Well, there was the wizard of oz. Classic, great story, book and movie.

Years later, Gregory whatsisname wrote the book Wicked, a version of the story not only of the wicked witch’s perspective, but her life story. A great story, well written.

For whatever reason, instead of a movie being made as you would expect in the modern era, a Broadway musical was made. It essentially did a Broadway version of what the wizard of oz movie did. More music, less dialogue, but essentially the same thing.

The musical play was an even better success than the book. However, because it’s a stage production, not only does it lack some of the visual power of the WOZ movie, it’s harder to actually see/hear. Yeah, there’s a touring company, but tickets are expensive, and it doesn’t go everywhere. Alas, they also haven’t done an official live recording of the stage production (afaik, and I’ve looked). You can see many musicals and plays in their stage form in official recordings, but not Wicked.

Thus, you have a large audience wanting to see it, and unable to, which means unhappy fans, and that is leaving money on the table. It’s one of the rare instances of supply and demand not being out of sync, and resulting in something highly desired being done, and done fairly closely (by word of mouth) to the stage version.

For real though, if you’ve never read the book, and aren’t a theater goer (and more specifically a musical theater fan), the movie won’t be anything to interest you at first glance. It seems like another shitty movie that didn’t need to be made like Wonka didn’t need making. But there is more to Wicked as a movie than a cash grab, people have been asking about/for a movie version for a long time now.

Via bootleg clips of the stage production, it is a tad saccharine at points compared to the book, but only a very little bit. And I’m sure you’ve run into “defying gravity” before, at least the pop version Idina Menzel put out (which is mixed poorly imo), which is the big number that people love from the stage. I like the song a lot, but I really wish she would re-record it with a better producer lol.

That may not be for you, though I would suggest giving the book a chance if you enjoy reading. But that’s why.