Wicked musical tour is currently playing at Sarofim Hall Hobby Center from July 10 through August 11, 2013.

Buy Wicked Houston Texas Tickets Online!

Where: Sarofim Hall Hobby Center, 800 Bagby St
Schedule:
Tuesdays to Thursdays – 7:30 PM
Fridays – 8:00 PM
Saturdays – 2:00 PM and 8:00 PM
Sundays – 2:00 PM and 7:30 PM

Wicked soars again in its fourth visit to Houston – reviewed by Everett Evans.

The alchemy that makes a hit musical is as weird and inexplicable as a witch’s spell – as the touring “Wicked” demonstrates yet again in the Broadway blockbuster’s fourth visit to Houston.

Based on Gregory Maguire’s novel telling the back story of the good and bad witches of Oz, “Wicked” soars despite unevenness in Winnie Holzman’s book and Stephen Schwartz’s score – both with fine moments, yet overall, more serviceable than inspired. “Wicked” lands a phenomenal punch anyway, because the premise is so irresistible and every other key element of the show, from direction to design to performance, is just about ideal.

As always, the first thing you notice is Eugene Lee’s elaborate scenic design: a proscenium of gadgets and gizmos, framing the show curtain depicting the map of Oz, topped by the Time Dragon, a huge puppet whose eyes glow red as it breathes fire and flaps its enormous wings. That’s the tip-off that “Wicked” is the real deal, a grand-scale, fully appointed Broadway musical – a rare breed these days, whether in New York or on the road.

Once the curtain rises, the rest of Lee’s settings, Susan Hilferty’s wildly imaginative costumes and Kenneth Posner’s magical lighting combine to conjure an extravagant vision, fantasyland with quirky twists – after all, Oz always had a freakish streak. Joe Mantello’s fluid and inventive direction melds all the design elements and the company into vivid stage pictures. With eclectic choreographic embellishment by Wayne Cilento, Mantello generates narrative momentum, with increasing attention to the more dramatic aspects as it advances.

David Nathan Perlow plays callow Fiyero with charm and sings agreeably. Kathy Fitzgerald makes a properly imperious, then sinister Madame Morrible. Walker Jones’ Wizard is a genial albeit low-key charlatan. Jenny Fellner and Alex Wyse do nicely with the subplot of lovelorn Nessarose and Boq, her ill-fated swain.

Perhaps inevitably, “Wicked” impresses much as before. You can’t keep a good, or wicked, witch down.

Read the complete review Via {Chron.com}

Only few chances left to see Wicked at Sarofim Hall Hobby Center. Buy Wicked Houston Texas Tickets Online!

Wicked Musical currently touring in Costa Mesa CA for almost 4-week run through March 17, 2013. The Wizard of Oz has returned to the Segerstrom Center for the third time and reviewed by ANNE VALDESPINO – Here is the review:

Now a decade old, “Wicked” continues to set records for ticket sales and it still attracts an eclectic audience: little girls in ruby red dresses, punks with platinum hair, fresh-faced young women dragging their boyfriends, seniors and gay couples. Its soaring score, fantasy landscape, love story and a book packed with one-liners appeal to a wide demographic.

It’s no surprise that composer-lyricist Stephen Schwartz, with his love of challenging subjects, could craft a musical out of Gregory Maguire’s best-selling 1995 novel. “Wicked” bristles with great music, from its foreboding title track, “No One Mourns the Wicked,” to songs of young love awakening such as “I’m Not That Girl,” and plenty of anthemic ballads in between: “Defying Gravity” and “The Wizard and I.”

Schwartz is suddenly hot again – or perhaps he’s never gone cold. “Pippin” is poised for a spring Broadway revival, and “Wicked” is just more candy for his hard-core fans. The composer of “Godspell” and Disney musicals including “Enchanted,” “Pocahontas,” and “The Prince of Egypt,” Schwartz is a master of pulling on heartstrings.

“Wicked” is about the odd friendship of two girls, one blond and popular, the other a green witch with strange powers. Thrown together accidentally, they experience the typical phases of teen relationships: first dances, bonding over clothes and hairstyles, fighting over the cutest boy in the school. Add politics, sorcery, betrayal and murder to the mix.

Continually taunted for her green skin, Elphaba attends school only to care for her wheelchair-bound sister Nessarose, and meets her opposite, Glinda, the girl with the golden hair. At first they tangle, then become roomies and best friends. Handsome prince Fiyero tests their loyalties by first falling for Glinda and then taking up Elphaba’s political cause: her championing of animal rights, which lands her in deep trouble at school and with the Wizard. Meanwhile, Nessarose has her heart set on Boq, a Munchkin who only has eyes for Glinda.

