After “Wicked,” What Do We Want from the Musical?

Summary

Critics at Large | The New Yorker

Episode: After “Wicked,” What Do We Want from the Musical?
Date: November 27, 2025
Hosts: Vinson Cunningham, Naomi Frye, Alexandra Schwartz

---

Overview

This episode of Critics at Large delves into the cultural phenomenon of the “Wicked” film franchise and, more broadly, examines the current state and future of the musical as both a film and stage genre. Through lively, candid conversation, the hosts debate what audiences seem to want from musicals today, what defines this unique art form, and which past and present works resonate most for them. The discussion balances personal anecdotes, historical perspective, and a critical look at both the successes and pitfalls of contemporary musicals.

---

Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Setting the Stage: The Phenomenon of “Wicked”

• Wicked Part 1 was a blockbuster, winning Oscars and dominating pop culture with songs like Defying Gravity. The conversation is prompted by the release of “Wicked Part 2.”
• Hosts reflect on the enduring appeal and polarization around movie musicals, mentioning other recent adaptations like Wonka and Mean Girls.
  • “It does feel...that the musical as a form is in a bit of an unstable place.” (Alex Schwartz, 01:18)
• On Broadway, the genre is caught between nostalgia-driven jukebox musicals and IP adaptations. Original works struggle to find footing (02:00–02:45).

2. The Hosts’ Personal Relationship to Musicals

• Naomi Frye is "historically not a lover of musicals" but admits to a few exceptions (02:54–03:04).
• Vinson Cunningham confesses to a soft spot, having performed in high school productions like Little Shop of Horrors (03:08–03:37).
• Alex Schwartz has a background in musicals and shares a fond anecdote about performing in The Rocky Horror Picture Show (03:39–04:08).

3. Reviewing the “Wicked” Movie: Performances, Pacing, and Emotional Resonance

• Frye’s take:
  • Found the film “objectively, way too long” but was “pleasantly surprised” by Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo's sensitive performances.
  • Praises the film’s “gentle” heart, especially embodied in the character Dr. Dillamond, the talking goat—whose mistreatment metaphorically explores fascism in Oz (05:11–07:49).
  • “I felt a beating heart, which I was surprised about… That said, way too long. Lots of boring parts.” (Nomi Frye, 07:34–07:53)
• Cunningham’s praise:
  • Embraces the epic length and emotional maximalism, drawing parallels to The Sound of Music.
  • Highlights how the film transforms internal longing into sweeping landscapes and grand images (08:00–10:40).
  • “What Chu does so skillfully… is turn that into landscape and turn that into image… emotional topography… written on the landscape.” (Vinson Cunningham, 09:26–10:16)
• Schwartz’s criticism:
  • Found the setting (Shiz University) tedious and missed the magical escapism of Oz proper.
  • “We are all absolutely stranded at the least interesting place on earth. Hogwarts Light, Shiz University... When are they going to let me out of this horrible place?” (Alex Schwartz, 13:01)
• Despite mixed critical feelings, they note the film’s broad audience appeal (“people are loving Wicked... Team Vincent”), and dissect what accounts for its emotional impact (13:44–14:48).

4. On Performance and Subtext: Homoerotic Energy and Comic Chemistry

• The co-leads exhibit palpable chemistry, prompting Cunningham to read the Glinda–Elphaba relationship as “totally homoerotic” (15:23–16:29).
• Schwartz inserts a clip of Ben Shapiro dismissing such interpretations, which sparks a pointed reflection on modern critical and audience response (16:44–18:21).
  • “These girls are hot for each other and they don’t understand…” (Vinson Cunningham, 16:23)
• Discussion expands to why people connect so strongly to Wicked: big emotions, friendship, and the “I want” song structure.

5. Comparing “Wicked” to Other Musicals and American Cultural Context

• Frye relates Wicked to Frozen—both focus on close, emotionally charged female relationships (19:13–20:03).
• Cunningham recalls the Disney Renaissance as a golden age for musicals, emphasizing the “I want” song’s role in self-definition and catharsis for contemporary audiences (20:03–21:01).

6. What Do We Want from Musicals?

• Cunningham’s “perfect musical” is The Sound of Music, which he sees as the ultimate artform Gesamtkunstwerk, blending all the performing arts for maximal emotional impact (22:39–23:30).
  • “To make every scene, frame, moment charged with what you feel inside… That to me requires a kind of maximalism.” (Vinson Cunningham, 24:11)
• Frye values “heightened realism”—fantastical stories grounded in reality or subculture, like the movie version of Hair (24:30–25:32).
• Schwartz theorizes that musicals resonate when they let the audience imaginatively “inhabit” the world and emotions of the central characters (26:09–27:00).

7. Brief History of the American Musical (27:00–28:30)

• Early revues focused on spectacle, then shifted toward narrative with Showboat (1927) and the story-driven, character-rich shows of Rodgers & Hammerstein.
• Musicals diversified in the 1970s with darkness and complexity from Fosse and Sondheim.

