Maybe you’ve heard, but the movie adaptation of the long-running Broadway musical Wicked hits theaters later this month, starring Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba and Ariana Grande as Glinda. It looks fantastic.
As of this posting, I have not seen the movie. (Womp womp.) But here’s a fun fact: Back in the day, when she was starring as Elphaba in Wicked on Broadway, I interviewed Idina Menzel. The interview took place more than 20 years ago, in March 2004, before Menzel won the Tony award for the role. (And before Frozen, and before John Travolta called her “Adele Dazeem”, and before everything else that happened after she left the show.)
The article was the cover story of the May 2004 issue of Continental — yes, the inflight magazine of Continental Airlines. Menzel and I spoke over the phone, but I did go to New York shortly thereafter to see her in the show. And then, after Menzel and Kristin Chenoweth bewitched me in their iconic roles (the latter played Glinda), I went backstage to hang out with Ms. Elphaba in her dressing room — after she’d showered and washed off all the green makeup, of course.
Unfortunately, these were the days before iPhones, otherwise I’d probably have photographic proof of this. Oh well.
Another fun fact: Six years later, in 2010, I interviewed Chenoweth, as well. (Again, over the phone.) It was when she was starring in the first-ever Broadway revival of Promises, Promises. During our conversation, I asked Chenoweth why she thought Wicked had touched such a chord in so many people. “There is in every one of us a little bit of Elphaba and a little bit of Glinda,” she explained. “Elphaba, who is green and is immediately outcast because of that, actually has quite a tough little exterior but is not so tough on the inside. Glinda is pretty on the outside, but what drives her? Insecurity. And then she grows into heartbreak. The show is about love and forgiveness and friendship, and those are the reasons why it has become a classic. Nothing makes me prouder than to have been a part of something like that.”
Anyway, I know you aren’t reading this post to learn more about me. You want to read my article about Menzel. So here it is, in its entirety. Enjoy!
Defying the Oz
It’s ironic that Idina Menzel’s first line of dialogue in a Broadway show was “Which way to the stage?” More than eight years after her debut in Rent, this born performer shows no signs of needing directions.
Menzel, a Long Island native who grew up dreaming of one day becoming an actor on the Great White Way, has been making memorable impressions on audiences with supporting roles in Aida, The Wild Party, and, most notably, Rent. Menzel’s performance as Maureen in Rent earned her a Tony nomination and announced her arrival as one of Broadway’s most exciting new talents.
Last October, Menzel opened in her first lead role, as Elphaba in Wicked. The show tells the story of Oz before Dorothy arrived, but like the Gregory Maguire novel it’s based on, Wicked is much more than a prequel to The Wizard of Oz. The show deviates from the classic story most drastically by presenting Elphaba, the character formerly known only as the Wicked Witch of the West, as a good-hearted, optimistic girl who was misunderstood by her peers because of her green skin.
Thanks to Menzel’s portrayal of her character as vulnerable yet intense, those who have grown up thinking of the witch as a villain are surprised to find themselves feeling sympathetic toward Elphaba. The chance to change people’s impressions was what initially drew Menzel to the role. She was so set on getting the part that she showed up for the audition in an improvised costume that included green lipstick and smoky black eyeshadow. The creativity paid off. “I thought [Elphaba] was the most interesting person,” Menzel says. “We see this woman in The Wizard of Oz and she has these warts and nose and chin. But what if that was just the glasses we were wearing? If we strip away all that preconceived stuff, we see that she was really pretty once.”
Wicked costars Kristin Chenoweth (Tony winner for You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown) as Glinda, the future good witch who, as a younger woman, was Elphaba’s friend. Menzel calls sharing the stage with Chenoweth a true partnership: “It’s rare,” she says, “for two women to have the opportunity to have such great roles on a Broadway stage. So we have to remind ourselves all the time of that, that we’re really lucky.” (The show also features Broadway legend Joel Grey as the Wizard.)
For Menzel, the luck runs deeper. For six years she fronted a wedding band, playing regular gigs to pay her bills. In late 1995, as business slowed down, she tried out for a small off-Broadway show on a whim, thinking a role would keep the money coming in. The show was Rent, and it was a transforming experience for Menzel, not simply because of the Tony nomination. The show’s tragic history — composer Jonathan Larson died of an aortic aneurysm the night of the show’s first preview — created lasting friendships among the cast. Included was Taye Diggs, best known today for his roles in the film How Stella Got Her Groove Back and the TV series Ally McBeal. Menzel and Diggs started dating while they were in Rent and were married last year.
Rent changed Menzel’s life in other ways. The show opened up opportunities for her, including the chance to perform at the 1998 Lilith Fair concert festival, to appear in films such as Summer of Sam and Kissing Jessica Stein, and to record an album, which Menzel appropriately called Still I Can’t Be Still, capturing the nonstop lifestyle she was enjoying.
“I have no life,” Menzel explains on this Wednesday between shows, as she tries to fit in an interview and a quick meal before getting ready to go back on stage. Clearly, things haven’t slowed down for her. “I wake up early enough to get my voice going. I go to the gym. I warm up. I come here,” she says. “After the show, I say hello to my guests, I go home, I shut off, and put the TV on. I haven’t been able to have much of a life in order to do eight shows a week at the level that I want to do them.”
Don’t pity Menzel, though. She’s exactly where she wants to be, doing exactly what she wants to be doing: starring in an original musical on Broadway. “I try to pinch myself all the time,” she says. “This is a dream come true. I write my own music and I’ve gone on that road, but I keep coming back to the theater. This has always been the warmest, most embracing place for me.”
One need look no further than the stage door after any given performance to see proof of this. Fans — many of whom have followed Menzel’s career since Rent — crowd around hoping for a glimpse of the star. “Those fans are the most loyal, devoted people,” she says. “They were really young [when I was in Rent], and we’ve sort of grown up together.”
This month, Menzel will learn if she has a fan in Tony, but it’s something she isn’t paying much attention to: “I try not to read anything,” she says. One thing is certain: the fast lane Menzel has come to know as her career shows no signs of slowing down.
Perhaps that’s why Menzel is making no plans for when her contract ends in October. “I’m just trying to enjoy this,” she says, “When I was in Rent, it was such a whirlwind, and it passed me by. It wasn’t until afterward that I really realized how extraordinary it was. To have another show that’s doing well, knock on wood, and that people are really loving…. I’m just trying to live in the moment and enjoy it.”
(Continental magazine cover photo by Emily Shur. Wicked the movie opens in theaters on November 22.)
Martin's Musings 
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