Read the complete review {Via OCRegister.com}

Wicked musical will play through March 17, 2013 at Orange County Performing Arts Center – Segerstrom Hall. Buy Wicked Costa Mesa CA Tickets Online – SAVE $10 when you spend $350 or more, Use code AFF$10.

Wicked Musical currently Stops in San Francisco CA for almost 4-week run. Wicked will be performing at Orpheum Theater SF through February 17, 2013. Wicked musical play at Orpheum Theater reviewed by Robert Hurwitt – Here is the review:

Elphaba, the green girl, flies high and sings with beautifully modulated power as she becomes the Wicked Witch of the West in the touring production of “Wicked” that opened Thursday at the Orpheum Theatre. Glinda the Good matches her vocally and dazzles the audience with charm. And that may be the bigger story.

Understudy Cassie Okenka rose from the ensemble to don Glinda’s blond locks, pink frocks and sunnily self-absorbed personality when co-star Patti Murin was sidelined with the flu Thursday. From her glittering first notes through every step of an assured performance, Okenka more than gave the audience its money’s worth at the latest show in SHN’s season.

It was another nice turn in San Francisco’s long relationship with composer-lyricist Stephen Schwartz and librettist Winnie Holzman’s adaptation of Gregory Maguire’s dystopian “Oz” prequel. The show had its world premier here in 2003, before going on to become one of Broadway’s hottest tickets, and returned for a prolonged run in ’09.

It’s very much the same, well-oiled production as last time, staged with quick-paced clarity by Joe Mantello and inventively boisterous dance by Wayne Cilento. The great smoke-breathing mechanical dragon looms above the massive gears and clockworks of Eugene Lee’s Victorian steam-punk set. The cast creates sharp individual portraits in Susan Hilferty’s scruffy peasant, odd animal and glittering Emerald City costumes.

The heart of “Wicked” is the story of Elphaba and Glinda, accidental roommates and rivals in wizardry and romance at Shiz University. Dee Roscioli shines as the shy but assertive, sharp-tongued green girl, the eternal outsider blessed – and cursed – with magical powers she’s only learning to use.

Though she’s played Elphaba more often than anyone else, Roscioli keeps the role fresh and immediate, whether navigating her uneasy growing closeness with Glinda or confronting the villainies of Kim Zimmer’s outrageously formidable Madame Morrible and the vaudevillian con-man Wizard of Kevin McMahon (also filling in for an ailing regular).

Read the complete review {Via SFGate.com}

Wicked musical will play through February 17, 2013 at Orpheum Theater, 1192 Market St., S.F. Buy Wicked San Francisco CA Tickets Online – SAVE $10 when you spend $350 or more, Use code AFF$10.

Wicked Musical currently Stops in Honolulu HI for almost 7-week run. Wicked will be performing at Neal S. Blaisdell Center Concert Hall through January 12, 2013. Wicked musical play at Neal S. Blaisdell Center – Concert Hall reviewed by RUTH BINGHAM as ““Wicked” works magic”. Here is the review:

“Wicked” the musical is a better, tighter story than Gregory Maguire’s novel, which composer Stephen Schwartz and author Winnie Holzman rewrote so that it works on multiple levels.

In the novel, the story is launched by a hurdy-gurdy man’s mechanical “razzle-dazzle spectacle” that comes to town to lead good citizens astray: “Wicked” the musical is that spectacle. We, the good citizens of Honolulu, assemble to see the novelty, a trained money cranks open the curtain, the mechanical Clock of the Time Dragon roars, and the fantasy begins.

The musical takes place wholly within the book’s Clock of the Time Dragon; it begins as a “once-upon-a-time” flashback from a point we thought we knew, but ends by sending us back into our world without returning to the starting point so that we carry the story with us as we leave.

On reflection, “Wicked” is a dark tale, on one level a morality play about good and evil, but it is told with humor and a happy Hollywood ending, making it suitable and enchanting for audiences of all ages. Part of its magic is that people experience the tale differently and walk away with different lessons, so no spoilers here — you have to experience it for yourself.

That said, “Wicked” will be the shortest three hours you’ve ever spent in a theater — it covers a lot of ground during that time. Like its structural forefather, Baz Luhrman’s “Moulin Rouge,” almost every line is a reference, and every twist and turn of its very dense plot is delivered in only a phrase or two, making every word essential.

“Wicked’s” pit orchestra — 15 musicians, nine hired locally — provide an almost subconscious flow, carrying the drama along. The production is at such a high level overall that when minor issues with balancing sound intruded during a performance last weekend, they fortunately passed quickly.

