The New Yorker Radio Hour
From Critics at Large: After “Wicked,” What Do We Want from the Musical?
17 Dec 2024
The American musical is in a state of flux. Today’s Broadway offerings are mostly jukebox musicals and blatant I.P. grabs; original ideas are few and far between. Meanwhile, one of the biggest films of the season is Jon M. Chu’s earnest (and lengthy) adaptation of “Wicked,” the origin story of the Wicked Witch of the West that first premièred on the Great White Way nearly twenty years ago—and has been a smash hit ever since. On this episode, Vinson Cunningham, Naomi Fry, and Alexandra Schwartz discuss why “Wicked” is resonating with audiences in 2024. They consider it alongside other recent movie musicals, such as “Emilia Pérez,” which centers on the transgender leader of a Mexican cartel, and Todd Phillips’s follow-up to “Joker,” the confounding “Joker: Folie à Deux.” Then they step back to trace the evolution of the musical, from the first shows to marry song and story in the nineteen-twenties to the seventies-era innovations of figures like Stephen Sondheim. Amid the massive commercial, technological, and aesthetic shifts of the last century, how has the form changed, and why has it endured? “People who don’t like musicals will often criticize their artificiality,” Schwartz says. “Some things in life are so heightened . . . yet they’re part of the real. Why not put them to music and have singing be part of it?”This episode originally aired on Critics at Large, December 12, 2024.
Full Episode
From the online spectacle around Leo XIV's election to our favorite on-screen cardinals. This week on Critics at Large, we're talking all things Pope.
The Catholic Church was made for this moment. I think 2,000 years ago, the Catholic Church basically anticipated TikTok, Instagram, X. You don't have those little Swiss guard outfits and think they're not being photographed. Oil painting is not enough.
I'm Vincent Cunningham. Join me and my co-hosts for an episode on what can only be described as Pope Week. New episodes of Critics at Large drop every Thursday. Find us wherever you get your podcasts.
Welcome to the New Yorker Radio Hour. I'm Adam Howard, and we have a special treat for you this week, an episode on movie musicals from our friends at Critics At Large. That's the New Yorker's weekly culture podcast. Please enjoy.
I want the note at the end where it's like, you know, like the air note. Wow. I knew it would happen. He's defying gravity already. So exciting. This is Critics at Large, a podcast from The New Yorker. I'm Nomi Frye. I'm Vincent Cunningham.
And I'm Alex Schwartz. Each week on this show, we make sense of what's happening in the culture right now and how we got here. Critics. Yes. Brace yourself. Oh, my goodness. We are in the eye of the storm. The holiday movies are coming. I can't even pause for your laughter. It's happening right now. It's happening. Last week, we did Gladiator 2. That's right.
And this week, we're pivoting to a film that simply could not be more different, except that they do both feature kind of deranged leaders, but that's a story for another time. Be Barbie to gladiators Oppenheimer, or so we're being told by much marketing. I'm talking, of course, about Wicked. The best way to bring folks together is to give them a real good anime. You're green. I am.
Wicked is, of course, the much-anticipated movie adaptation of the Broadway musical. It stars Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo. And we should be quite clear, this movie, which runs to two hours and 40 minutes, is only part one of Wicked. How is that possible? Well, in spite of this, audiences are loving it.
They are loving Wicked Part 1, judging by box office numbers and just from the sheer amount of oxygen Wicked is taking up in the culture right now.
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