Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo are ready for their Emerald City debut.
The pair co-star as Glinda and Elphaba in the upcoming two-part movie adaptation of Broadway musical "Wicked." The first film opens in theaters on Nov. 27, 2024.
While both Erivo and Grande have teased their performances as Oz's good and bad witches, the first glimpse of them in character came on April 16. The two singers, Universal Pictures, director John Chu and the movie all posted first-look photos on their social media pages.
"You weren’t told the whole story. What happens when you veer off the Yellow Brick Road? FIRST LOOK of the #WickedMovie … currently in production in Oz," director Chu wrote in the caption of his post.
It’s hard to see their faces in the dimly lit photos. What is visible, though, is Elphaba’s trademark pointy hat, her long black hair and her trench coat. She appears to be inside a tower of sorts.
Glinda's powder pink dress and blonde hair stand out as she ascends a staircase against an equally dark backdrop.
Many fans online were eager to have a visual from the movie, at last.
"GASPINGGGGGGGGGGGG," a commenter said on Erivo's post.
"I think I just passed out," someone said on Grande's post.
Tan France of "Queer Eye" fame provided an all-caps, "OH MY GOSH!!!"
The stakes are high, given fans' hype. As one person wrote, "I SERIOUSLY HOPE ITS GONNA BE DONE WELL! Wicked is EASILY MY FAVORITE BROADWAY MUSICAL, SO I HOPE BEYOND HOPE THE MOVIES WILL DO IT JUSTICE."
Others were perplexed by the dark mood board, commenting "What movie is this?" and "What's this?" on the studio's Instagram post.
And not everyone in the know is enthused. “Thanks! I hate it!” a person commented on an Instagram post of Grande as Glinda.
"Wicked" is a musical adaptation of Gregory Maguire's 1995 novel of the same name, written as a prequel to "The Wizard of Oz." The musical gives a backstory for the Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda the Good Witch, and imagines that before they were lifelong enemies, they were best friends.
Anticipation for the film has been building since the adaptation was first announced in 2021. The following year, in April, Chu revealed there would be two "Wicked" movies, with the first coming out in 2024 and the second in 2025.
“As we prepared the production over the last year, it became impossible to wrestle the story of ‘Wicked’ into a single film without doing some real damage to it,” Chu said in a statement at the time.
“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," he wrote. "We decided to give ourselves a bigger canvas and make not just one ‘Wicked’ movie but two! With more space, we can tell the story of ‘Wicked’ as it was meant to be told while bringing even more depth and surprise to the journeys for these beloved characters.”
