‘Wicked’ the musical in India: Inside the new production bringing Oz to Mumbai

Wicked’ arrives at NMACC: A new production of the global phenomenon lands soon in Mumbai

The Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre has made something of a habit of importing spectacle. After hosting crowd-pullers like The Sound of Music, Mamma Mia!,West Side Story, Life of Pi, The Phantom of the Opera and The Nutcracker, it now welcomes its ninth international showcase: Wicked, which runs from March 12-29. And not just any Wicked, but an entirely new production that carries the same beloved score and script while reimagining the direction, choreography and design for a fresh generation.

Globally, Wicked has drawn more than 65 million people across 130 cities in 16 countries. Its songs — ‘Defying Gravity’, ‘Popular’, ‘For Good ‘— have become cultural shorthand for ambition, friendship and the kind of heartbreak that still leaves you standing. The story, based on Wicked, with music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and a book by Winnie Holzman, takes us back to Oz long before Dorothy’s neat pigtails and ruby slippers. It asks a far more unsettling question: who decided one woman was wicked and the other good?

Elphaba and Glinda inWicked | Photo Credit: @joaocaldasfilho

At the helm of this new staging is director John Stefaniuk, who approaches the material with a keen awareness that the world has shifted dramatically since the show first opened over two decades ago. “When first looking at Wicked and trying to decide how to approach such a historic piece in cultural history and how best to give it a voice that would speak to today’s audience, I first looked at what had changed since it was first introduced some 25 years ago,” he says. “For me, the greatest shift in the last 20 years has been the introduction of social media and its influences on society.”

It is a deliciously modern lens through which to view Oz. “Beginning with Glinda, to me she is truly the first Ozian social influencer, spreading her thoughts through bubbles across the land,” John explains. “Elphaba, on the other hand, is a victim of cancel culture in Oz, shouldering the burden of being different physically and then cancelled from speaking the truth.”

To bring those themes of identity, prejudice and public shaming to life, John keeps the rehearsal room stripped back at first. “I always begin every rehearsal process sitting at a table where we don’t rely on the set or costumes or movement, we only rely on the text and understanding what and why we say every word on the page,” he says. The idea is simple but effective: before the broomsticks fly and the gowns shimmer, the actors must find themselves in the lines. “For me, the more of themselves the actor is willing to bring to stage, the more truth will shine in the production.”