The Untold Story of the Witches of Oz
A visual research and study guide to the world of Wicked — the long-running Broadway musical and Jon M. Chu's 2024 film adaptation. Meet the witches of Oz, walk the halls of Shiz, gaze up at the Emerald City, and read the Grimmerie.
Wicked tells the story of Elphaba Thropp, the green-skinned girl who would become the Wicked Witch of the West, and her unlikely friendship with Galinda Upland, who would become Glinda the Good. The work exists in two principal forms — each a complete artistic interpretation in its own medium.
With music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and book by Winnie Holzman, the stage musical opened in 2003 and runs as a sung-through two-act drama. Its visual language is theatrical: a single abstract set, a vocabulary of color (green for Elphaba, pink for Glinda, gold for the Emerald City), and a chorus of “Ozians” who transform scene by scene. This is the original version of the work — every song, every character, every story beat originates here.
Directed by Jon M. Chu, the film is a two-part cinematic adaptation that realises the world of Oz in full visual detail — the craggy towers of Shiz, the gleaming Art Nouveau Emerald City, the poppy fields of Munchkinland, the dark towers of Kiamo Ko. The first part (titled simply Wicked) covers the first act; the second (Wicked: For Good) completes the story. These pages reference the film as the visual reference, with its character posters and concept art serving as the source for most of the images.
Long before Dorothy drops in from Kansas, two young women meet at Shiz University in the Gillikin Country of Oz. Elphaba — born with green skin, brilliant, abrasive, and politically furious about the persecution of Oz's talking Animals — is shunned by everyone except the popular, glittering Galinda. An unlikely friendship forms. The Wizard of Oz, it turns out, is a fraud. And the “Wicked Witch” of legend is not what the world believes her to be.
“Are people born wicked, or do they have wickedness thrust upon them?”
— Glinda, Act I
Meet Elphaba and Glinda at the heart of the story, plus Fiyero, Nessarose, Boq, Doctor Dillamond, the Wizard, Madame Morrible, and the rest of the cast — each with their own motivations, allegiances, and arc.
Tour the in-universe places of Oz: Shiz University, the Emerald City, the Governor's Mansion in Munchkinland, the Impassable Desert, and Elphaba's stronghold at Kiamo Ko.
A full act-by-act breakdown of the narrative, the complete song list, and a side-by-side look at how the story unfolds on stage and on screen.