8. The Modern Broadway Landscape

• Broadway is largely divided between jukebox shows (Mamma Mia!, Jersey Boys), adaptation musicals (Mean Girls), and rare breakout innovations (Hamilton), often with a fiercely passionate, young fan base (29:16–30:28).
• Schwartz positions Wicked as closer in spirit to the “power musicals” of the '80s (e.g., Andrew Lloyd Webber) than to recent bold innovations.

9. The Musical’s Evolving Sound and Role

• Cunningham and Frye agree contemporary musicals have a recognizable, perhaps limiting “musicalese”—big vocal acrobatics, R&B stylings, “slick” harmonies, echoing trends from American Idol and Christian contemporary pop (30:55–32:20).
• Frye wonders about the next evolution of the form; Cunningham highlights Michael R. Jackson’s A Strange Loop and Teeth as promisingly ambitious, “R-rated” musicals that tackle adult themes directly (32:55–34:58).

10. Looking Forward: Sweet & Sour, New Innovations

• Schwartz praises Kimberly Akimbo, an offbeat, bittersweet recent musical that balances heart and melancholy—a quality she links to the enduring legacy of Sondheim (35:07–36:08).

---

Notable Quotes and Memorable Moments

• On “Wicked’s” success and formula:

  • “It is there to cause feelings, big feelings.” (Vincent Cunningham, 18:32)

• On the “I want” song and American identity:

  • “This thing that Americans today struggle with so much, which is, like, identity formation. How do you deal with desire and how do you express it…?” (Vinson Cunningham, 20:03)

• On musical maximalism:

  • “That to me is the point of it… requires a kind of maximalism.” (Vinson Cunningham, 24:11)

• On the limits of current musical sound:

  • “There has emerged a kind of musicalese… It’s like R and B style vocals, very slick harmonization…” (Vinson Cunningham, 30:55)

• On evolving the form:

  • “There is a deeper engagement with realism… a musical that’s not only like an issue musical but is trying to be a tool of, like, a cultural vanguard.” (Vinson Cunningham, 34:35)

---

Timestamps for Key Segments

• Wicked’s Cultural Impact: 00:36–01:58
• Musicals in Crisis? 01:59–02:45
• Hosts’ Personal Histories: 02:46–04:08
• Wicked Review: Performances & Politics: 05:11–07:49
• Emotional Maximalism and Visuals: 08:00–10:40
• Plot Summary & Critiques: 10:40–13:44
• Subtext & Homoerotic Energy: 15:03–16:29
• Ben Shapiro & Culture War Reactions: 16:44–18:21
• Emotion-Centric Appeal: 18:32–19:13
• Disney, Identity, “I want” Songs: 19:13–21:01
• Dream Musicals & History: 22:39–28:30
• Modern Broadway Patterns: 28:30–30:28
• Musical “Homogenization” / “Musicalese”: 30:55–32:20
• Next-Gen Musicals, Innovations: 32:55–34:58
• Kimberly Akimbo, Sondheim’s Legacy: 35:07–36:08
• Hosts’ Go-To Shower Songs: 36:46–37:32

---

Show Tunes That Stick: The Hosts' Shower Songs

• Vincent: Wicked's “o-o-o-o-ing” (36:46)
• Nomi: “The Age of Aquarius” from Hair (37:02)
• Alex: “Good Morning Starshine” to her son (37:21)

---

Conclusion

The trio’s conversation is an entertaining, searching exploration of what musicals mean in the current landscape—where nostalgia, emotional catharsis, new storytelling forms, and spectacle jostle for dominance. Even as they differ on their affection for “Wicked,” the hosts come to agree: a great musical should allow audiences to viscerally inhabit another world, experience maximal emotion, and—ideally—leave the theater (or theater of the mind) singing.

Transcript

[Alex Schwartz]

I want the note at the end where it's like, you know, like the air note. Wow. I knew it would happen. He's defying gravity already. Oh, so exciting.

[Nomi Frye]

This is Critics at Large, a podcast from the New Yorker. I'm Nomi Frye.

[Vincent Cunningham]

I'm Vincent Cunningham.

[Alex Schwartz]

And I'm Alex Schwartz. Each week on this show, we make sense of what's happening in the culture right now, how we got here. Hello, critics.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Hi.

[Nomi Frye]

Hi.

[Alex Schwartz]

So you may or may not have heard about a little movie that opened last week. I'm of course, talking about Wicked Colon for good, Part two.

[Nomi Frye]

The Wicked Witch can't elude us forever.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Not with Prince Fierro and his squadron hot on her trail.

[Alex Schwartz]

The first installment of Wicked was a gigantic mega hit. This time last year, it made hundreds of millions of dollars at the box office. It took home Oscars for costume design and production design. Defying Gravity was on the Billboard top 100. The colors pink and green were basically ubiquitous for months. And so today we're re sharing our conversation that we had last year when Wicked Part 1 was top of mind. Wicked. We wanted to know what the audience response to this franchise tells us about the state of musicals more broadly. It does feel to me, and it felt to me then that the musical as a form is in a bit of an unstable place. We keep seeing movie musicals in addition to the Wicked franchise. There was Wonka. Do you guys remember Wonka? Of course. It's. You know, for me, it fades.

[Vincent Cunningham]

I remember at this. I did not see it exactly. Yes.