Read the complete review {Via HonoluluPulse.com}

Wicked musical will be in Honolulu HI through January 12, 2013. Buy Wicked Neal S. Blaisdell Center – Concert Hall Tickets Online – SAVE $10 when you spend $350 or more, Use code AFF$10.

Wicked Musical is currently performing at The Fabulous Fox Theatre – St. Louis, MO. Based on the novel by Gregory Macguire, “Wicked” is the back story of “The Wizard of Oz.” Wicked musical play at The Fabulous Fox Theatre reviewed by Andrea Braun. Here is the review:

The story begins with the birth of a bright green infant named Elphaba conceived in a one-night stand in which her apparently slutty mom slept with a man addicted to a colored substance he shared with her. So, okay, we don’t start out with a woman being anything but a stereotype. As it happens, said woman is married to the Governor of Munchkinland (only he’s not short) whom she does not love. Still, they conceive another daughter, Nessarose, who is born early and damaged from the plant her husband forces upon the mom to ensure the child is not green. Well, she’s not, but she’s premature and has underdeveloped legs, and her mother dies, leaving Elphaba with only a green bottle to remember her by.

We next see the sisters when their father drops them off at Shiz, a tony prep school for well-to-do children of powerful Ozians (Oz is an area divided into several different lands but all are under the control of the “Wonderful Wizard” of Oz.) Elphaba is only sent to be a guardian to daddy’s darling wheelchair-bound Nessa, but she displays her extraordinary powers early (she’s like The Hulk: You really don’t want to make her angry AND she’s green). The headmistress, Madame Morrible, selects her for special training, a privilege the wealthy and spoiled Galinda assumed would be hers. Instead, the vapid blonde and the smart green girl end up roommates who move from “loathing” (“What Is This Feeling”) to BFFs fairly quickly (in musical terms, within two songs before“Popular”).

Gregory Maguire’s novel, Wicked, tells the story of the “Wicked Witch of the West” before Dorothy blew into town, but the musical is quite different from its source material. Stephen Schwartz (music and lyrics) and Winnie Holzman (book) have created an entirely sympathetic Elphaba, a finally admirable Glinda (after she realizes her happiness is not the entire world’s responsibility), and others who are good—Fiyero, beloved of both Elphaba and Glinda, and Boq, a virtual slave to the nasty Nessa—or bad—Morrible, the Wizard. A talented singing and dancing chorus functions as Shiz students, citizens of Oz, palace guards, and those famous flying monkeys. It is a lovely looking show, leaning toward gears and a big clock and stylized costumes. It’s essentially really elaborate Steampunk.

Read the complete review {Via PLAYBACKstl.com}

Wicked will be in Saint Louis MO through January 6, 2013. Buy Wicked The Fabulous Fox Theatre Tickets Online – SAVE $10 when you spend $350+, Use code AFF$10.

Wicked Musical is currently performing at Fabulous Fox Theatre-St. Louis, MO. Based on the novel by Gregory Macguire, “Wicked” is the back story of “The Wizard of Oz.” Harry Hamm reviewed the musical at stlouis.cbslocal.com. Here is the review:

From every production value you can imagine, and some you probably couldn’t until you see the show, “Wicked” is a masterwork of staging and creativity. It is the kind of production that challenges itself on every level and succeeds brilliantly. Casting is always a strong point of this production and in this visit, it is exceptional as well. Christine Dwyer as Elphaba carries the role with a wonderful voice and strident, authentic strength of character.

Jeanna de Waal as Glinda is sweet, funny and full of feeling when it is needed. The performance chemistry between she and Dwyer is genuinely winning.

Supporting and ensemble casts member are all outstanding, especially Jay Russell as Dr. Dillamond, Billy Harrigan as Fiyero and Paul Kreppel as The Wizard.

“Wicked” is a musical that is moving, amusing, exciting, funny and heartfelt. Subtexts abound. There are so many elements that can relate to almost any audience member about instances in their own stories that in many ways “Wicked” becomes a reaffirmation of life. And by the way, the 14 piece orchestra, under the baton of Valerie Gebert, and including 9 local musicians, makes the music soar. “Wicked” will be on stage at The Fabulous Fox Theatre through January 6.

Read the complete review {Via stlouis.cbslocal.com}

Wicked will be at Fox Theatre through January 6, 2013. Buy Wicked Saint Louis MO Tickets Online at discounted prices – SAVE $10 when you spend $350+, Use code AFF$10.

