Toss Toss!

To the naked (or non-fangirl) eye, Wicked is merely a hit Broadway musical with dazzling costumes, out-of-this-world sets, and catchy tunes. But to a Broadway-loving, Toss Toss-blogging, theatre-stagedooring, fantail-writing Elphie-to-be (that would be me), it is SO much more than that. Now this isn’t my typical, sappy-happy post about how Wicked has “cliche-ingly” changed me for good, but quite a technical post evaluating Wicked’s script (a.k.a. libretto or book) and score: the foreshadowing, dramatic irony, mixed meanings, and a whole bunch o’ fun stuff that only a true theatre soul would notice. So if you’d like to exclaim “OHHHHH” and the end of this adjective-injected (and hyphen-injected, apparently) post, read on my amigo, but if, alas, you want to reblog some GIF with a screaming Alli Mauzey, then please, spare us the time. ANYWHO! I noticed a few things that repeat themselves over the course of the story (clever, Winnie Holzman, cuh-leh-ver)… First of all, the line “What is it? What’s wrong?” is repeated 3x throughout the show, in which 1) Elphie’s mommy just gave birth to a green kid and everyone’s screaming like the Dickens 2) Elphaba pulls away from the passionate Fiyelphaba kiss kiss in ALAYM and 3) When Elphaba gets the a letter saying Fiyero’s “dead” and Glinda’s all like OMG ELPHIE WHAT IS IT?!. Each time, the quote takes on a new meaning. Cool! NEXT. Also repeated 3x is when two characters are hustling and proceed to point things (such as broomsticks) at one another while circling their enemy, like... 1) In Wicked Witch of the East, when Boq points a butter knife (???) at the Thropp Witches 2) In Wonderful, when the Wizard circles Elphaba with a broom and 3) Catfight Scene, baby! Wand vs. Broomstick. :-) AND I already mentioned that Glinda mentions she needs to lie down twice, but becomes more mature. Got it. So those were some Oz-servations from the mind of an analytical thinker who currently has an A- (curse that -!) in English. A-toss toss!