[Alex Schwartz]

There was the new Mean Girls movie. Vincent, I know you saw that in theaters.

[Vincent Cunningham]

I did.

[Nomi Frye]

I did as well. Randomly.

[Alex Schwartz]

It was not good.

[Vincent Cunningham]

It was not good.

[Nomi Frye]

Inexplicable.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah.

[Alex Schwartz]

On Broadway, of course, the original home of the American musical. We seem to be stuck a bit between jukebox musicals, which bank on audiences, nostalgia for old hits, and on the other hand, a kind of blatant IP grab in the form of adaptations of beloved movies or books that everyone reads in high school or an artist's very successful work. There are new musicals, but it's hard to get them off the ground. It's hard for them to make money, so they're getting squeezed. So that's today on critics at large. What do we want from the musical? All right, just to set expectations here. Where do each of you fall when it comes to musicals?

[Nomi Frye]

Guess.

[Alex Schwartz]

I'm gonna say that Nomi Fry is not a lover of the musical form.

[Nomi Frye]

I am. I am historically, historically not a lover of musicals. But I may surprise you today by name, checking a couple of favorites.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Okay.

[Alex Schwartz]

Okay.

[Nomi Frye]

I mean, yeah. I mean, honestly, I don't like musicals, but there are some exceptions.

[Vincent Cunningham]

I'll say that I harbor kind of a soft place in my heart for musicals. In high school, I was in a couple of them.

[Alex Schwartz]

Would you like to. Yeah, tell us.

[Nomi Frye]

Share.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Well, okay. I played the voice of the Plant in Little Shop of Horror.

[Nomi Frye]

No.

[Vincent Cunningham]

So Audrey too. That was me, Sydney Seymour in A High Window, while my friend Nick Barash was the body of the Plant doing all the Ba ba ba ba ba da.

[Nomi Frye]

Oh, wow.

[Alex Schwartz]

What a career. I am very excited to discuss musicals with you guys because I was quite into musicals as a child. And in my formative years, I was in musicals. In high school, I was in an all female production of the Rocky Horror Picture Show. In college, I played Brad. You know, I had some people really, really into Brad. I'll just say that much. I had some admirers. Anyway, the height of this. Just let it go, Naomi. Okay.

[Nomi Frye]

Okay. Maybe off mic.

[Alex Schwartz]

Off mic. We'll come back, you know. Okay, let's turn to Wicked Part 1. Okay, we're at Wicked. Wicked is directed by John M. Chu, who has directed a number of movie musicals. In the Heights, he did step up.

[Nomi Frye]

3D and also the Bieber performance movie, Never say Never.

[Alex Schwartz]

Oh, that's right.

[Vincent Cunningham]

One of the great musicals of our.

[Nomi Frye]

Time, which is actually great.

[Alex Schwartz]

Okay, this is an excellent point. So Wicked stars Ariana Grande as Galinda Glinda and Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba. I actually never saw Wicked in theaters. I don't know if you guys did.

[Vincent Cunningham]

On Broadway.

[Alex Schwartz]

On Broadway you did.

[Nomi Frye]

I did not.

[Alex Schwartz]

So Vincent did Nomi and I did not. So what did you guys think?

[Nomi Frye]

Okay, so I'm gonna start.

[Vincent Cunningham]

I should say that Nomi is in full Elphaba Green right now. I just wanna say that she came ready. She came ready to do this.

[Nomi Frye]

What if I'm wearing a witch's hat? Like, you know, that pointy hat comes.

[Vincent Cunningham]

In with a big gnarled broom? Yeah, sorry. Okay, go ahead. I'm sorry.

[Nomi Frye]

Okay. I am in two minds about this movie.

[Alex Schwartz]

Okay?

[Nomi Frye]

I was trying to come to this open and be like, what if I suddenly like it? You know, Especially since people, a lot of people I like, you know, people whose opinions I admire were like, this is amazing. You know? And obviously each person has his or her own story, own history with musicals. But I was open. I didn't love it. I can't emphasize enough how long it is. Like it was un. Real long. Like there really is, I think, even beyond putting aside my feelings about musicals. I think it's just, like, objectively, way too long. Like, like 40 minutes. Could have lopped off, like. And no, no miss. But I have to say I was pleasantly surprised, first of all, at the performances. You know, I'd never seen. I mean, I know, like, Ariana Grande's music, but I haven't seen her, like, act in anything. And also, Cynthia Erivo, I wasn't familiar with her, and I thought they both delivered pretty sensitive performances, I thought, which I was surprised about. I felt like it was kind of a gentle movie, which I liked. My favorite character was the talking goat, Dr. Dillamond, and who had, like, glasses. And there's a moment, there's the whole subplot. Oz is kind of turning fascists. You know, there's a kind of, like, fascist strain that is with, like, the animal. The talking animals kind of being targeted. And Dr. Dillemond, the talking goat professor at Shiz University at Chis. Not Shiz University, but yes, it's called Chis University, where Elphaba and Glinda are students, is the victim. One of the victims of this kind of fascism.

[Vincent Cunningham]

And.

[Nomi Frye]

And there's a part where, like, his little, like, glasses, like, fall off his, like, snout. And I was like. I literally gasped. I was like.

