Wicked 1-5-05 — Page 2

I am missing exactly how Joel Grey acted the Wizard better than Hearn...Just because he doesn't dance? What? What Mr. Hearn does in that role is far more important...think of the "Sentimental Man" into "Defying Gravity" scene. The second Glinda and Elphaba leave the stage, there is a transformation of his character. He does a perfect job of playing the charming side of the Wizard in the appropriate scenes, but in the aforementioned scene, he very clearly brings out the other side of the Wizard, which Joel Grey did not do. It makes the character far more realistic, and I just think it works better. Joel Grey can dance. *applauds* Well, that's just fantastic, but nothing about that dance was important in telling the story.I think it's more important to have a better actor in the role, or at least a more interesting interpretation of the role.

In fact, one thing I really like about George's performance is that his "charming" side of the Wizard very much reminds me of the Wizard in WoZ. I think it works perfectly.

And Jennifer Laura "doing" Kristin?...Kristin was doing Kristin. Jennifer is doing Glinda and she is spectacular. I always felt Kristin's choices went more for audience reaction instead of some real character development. On the other hand, Jennifer really nails the characterization and she let's that work for the audience's laughs. She doesn't go fetching them.

Re: George

I thought he was one-note. Maybe I'm missing the transformation (I've only seen him twice, third'll be on Sunday). Joel was effective, I thought, at being a Wizard who had absolutely no confidence, and absolutely no way to show it. You could see him getting hooked into being somewhat evil by the people of Oz's expectations. Sean is the showman of the group. He REALLY sells the evil.

In complete agreement with you re: JLT!

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BroadwayGirl,

Yep, I get what you're saying. But because the part is so small, we barely ever get to see him "behind closed doors". I'm not sure why they changed "Wonderful"; the new ending and two lines in the middle don't do a whole lot. If they were going to edit, I could have used a scene between the Wizard and Morrible.

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what do you mean?

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oh ok

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You were there on the 5th?? (yesterday?) cause if you were, i was too!! in Wonderful, Idina went to fix her hat and she accidently hit the microphone on it and it made a loud noise. the she tapped her hat in a weird way and gave thumbs up to the audience and was like im good, im good! and popular was hilarius! JLT made Idina laugh so hard that she fell back on the bed twice!!! also-while were on the topic

I had my head poked in the stage door before the show and Heather (idinas biggest fan) was with me and all of a sudden someone taps me on my shoulder and says "Excuse me" i turn around and its JLT and heather is like SAY SOMETHING!! so i screm I LOVE YOU! and JLT said "Aww i love you too!" and she remembered me after the show and gave me and heathers hugs and took a picture with us!

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ive seen it come back up but that was like after the music stopped and everyone was offstage. that was when i was at the dec.30th matinee. I'm not sure what you mean.

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good point angelrock

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I have not gotten to see Mr. Hearn go on for the Wizard, but I have seen Joel Grey and Sean Mcourt and I must say, I thought Sean's portrayal was much more interesting, perhaps because he played up the evil factor, as someone already pointed out. As written in the show, the Wizard isn't a well-developed character, but with Sean's portryal, I felt I could understand the reasons for his actions, more so than Joel's.

As for Kristin playing Kristin, I couldn't agree more. She was charming in her own right, but JLT has clearly made deliberate choices in how she plays G(a)linda and shows more vunerbility in the role than Kristin did, at least in my opinion.