If it wasn’t apparent by the $114 million opening weekend “Wicked” had at the box office last November, the Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande-led musical has garnered one of the most loyal fanbases in recent film history. It was that fandom, most of which already have their tickets booked for when “Wicked: For Good” hits theaters later this month, that NBCUniversal hoped to both reward and leverage with “Wicked: One Wonderful Night.”
The two-hour musical special, which airs Nov. 6 on NBC and streams on Peacock the next day, features the franchise’s main cast performing favorites from the first film, some of which were performed live for the first time, as well as some sneak peeks for the followup “For Good” film, to a fan-packed studio audience in Hollywood’s Dolby Theatre. Debuting just weeks before the franchise concludes its two parts, “One Wonderful Night” was crafted to celebrate the joy of the films and bring the fandom before the epic comes to a close, according to NBCUniversal EVP of live events and specials Jen Neal.
“We wanted to do something that audiences and fans hadn’t seen before that would get them engaged and remind them of the fandom and love for the ‘Wicked’ franchise,” Neal told TheWrap. “That fandom is so unmatched, and we wanted to make sure that we were creating this special that delivers everything those fans want.”
With that, fans were at the center of the evening, with fans featured in special video compilations, and in the audience, included in choreography for the opening “No One Mourns the Wicked.” One lucky fan even joined Grande on stage for her rendition of “Popular” in a particularly heartwarming performance. “You always want to reward those fans and provide them with things that get them engaged and excited,” Neal said.
Neal cites “One Wonderful Night” as the brainchild of longtime film chief Donna Langley, TV head Pearlena Igbokwe and marketing head Michael Moses, who saw the special not only as a way to unite the fandom, but also to flex NBCUniversal’s live events division, support for its theatrical releases and ability to deliver what Neal sees as “cultural moments.”
Crafting these moments came with a fair amount of pressure for director Paul Dugdale, who likened the attention to the special to his previous documentary on the Glastonbury festival. “It has this extreme fandom, a lot of passion from fans of it and of all the cast, of course, so you just want to make sure that you are able to translate these performances really well to screen and do it justice,” Dugdale said, noting the enormous scale of the Dolby matched the star power in the room.
While the special was initially only announced to include its leading ladies with the promise of some special guests, “One Wonderful Night” quickly wowed its audience by bringing out nearly all of its main cast, including Marissa Bode, Bowen Yang, Ethan Slater, Michelle Yeoh and Jeff Goldblum. Getting the whole crew together, while likely a logistical feat, was an easy commitment for the cast, who Neal said loved being back to engage with fans. “That franchise understands the importance of fans, and they really value that tremendously, and feel that is an honor to be able to do that,” Neal said.
Jonathan Bailey, however, could not make it to the special for a reason undisclosed by Neal nor Dugdale, but they noted he is still present in the special in other segments beyond the performance component. “He was missed, of course, in the room, but he has a good presence in the special,” Dugdale said, noting that his absence “allowed us some opportunity, let’s say, to seek out other ways of covering his tracks,” pointing to Yang and Slater fighting over who got to fill in as Fiyero in “Dancing Through Life.”
In instances like “Dancing Through Life,” the supporting cast got their chance to shine, including Yeoh, who performed particularly complex choreography during “What Is This Feeling?” “She was fantastic — I was at that rehearsals when she was doing that, and it’s a complex routine that she had to learn for that,” Dugdale said. “Everyone gets just such an incredible hero moment across the board.”
The special included several sneak peaks of new songs from “For Good,” whose performances were more exploratory than established hits like “Defying Gravity” or “The Wizard and I,” with Dugdale describing the new tracks as “future classics.”
“There is an interesting difference between the two … there are songs that you know are huge hits, and songs that you know are going to be huge hits,” he said, adding that he’s had a similar feeling when being invited into album playbacks of artists without having previously listened to the new tracks. “It’s sort of a weird feeling, hearing that music for the first time, before there’s been any fanfare, most of the time, even before the press have heard it, and knowing that this music is about to be enormous, and people are going to be humming it, and it’s going to be an earworm for millions of people around the world.”
The most-anticipated song of the second movie, “For Good,” was not taped at the Dolby Theatre, but instead at New York’s Gershwin Theatre, and we’re sure there’s some surprises in store there, though Dugdale remained tight-lipped on any details.
The special closed out with Erivo and Grande performing a beautiful medley of “Get Happy” and “Happy Days Are Here Again” in a nod to the duet performed by Judy Garland and Barbra Streisand on “The Judy Garland Show” in 1963.
“It’s just the two-shot, and you just see their chemistry, and so much of our coverage was an ode to that,” Dugdale said. “It’s just boiled down to this beautiful chemistry between those two actors. It was just a beautiful, simplistic moment. Sometimes when you’re filming those sort of things, you become to have the confidence to not do a million cuts and try and do all these really elaborate camera moves or whatever, to just see them performing. It is the best way to serve that song and that moment on the emotion.”
“It’s a real nice, warm hug to leave the special with. I couldn’t imagine a more suitable end [or] goodbye than that,” he said.
“Wicked: One Wonderful Night” premieres Thursday, Nov. 6 at 8 p.m. ET/PT on NBC and begins streaming on Peacock starting Nov. 7.