[Alex Schwartz]

It just seemed like she wasn't expecting that. So that just took it too far.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Those things were perched.

[Nomi Frye]

They were really perched precariously on that. Is it a snout for a goat? What?

[Alex Schwartz]

Is it a muzzle?

[Nomi Frye]

A muzzle?

[Vincent Cunningham]

I don't know.

[Nomi Frye]

I don't know. But anyway, I have to say that these touches, like, you know, obviously, it's a big movie. It's a big movie with grand gestures. But even. But within that, I felt a beating heart, which I was surprised about.

[Alex Schwartz]

Wow.

[Nomi Frye]

That said way too long. Lots of boring parts.

[Alex Schwartz]

Vincent, I want to hear what you think, because I already knowmi's given us much to think about and discuss so much. Especially the glasses.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Especially the glasses. I should say that, like, Nomi's focus on Dr. Dillamond is very much on brand this week. You just published a whole piece about the animals of the year. Mu dang, et cetera.

[Nomi Frye]

Yeah, it's true. I do love the animal world.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Monkeys.

[Alex Schwartz]

But Dr. Dean didn't make it.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Exactly. So Dillman, he came to Animal.

[Nomi Frye]

Well, I was. Yeah, I was actually closing the piece. As I was watching, I had to text my editor, Namal, and say, like, I'm sorry, I can't look at fact checking yet. I'm actually, lol at Wicked.

[Vincent Cunningham]

I'm looking at this goat. So, anyway, thank you for that. I really liked it. I really liked it. I like long movies, I like the epic. And I just thought that it captured what's good about movie musicals, which is taking the logic, the psychological logic of musical theater, which is actually we can tell a story but have no. We can explode the subtext and make all the subtext into song. Like the sort of I want song that sort of starts to define a character. What Chu does so skillfully, I think, is. And I think this accounts for the length as well. Sort of turn that into landscape and turn that into image where. So she's singing the song about, I want to meet the wizard. Oh, my God, people are finally going to, like, look at me as something else.

[Alex Schwartz]

Did that really just happen? Have I actually understood this weird quirk I've tried to suppress or hide is a talent that could help me meet the wizard?

[Vincent Cunningham]

And then, weirdly, she's like, in Chiz, as this is happening, she's in the university setting as this happens. Suddenly she goes outside and starts running around and all of a sudden she's just on the sheer edge of some cliff. I'm like, what is the geography here?

[Alex Schwartz]

Mm. It's by the White Cliffs of Dover. That's basically where it is.

[Vincent Cunningham]

But she's out on a cliff edge all of a sudden, talking about what she wants. And that, like, emotional topography is now all of a sudden written on the landscape. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Like, imprinted on all of these, like, big dramatic images. It made me think of, like, the Sound of Music, like, just, like those hillsides and all these things that just, like, so deeply echo the sort of emotional atmospherics.

[Alex Schwartz]

Well, there's. If I may just insert myself for a second here, I want to get in it. I want to tell you guys what I thought, but I also just want to set the listeners up, please. So Wicked takes place. Wicked opens with the death of the Wicked Witch of the West. Fellow Ozians, the Wicked Witch of the west is dead. We see a kind of melting hiss of a candle having just been snuffed out. And shortly thereafter, all of Oz is in great celebration. They're celebrating that the tyrant.

[Nomi Frye]

A ding gong. The Witch is dead.

[Alex Schwartz]

Yeah, a tyrant is gone. So there's a lot of singing about this. Glinda arrives. Glynda is sort of asked, weren't you friends with the Wicked Witch once? Yes. I mean, I did know her. That is, our paths did cross at school. And here we go into the Backstory. Shiz University. A truly insane name choice.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah, I don't get it.

[Alex Schwartz]

That has to be said with a straight face by everyone in this film at least 500 times. And Glinda, who at that time is called Glinda, is the popular girl who arrives at school. They have to room together, a rivalry breaks out, and through interpretive dance, at a moment of great shame and distress for Elphaba, they are brought together and end up forming an unlikely friendship and going off to Oz. Vincent.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yes.

[Alex Schwartz]

I'm so glad that you love this movie. And I'm not kidding, because so many people are loving this movie and I want to, like, deeply relate to them and yet I know that can help me.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Am I the wicked liker in the room? I love it when this happens.

[Alex Schwartz]

I really didn't like Wicked. Okay, I didn't like Wicked. And.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Wow, how not?

[Alex Schwartz]

Anyway, okay, I liked that scene. Vincent is of course singing the final beautiful notes with his gorgeous voice of defying gravity. And yes, I am. Well, one reason is that scene takes 14 minutes. And as Nomi says, this movie is too long. And I just want to say something about musicals in general, which is the show has got to work. We have to have a crest, a peak, a fall, another crest. Now we have two shows, basically, two different movies. Two different shows. And what this means is that we are all absolutely stranded at the least interesting place on earth. Hogwarts Light, Shiz University. I'm sitting at Shiz, desperate to drop out so much.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Shiz.

