persecuted Elphaba as she finally rides off ...

Slate     Nov 21, 2024