Broadway’s biggest blockbuster “Wicked” is playing the second time at Proctors Theatre, Schenectady NY. Wicked will be at Proctors Theatre through November 25, 2012. Bob Goepfert reviewed the musical at Saratogian.com. Here is the review:

Wicked musical is just as good and, arguably, even better, than the first, which is a great tribute to the production.

That’s because “Wicked” is a show in which the storyline is more important than its musical component. If you are not involved in the story, you might find the material too dense.

Yes, the score is pleasant enough to be enjoyed alone and, when special effects are added to the first-act closer “Defying Gravity,” it’s a goose bump moment. But songs like the love duet “As Long As You Are Mine” and the ode to friendship “For Good,” while lovely, take on an added resonance because of our attachment to the characters and the situation of which they are singing

The biggest hurdle for audiences who saw the first “Wicked” at Proctors is familiarity with the plot. “Wicked” turns the traditional “Wizard of Oz” tale on its heels, as most of the fun comes from the revelations about how the Wicked Witch of the East and Glinda, the Good Witch, got their reputations.

That said, the talented cast captures the essence of the story and develops the friendships and romances between the characters while keeping the balance between comedy and intense drama. This production is always engaging.

The two leads are terrific. The central figure is Elphaba, the girl who was born with skin an odd shade of green which made her an outsider. Christine Dwyer plays the woman who becomes the Wicked Witch of the East as an outspoken, independent woman, but also indicates her need for acceptance.

Almost stealing the show from Elphaba is Glinda, who is portrayed in a delightfully comic manner by Jeanna De Waal. De Waal’s Glinda grows from being a self-centered, dumb blonde to become an emerging independent woman with a world view.

In many ways, Glinda’s journey is more satisfying than is Elphaba’s. That’s because Elphaba’s destiny is almost preordained while Glinda’s growth comes from increasing self-awareness.

Read the complete review {Via Saratogian.com}

Wicked will be at Proctors Theatre through November 25, 2012. Buy Wicked Schenectady NY Tickets Online at discounted prices – Save $10 on Orders of $350 or more, Use code AFF$10.

Wicked second national tour is currently in Baltimore, MD for the second time for a month long run from October 03 to November 04, 2012. Wicked first visited Baltimore in 2007.

Here is the review of the Wicked musical by Tim Smith at BaltimoreSun.com:

Equal parts nostalgia and hipness, satire and sentiment, one-liners and philosophy, the hit musical “Wicked” remains a potent brew. Bewitching, even.

This tale-spin about life in Oz, before that rude girl from Kansas crashed the place, is neither quite as profound as its most ardent champions would aver, nor quite as empty as its detractors have charged. But the work’s component parts certainly come together snappily in ways that create entertainment writ large.

The plot, adapted by Winnie Holzman from the Gregory Maguire novel, presents a back-story for the peculiarly green woman we last saw in a puddle — the Wicked Witch of the West, who tried so darn hard for the return of those jeweled slippers in the 1939 film “The Wizard of Oz.”

Various details we accept as gospel from that movie get some interesting twists (better to … forget what you remember Margaret Hamilton’s iconic witch doing to the Scarecrow). And, like in Mozart’s “The Magic Flute,” characters are apt to shift between good to evil without warning.

Oz, it turns out, is not entirely Eden-like. The Wizard happily tells his people lies, because “they were lies they wanted to hear.” Prejudice, intolerance, suspicion of the “other,” power-hunger, fast-flying rumor — it’s all happening in or around this emerald-tinted world.

Some of these issues, especially a campaign against talking animals (a chilling classroom scene is fully Third Reich-redolent), could use more depth. But the fast-moving, if opera-length, show stays primarily focused on the emotional journey of the supposedly wicked witch, Elphaba, how and why she moved toward the dark side.

One of the tricky things about “Wicked” is how to keep the Glinda character from tilting the musical her way; she spreads glitter from the get-go and could go on to steal any scene.

The touring production boasts terrific balance and chemistry between the two leads — Christine Dwyer’s sensitive, wry Elphaba and Jeanna de Waal’s iridescent Glinda. Both are nuanced actresses who manage to tap into something genuine about the characters. Their unlikely friendship, the bond that changes both women “for good,” resonates strongly here.

Dwyer doesn’t just nail the glum, glib side of Elphaba, but unleashes the eager little girl beneath. Even in her most theatrical moments, she doesn’t lose a touch of humanness.

Would that Stephen Schwartz’s score contained a few more items of that cleverness. A lot of the songs are in generic pop mode, spinning their wheels over well-worn harmonic paths and failing to generate a really strong melodic hook.