[Alex Schwartz]

Desperate. Just when are they going to let me out of this horrible place we're supposed to be in? Oz. The miraculous, wonderful place that most of us know from the 1939 movie the wizard of Oz. You might know it from L. Frank Baum's books. Why are we stuck at Shiz? This has to be the stupidest place in all of Oz. Those feelings notwithstanding, people are loving Wicked. They're on Team Vincent or Vincent is on Team them.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Why America? I am on your team.

[Alex Schwartz]

What a hero. That's right after the break on Critics at Large from the New Yorker. It's one of Britain's most notorious crimes, the killing of a wealthy family at White House Farm. But I got a tip that the story of this famous case might be all wrong. I know there's going to be a.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Twist one day, a massive twist.

[Alex Schwartz]

At every level of the criminal justice system, there's been a cover up in this case. I'm Heidi Blake. Blood Relatives is a new series from in the Dark and the New Yorker. Find it now in the in the Dark podcast feed. So I will just say I'm not coming out here proudly waving my hate flag. And I didn't hate it, I just found it dull.

[Nomi Frye]

You're a bit of a bad girl.

[Alex Schwartz]

I'm a bit of a bad girl. I mean, I agree with you, Nomi. I totally agree. I thought the performances were very, very good. Very strong. The singing was super strong. Ariana Grande was funny, which I appreciate.

[Nomi Frye]

She was really funny.

[Vincent Cunningham]

She's really funny.

[Nomi Frye]

She's really funny.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Such a great performance.

[Nomi Frye]

Yeah.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Her Galinda is self absorbed, kind of a mean girl, but also just kind of a Tracy flick. All of these internal contradictions which are really like. It's a really well written character and she does it really well. Erivo is just so good at singing.

[Alex Schwartz]

She's great at singing.

[Nomi Frye]

Yeah.

[Vincent Cunningham]

That I just was totally into that. So just the two of them, what they did together was not really explored in the production that I saw, which is the totally homoerotic nature of the relationship between these two women is so, so apparent in every beat of their relationship.

[Alex Schwartz]

In the musical.

[Vincent Cunningham]

No, in the movie that we all watch.

[Alex Schwartz]

In the movie.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Oh, yeah. When they're like, I'm getting this feeling when I see you I don't know what it is and then they go into the loathing.

[Alex Schwartz]

What is this feeling? So sudden and new I felt the moment I laid eyes on you My pulse is rushing My head is reeling well, my face is flouching what is this feeling? Fervid as a flame does it have a name?

[Nomi Frye]

Yes.

[Alex Schwartz]

Loathing Unadulterated loathing.

[Vincent Cunningham]

It's just a love song. These girls are hot for each other and they don't understand and.

[Nomi Frye]

Oh, interesting.

[Vincent Cunningham]

That's what it seems. I don't know. That was my reading of this movie so strongly that I was like, these. What they, they have incredible chemistry together. They are a great comedy team.

[Alex Schwartz]

I thought, okay, this is very interesting. I have to make a confession. It's a weird confession to make.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yes.

[Alex Schwartz]

Last night when I was looking around for reviews of Wicked, for some reason I ended up watching Ben Shapiro's 24 minute long review of Wicked and laughing about conservative culture commentator Ben Shapiro, with whom I agree on absolutely nothing. But I was like, oh, wow, he's just giving a straight review of it.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Was it direct to camera?

[Alex Schwartz]

Oh, of course, of course.

[Ben Shapiro]

So I know the question you're asking, am I gonna burn Barbies? Am I gonna set Wicked dolls on fire? Am I going to take some sort of bulldozer and Run it directly through a model of Oz. Who knows? Actually, here's the thing. The movie's good. The movie's actually quite good.

[Alex Schwartz]

So I just found it fascinating. I was like, oh, my God, am I gonna end up red pilled and loving Wicked? Is that what's going to happen to me if I watch Ben Shafiro talk about his own love for William?

[Nomi Frye]

Well, it's one or the other.

[Vincent Cunningham]

You come in here and you're just fucking like Laura Loomer.

[Alex Schwartz]

He really, really liked it. Yes, he really liked it. But I bring it up because this point that Vincent is making about the homoerotic energy.

[Ben Shapiro]

The most irritating and stupid thing about the press rollout for this film was Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo suggesting that there was a sexual undertone to the friendship between Glinda and Elphaba, which, by the way, defeats the entire purpose of the musical in about eight different ways. They're fighting over a boy in the musical. They're literally fighting over a boy in the musical. And the whole point is that they're friends. If there's something sexual, none of it works. I don't know when it became a thing in Hollywood that people aren't allowed to be friends. If two dudes are friends, they must be gay.

[Alex Schwartz]

Ben Shabra is like, isn't it possible for people just to go to school together anymore and just be friends? So, yeah, I just. I don't even know what to make of the fact that I dabbled in that, but I found it absolutely fascinating.

[Nomi Frye]

I love it.

[Alex Schwartz]

Yeah. I mean, I think Vinson, this is definitely getting into why people are liking Wicked. I mean, it's. Why do you guys think it's such a hit?

