Wicked Has A Surprise Cameo For Broadway Fans
Oh, this is thrillifying.
Spoiler warning: This story contains spoilers for Wicked Part I. Wicked’s best-kept secret is a surprise cameo by Broadway legends Idina Menzel and Kristin Chenoweth. When Elphaba (played by Cynthia Erivo) and Glinda (played by Ariana Grande) arrive in the Emerald City, they’re greeted by a theatrical performance of the story of the Grimmerie, a spell book — and Menzel and Chenoweth play actors in the street production.
The cameo happens in the middle of “One Short Day,” and Menzel and Chenoweth have their own verse about the creation of magic in Oz. They each interact with the new Glinda and Elphaba toward the end of their number, too. Chenoweth embraces her Glinda roots, stepping in front of Menzel at one point and covering Grande’s mouth at another. Her faux-wand in the scene also doesn’t light up right away, and she has to hit it to get it to work. The whole set-up is pretty similar to Glinda’s struggles with her training wand during “Popular.”
Menzel also got to revisit one of her more iconic Elphaba moments, hitting the same note in the song as she does at the end of “Defying Gravity” in the original Broadway production.
Menzel and Chenoweth have been publicly supporting the Wicked film and its two new stars, Erivo and Grande. Menzel attended the Los Angeles premiere and shared photos with both iterations of Glinda and Elphaba. “@wickedmovie premiere with my sisters @kchenoweth, @cynthiaerivo and @arianagrande. The film is so loving and respectful of the original show but then builds on it in so many beautiful ways I never thought possible,” she captioned the post. “The cast is spectacular. Cynthia and Ariana will blow you away. Extremely moving and emotional for me. I love my @wicked_musical family. 💚.”
Chenoweth has also congratulated Grande and Erivo. On Oct. 29, she posted photos after attending a Wicked screening. “I’m in so much awe 🫧🧹 @wickedmovie is a gift for us all I am beyond proud of my precious angel, @arianagrande. She was born to play this role,” Chenoweth wrote. “I cried the whole night watching her & @cynthiaerivo. I love them from the bottom of my heart.”
The cameo was definitely ~popular~ with fans. “The Idina Menzel and Kristin Chenoweth cameo was perfect. I expected a blink and you miss it cameo but giving them an entire musical sequence was such a fun surprise. It was a beautiful passing of the torch moment as they stood side by side with Ariana and Cynthia,” one wrote on X, formerly called Twitter.
Another fan tweeted, “THE IDINA AND KRISTIN CAMEO OMHHH AND THEM SINGING OMYGOD IM LITERALLY GAGGING AT THE CINEMA RN.”