The supporting cast does uniformly persuasive work. Paul Kreppel makes a disarming Wizard, Gina Ferrall a colorful Madame Morrible. Billy Harrigan Tighe has the fresh, all-Ozian looks and smooth swagger for Fiyero, the man who lights a spark under Elphaba and Glinda.

Read the complete review {Via BaltimoreSun.com}

Wicked musical performances at Hippodrome Theatre will continue through Sunday November 04, 2012. Buy Wicked Baltimore MD Tickets Online at discounted prices, Get $10 OFF on Orders of $350 or more by using code AFF$10.

Wicked Musical is currently playing at Reynolds Hall in the Smith Center for the Performing Arts through October 07, 2012.

Here is the review by Don Chareunsy at Las Vegas Weekly.

The song could be about “Wicked” itself, as the Broadway smash based on the 1995 novel “Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West” by Gregory Maguire has become a theatrical phenomenon, winning three Tonys in 2004 and thrusting its two dynamic lead actresses Kristin Chenoweth as Glinda (or Guh-linda, with a Guh), and Idina Menzel as Elphie (Menzel, facing off against Chenoweth, went home with the statuette) into the spotlight.

No matter that “Wicked,” a prequel and parallel of Frank L. Baum’s “The Wonderful Wizard of Oz” and the 1939 Hollywood classic “The Wizard of Oz” starring Judy Garland, has divided critics from day one (it was nominated for 11 Tonys and notably lost Best Musical, Best Book and Original Score to “Avenue Q”); it is critic proof — in the vein of the “Twilight” books and films — and has a devoted (fanatic) following like its predecessor “Rent.”

The scenic and costume design (the other two Tony winners) at Reynolds Hall on Thursday night were exemplary, and the supporting cast — Kim Zimmer (Madame Morrible — and, yes, Reva Shayne from “Guiding Light,” which garnered her four Emmys), Cliffton Hall (Fiyero), Tom McGowan (the Wonderful Wizard of Oz) and Demaree Hill (Nessarose) — under director Joe Mantello were very good.

But it’s no surprise that Parker and Murin are the exceptional standouts, and they hold their own against role originators Menzel and Chenoweth, respectively — big red ruby slippers to fill, indeed.

Murin is a comedic, ditzy blonde delight as Glinda, and she does the book by Winnie Holzman (“My So-Called Life”) proud with every hilarious vocal and physical delivery. Her rendition of “Popular” was a highlight of the evening; it’s good to be Glinda the Good Witch, who travels by bubble.

The audience heaped praise before, during and, in the valet line, post-show. The full standing ovation was immediate — and not just for Parker and Murin — and rousing.

“Wicked” is popular, and it will be po-pu-lar for many years to come. It’s Oz-some.

Read the complete review {Via LasVegasWeekly.com}

Wicked will continue performances at the Smith Center for the Performing Arts through October 07, 2012. Buy Wicked Las Vegas Nevada Tickets Online at discounted prices.

Wicked Broadway musical tour is currently performing in Montreal Canada from August 01 to August 26, 2012. Here is the Wicked musical review by Anne Sutherland, The Gazette.

The strength of the musical Wicked lies in the two leads, the Wicked Witch of the West and Glinda the Good. For all the sumptuous costumes, fancy sets, dry ice, flying monkeys and production numbers, it all boils down to whether these two dames can belt it out.

To state the obvious, the two leads are wicked good.

Wicked, the touring version that just touched down at Place des Arts for almost the entire month of August, is blessed with the gifted pipes of Jeanna de Waal as the saintly sweet Glinda and the superb Christine Dwyer as the flawed but ultimately redeemed Elphaba, the witch of the title.

It’s the story that purports to tell the tale of what happened before Dorothy and her house landed on the Witch of the East in the classic children’s book and 1939 movie The Wizard of Oz.

Based on a series of books by Gregory Maguire, the musical backstory of the friendship of these two divergent characters has been a juggernaut on Broadway, London’s West End and broken all sorts of attendance and box office records since its debut in 2003. And it’s a great show, with outstanding songs culminating with the goosebump-raising vocals on Defying Gravity.

The story opens with widespread jubilation as the citizens of Oz celebrate the passing of the Wicked Witch of the West, a dastardly green creature who has been bedevilling the land. As fans of the story know, she was done in by a bucket of water tossed by Dorothy. Seems her soul was so unclean that pure water could melt her.

Elphaba is destined for great things, Morrible says, and will be introduced to the great Wizard of Oz, her lifelong dream.

The costumes are quite brilliant, particularly the numerous hues of green in the Emerald City tableaus and the candy-coloured gowns sported by the good witch.

Read the complete review {Via MontrealGazette.com}

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