[Vincent Cunningham]

I just think it is. It's big emotion. It's like. It's about friendship and being misunderstood. It is definitely. I think it gives a lot. Yeah. I don't know. There are people crying to Defying Gravity in my theater. I just think it's like a very. I don't think any of the songs are true bangers. Defying Gravity is very memorable, but it's not a banger banger. But there are great emotional moments in almost every one of the songs. It is there to cause feelings, big feelings.

[Nomi Frye]

You know what it reminded me of in this sense? I think, and in the kind of like story of a relationship between two women, it kind of reminded me of Frozen. My daughter, who's now 13, was like, you know, a toddler, I guess, you know, and Frozen came out about a decade ago and I so I watched it with her, and I watched it a million times, as one does when you have a child who likes something. And I think similarly to what you were saying, Vincent, about the sort of emotionality, you know, the songs, the relationship, the strength of emotion, and the kind of, like, ability to follow the course of a relationship between two very different women.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Well, I mean, it's interesting that you mentioned Disney because, like, I feel like the height of sort of recent love of musicals is the sort of. Is the Disney run that coincided with at least my childhood. You know, Aladdin and the Lion King, these things that were so. Well, in every one of those, you know, I just can't wait to be king, et cetera, et cetera. These strong early songs of, like, I want, I want, I want this thing that I think Americans today struggle with so much, which is, like, identity formation. How do you deal with desire and how do you express it in a way that makes, I don't know, society come into accord with your wishes? It's so strong in those Disney things. And I think that's totally right. Not only the sound, but the structure of feeling as we keep on talking about this emotion thing. I think that's totally, totally right.

[Alex Schwartz]

Yeah, absolutely. The classic obstacle to the real desire and the quest of the film or of the musical being to kind of overcome the obstacle and overcome the foe to get to that desire. And of course, Wicked does make it a bit more interesting by having these two protagonists who are at cross purposes. In a minute. What do we actually want from our musicals? Critics at large from the New Yorker will be right. Back. In early 1988, federal agents raced to track down the gang they suspect of importing millions of dollars worth of heroin into New York from Asia.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Had 30 agents ready to go with shotguns and rifles, and you name it. Five, six white people pushed me in the car.

[Alex Schwartz]

I'm going, what the hell? Basically, your stay at home moms would be picking up these large amounts of heroin. Listen to the Chinatown Sting, wherever you get your podcasts. So, critics.

[Nomi Frye]

Yes.

[Alex Schwartz]

If you were a Chiz and you had a magic wand, were you a Chiz? Were you to have the honor of unrolling a Chiz and to have a.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Magic wand, our noble alma mater.

[Alex Schwartz]

Yes, yes. And you could magically make appear before you the perfect musical, what would that perfect musical be?

[Vincent Cunningham]

I think when I. When I wave my wand, or just when I close my eyes and think platonically, capital M musical, what comes into my mind is the sound of music.

[Alex Schwartz]

The hills are alive with The Sound of Music with songs they have sung for a thousand years.

[Vincent Cunningham]

It's got everything. And part of the remit of the musical is to have everything. It's gotta be what the Germans call a Gesamkunstwerk, something that contains all many of the arts within itself. You know, the dancing, the singing, the acting, all of it working together in like this unbelievable harmony. It's got great songs, it's got great dances. It's amazing.

[Alex Schwartz]

What would you say if I told you that Pauline Kael, one time long time movie review at the New Yorker called the Sound of Music the single most repressive influence on artistic freedom in movies?

[Vincent Cunningham]

Wow. I would argue with my esteemed colleague.

[Alex Schwartz]

That's it.

[Vincent Cunningham]

What was the argument?

[Alex Schwartz]

Well, it's just repressive.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Do you know how big and open and beautiful and fluid that musical is?

[Alex Schwartz]

I think it just. I think the argument was schmaltz on schmaltz, basically that this is, you know, if the singing nuns don't get you, the stomping Nazis will was basically the thought. I mean, but Vincent, you're talking about bigness, grandness, lushness.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yes, that to me is the point of it. To make every scene frame, moment charged with what you feel inside. That to me requires a kind of maximalism.

[Nomi Frye]

For me, I feel like heightened realism is kind of like a good formula. Like I'm thinking if I, you know, just. Just to sort of like reverse engineer, like thinking about musicals that I do actually like. For instance, the musical Hair, which I actually have never seen on stage, but I've watched the movie a million times.

[Alex Schwartz]

The 1979 Milos Forman movie?

[Nomi Frye]

Yes, the 1979 Milos Fohrman movie starring the, you know, recently, recently departed Treat Williams as Burger. So this is a movie about a particular moment in time. You know, the kind of like the hippie, you know, the anti Vietnam hippie movement.

[Alex Schwartz]

Any person who alters, forges, knowingly destroys, knowingly mutilates, or in any manner changes this certificate. Maybe find not to exceed $10,000 or imprisoned for not more than five years, or both.

[Nomi Frye]

But of course it's fantastical as well, right? It's like heightened to such an extent that them breaking out in songs and dancing on the table and like swinging from the chandelier and, you know, whipping their hair back and forth reads as completely. And you know, thinking about all the these musicals that I do like, it strikes me that all of them have some kind of subcultural element to them, weirdly. And I wonder if that's something that could be more Generally said about the musical form.

[Alex Schwartz]

I have a theory about your theory, Nomi.

[Nomi Frye]

Okay.

[Alex Schwartz]

I have a theory to build on top of your theory.

[Nomi Frye]

Yes, please.

[Alex Schwartz]

And here's what it is. Maybe the reason why you feel that way about the particular musicals you do is because think of what the musical actually allows us to do. The songs put you directly inside a character. And so the musicals you're describing are all worlds that you're interested in living in. And so when you walk around and you can sing the songs from here, those feelings come out through you. And that is the technology of the musical that I think is so still exciting. And it is exciting when people use it in different ways. I mean, that's why, like I had asked at the top of the show, and I want to ask this again from you guys, what we want from the musical. Like, I'm just thinking, if I may, for a minute about the history of American musicals, please. Because I think they may help us answer this question a bit. Thinking about what people want and have wanted.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah.

[Alex Schwartz]

You know, basically at the beginning of the 20th century, you had really review style musicals. You had musicals that had no plot to them, that were just about having songs transmitted a glimpse of stocking whirls.

[Nomi Frye]

Of dawn or something shocking.

[Vincent Cunningham]

But now, God, God knows, Anything Goes.

[Alex Schwartz]

It didn't matter what the, you know, what Anything Goes was about. No one really remembers. But you remember the song Anything Goes. This changes for the first time in the late twenties when the Jerome Kern and Oscar Hammerstein musical Showboat is premiered. I think it's 1927. Suddenly the musical has a story. It's a real like American issue story. It's about the American south and race and the legacy of slavery and Jim Crow and all of these things, you know, wrest with this in musical form. Yes. Like let's get serious, but sing about it. And then in 1943, you get Rodgers and Hammerstein, Oklahoma. And suddenly you have sung through musical. And this is kind of where the dam breaks for the first time. Songs really replace a large part of the dialogue. But also the songs become crucial to character, to character development, to plot development, but give you some deeper insight into what is happening. And the stories, South Pacific, the King and I, you know, these memorable people and characters to go with the songs that you sing. And later, when you get into the kind of disillusion of the ideals, the 70s, you get two of the greats, Fosse and Sondheim. You get darkness, sex, competition and real complexity.

[Nomi Frye]

Send in the Cloud.

[Vincent Cunningham]

When you now look at Broadway. Given that history, where do you think we are now?

[Alex Schwartz]

Yeah, when I look at Broadway now, you know, we got jukebox musicals, songs that music that you want to re inhabit and you want to see them, crucially, I think, performed live. That's really fun. Also, you get these adaptation musicals like Mean Girls, which started out as a movie, was made into a musical, and then was made into a musical movie. And then every so often cropping up is a really interesting independent idea. And here I got him out a little defense of Hamilton, which has been through so many pro and con cycles as a representation of the liberal American dream. We can absolutely mock it and laugh at it and criticize it, but as like a musical innovation. What I will tell you about seeing Hamilton was when I got to that theater, it was like being at a Beatles concert in 1964. The youth around me already knowing the songs and singing them.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah.

[Alex Schwartz]

Just to wait.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Alexander Hamilton.

[Alex Schwartz]

Alexander Hamilton we are waiting in the.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Winds Are you waiting in the wings.

[Alex Schwartz]

Weeping Hyped up beyond belief Something was getting transmitted.

[Nomi Frye]

Yeah, yeah.

[Alex Schwartz]

Directly, like shot into the veins of that audience that hasn't been the same since.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Yeah.

[Nomi Frye]

Where's Wicked for you in relation to this Matrix? You just.

[Alex Schwartz]

I think Wicked is a bit of a. Like. I mean, to me, Wicked kind of harkens back to the like, real power musicals of the 80s. A bit like Weber. Yeah. Like Andrew Lloyd Webber. What do you think that makes sense?

[Vincent Cunningham]

It is, but it is an example, though, musically of. And I think this also includes Hamilton kind of, to me, a strange homogenization of the songs. There is kind of. There has emerged a kind of musical ease. Not musical space, E, A, S, E, but musicalese E, S, E. This kind of very. It's hard. So it's like R and B style vocals, very slick harmonization that, like, you know. I love the musical figure that does run through Wicked, I have to say, the one that is always punctuating. They're like, boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. It's like it pulls out these weird. This, like one emotional string that unfortunately mine, whatever hard chord that is mine, is always available to be plucked in this room.

[Alex Schwartz]

Oh, I'm so happy to hear that.

[Vincent Cunningham]

I know it's not good, but I'm like, ah. But I feel it. I don't know. I feel like the sound of musicals. I can't even describe it. The only thing I can think of as a corollary is like a cheesy arena Christian contemporary music.

[Nomi Frye]

Yeah.

[Vincent Cunningham]

Musicals have a sound right now that I think is Maybe inaugurated by Wicked, I'm not sure. But it's about acrobatics in singing, maybe a little bit preferred over the storytelling function. There is a kind of. Yeah, power.

[Nomi Frye]

I mean, it kind of came out around the same time as American Idol, you know, which is kind of like a similar style, sort of feats of amazing vocal ability, you know, hitting those notes. Yeah, yeah. You guys are more obviously you were both theater critics and so you saw a lot like, is there a place where you see the musical going next? Are there any examples that you could. Recent examples you can think of that might point towards where we're going?

[Vincent Cunningham]

Well, I think that there is. And maybe this kind of goes to what we've been talking about vis a vis, on the one hand a sort of Disney fied thing, and on the other a kind of not a realism, but a deeper engagement with realism. I'm thinking about Michael R. Jackson, the musical theater artist. He did a production called A Strange Loop about a young aspiring musical theater writer who works as an usher at Lion King. So it's also very sort of like meta musical theatrical. It's very much about musicals in a certain way. Young black gay man who's sort of figuring out his life in very weirdly explicit ways. There's a scene of him, a very graphic sex scene in it and stuff like that. And he did a musical recently that I really liked actually called Teeth, adapted from the horror film of the Same Name of 2007, where it's like a young evangelical woman grows like a vagina dentata.

[Alex Schwartz]

My panties are wet but it's not blood or sweat and it's Toby's doing. He's pure and he's sweet But I still feel the heat, the heat of temptation. Cause he's so freakin hot and I.

[Nomi Frye]

Wish I did not feel desire brewing.

[Alex Schwartz]

But when desire burns, that's when shame.

[Nomi Frye]

Returns and I seek its painful salvation.

[Alex Schwartz]

I need the sting of shame in my body.

[Nomi Frye]

I need it to whip me again.

[Vincent Cunningham]

It sort of. It becomes like a revenge thriller of the vagina against these predatory men. And so I think there's some of that coming on the horizon. Like the R rated musical, the musical that's not only like an issue musical but is trying to be a tool of like a cultural vanguard or something like that.

[Nomi Frye]

It's not your grandchild, the A24 musical. It's not your grandchild's musical.

[Vincent Cunningham]

No, no, no, no, no. It's like the musical is what I'm imagining next.

[Alex Schwartz]

Yeah, yeah. I think that's A great example. I mean, first of all, I kind of want to just say, like, musicals, do what you're doing. I wouldn't want to tip the scale too strongly one way or another because I feel a little bit my heart. Not singing to Wicked really does make me feel totally out of step with the culture. Like, I'm happy for the people who love Wicked. I want them to have that. I wanna have it for me. I wish I could have gone to Shiz, you know, and left with those feelings. But a musical I did really enjoy and I saw it when it was not yet on Broadway and it did go to Broadway. It's closed now. It's called Kimberly Akimbo. It's about a 16 year old girl who has a genetic condition that makes her age super rapidly. So in the musical she's actually played by a woman in her 60s because that's how she appears. But she is a teenager and she has problems with her family and she has a crush at school and she has all kinds of, you know, it's.

[Nomi Frye]

Like Jerry Blank, the Musical.

[Alex Schwartz]

Yeah.

[Vincent Cunningham]

So like, you get it.

[Alex Schwartz]

Yeah. So there was just something about the kind of mix of sweet and sour that I think can work really well for a musical. And that Sondheim did better than anyone. And that's why we are always talking about Sondheim. That sweet and sour element. The heart soaring and at the same, you know, maybe five minutes later, sinking it did it in a lower key way and I appreciated that. Last question, guys. Ooh, a show tune that you sing in the shower. Where do you go, Vincent? Are you just belting out at Wicked at all times? Are you defying gravity between yesterday and yesterday?

[Vincent Cunningham]

I will admit I've been o o o o ing a lot. I've been doing a lot of o o o o o.

[Nomi Frye]

For me, it would probably be something from here.

[Alex Schwartz]

I don't want to finish any. Do you wanna give us any notes?

[Nomi Frye]

This is the dawning of the Age of Aquarius. The Age of Aquarius.

[Alex Schwartz]

Glorious.

[Nomi Frye]

My eyes are closed, by the way.

[Alex Schwartz]

Listeners, they were so brilliant.

[Vincent Cunningham]

They were screwed shut.

[Alex Schwartz]

You know, I like singing Good morning starshine to my young son.

[Nomi Frye]

Good morning starshine.

[Alex Schwartz]

And then you get to just be like dooby dooby da da gleeby glabba.

[Nomi Frye]

Dabba gliby gliby glibby glob gluby globy.

[Alex Schwartz]

Exactly.

[Nomi Frye]

Saba sibi saba Newbie.

[Alex Schwartz]

This has been Critics at Large. Our senior producer is Rhiannon Corby and Alex Barish is our consulting editor. Our executive producer is Steven Valentino. Alexis Quadrato composed our theme music and we had engineering help today from James Yost with mixing by Mike Kutchman. You can find every episode of Critics at [e-mail] Critics. Famous Amos It's a brand synonymous with chocolate chip cookies. It's also the creation of my dad, Wally Amos.

[Nomi Frye]

When he passed away last year, I.

[Alex Schwartz]

Set out to understand how he became.

[Nomi Frye]

One of the most famous Black men in America and how his his life and our family unraveled.

[Alex Schwartz]

From Vanity Fair, this is Tough Cookie the Wally Famous Amos Story, available wherever you get your podcasts.

[Nomi Frye]

From PRX.