- 3 months ago
In this episode of Billboard On The Record, director Jon M. Chu and music editor Jack Dolman join host Kristin Robinson to talk about bringing the iconic musical 'Wicked' to the big screen. They dive into the process of adapting a beloved story, from working closely with Stephen Schwartz to deciding how to split the film into two parts. Chu and Dolman share behind-the-scenes insights on live performances by Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo, balancing music and acting and maintaining the integrity of every song. They discuss the challenges of transitioning from dialogue to song, collaborating with the cast and crew and making sure each moment feels timeless. Along the way, they reveal their favorite musical moments, their philosophy on storytelling through music and are faced with the ultimate question… pink or green?
Love what you hear? Follow Billboard On The Record on Instagram, Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Youtube @billboard so you never miss an episode.
Billboard On The Record is a podcast in partnership with SickBird Productions.
Host:
Kristin Robinson
Executive Producers:
Diona DaCosta
Hannah Karp
Jade Watson
Produced By:
Kayla Forman
Mateo Vergara
Edited By:
Rachel Derbyshire
Love what you hear? Follow Billboard On The Record on Instagram, Apple Podcasts, Spotify and Youtube @billboard so you never miss an episode.
Billboard On The Record is a podcast in partnership with SickBird Productions.
Host:
Kristin Robinson
Executive Producers:
Diona DaCosta
Hannah Karp
Jade Watson
Produced By:
Kayla Forman
Mateo Vergara
Edited By:
Rachel Derbyshire
Category
🎵
MusicTranscript
00:00:00Wicked. It's one of the most successful Broadway musicals of all time, featuring beloved songs
00:00:05like Defying Gravity, Popular, and For Good. In 2024, after many years of development,
00:00:11director John M. Chu turned this musical into a blockbuster film starring Ariana Grande and
00:00:16Cynthia Erivo, reviving the story of Oz once again for a new generation of fans.
00:00:22Now that it's 2025, it's time for John Chu to do it again in the second installment of his
00:00:26film adaptation, which is called Wicked for Good. Today, we are going to talk to the director
00:00:31himself, John M. Chu, and the supervising music editor, Jack Dolman, about how they transform
00:00:36the iconic songs of Wicked for the big screen. Welcome back to On the Record, a music industry
00:00:47podcast from Billboard and Sick Bird Productions. As always, I'm your host, Kristen Robinson,
00:00:52and we have a very special episode today. The second part of the Wicked story will debut
00:00:56later this month on November 21st, featuring all the same characters who came to love in Park 1,
00:01:02but this movie will feature two new songs, Girl in the Bubble and No Place Like Home,
00:01:07which were not included in the stage production. These additions point to the challenges and
00:01:12opportunities that the big screen poses to any musical adaptation, especially one like this,
00:01:17where the source material has been bisected into two separate films. These new songs help fill out
00:01:22the second half of the Wicked story in which the tale of Elphaba and Glenda finally catches up with
00:01:28Dorothy and the Wizard of Oz. Another fascinating part of this whole thing to me is that John, Jack,
00:01:33and the whole Wicked crew are not just adapting the song and the story from the beloved musical,
00:01:38they're also rubbing up against that MGM classic film, Wizard of Oz. And also don't forget that
00:01:44there's an even deeper layer here because Wicked and Wizard of Oz are both adaptations of books.
00:01:49So it's all pretty mind-blowing. It's an adaptation of an adaptation that kind of comes along with
00:01:56another adaptation, but if there's anyone that can be up to this task to direct such a thing,
00:02:02it would be John. He has lots of experience directing music and dance-focused films, providing
00:02:07him with the perfect resume to take this on. Previous to Wicked, John directed the adaptation of
00:02:12In the Heights. He also worked on multiple films in the Step Up franchise, and believe it or not,
00:02:18he directed Justin Bieber's concert film, Never Say Never, which did some crazy numbers in my middle
00:02:23school. And of course, he also directed the hit film Crazy Rich Asians. Jack Dolman is a seasoned
00:02:29film pro in his own right, working as the music editor on films like Kingsman, Solo, A Star Wars Story,
00:02:35and multiple Captain America films. But anyways, that's enough for me. Let's bring in our guests
00:02:40this week, Jack Dolman and John M. Chu from Wicked. Jack Dolman and John M. Chu, welcome to On The Record.
00:02:48Thanks so much for being here. So cool to be here. It's great to be here. Thanks for having us.
00:02:52On The Record, we often talk to music executives in different areas in the music business, whether
00:02:56they're from a record label or they're from an agency. But we have not yet touched on the idea
00:03:03of music being used in film or music being used on the stage and what an important part of the
00:03:08industry that is. So I feel like Wicked is kind of the perfect vehicle to talk about both. So I'm excited.
00:03:14Yeah, I think you picked the right film. It's really exciting to be able to talk about sort
00:03:18of the inner workings of how we put the music together for Wicked and to have John here with
00:03:23us to help explain the entire process and how exciting it was to put this incredible saga
00:03:31together. It's just really fun and exciting.
00:03:33Yeah. So I want to start off with just a fun question. I want to hear if you guys have a
00:03:37personal favorite song from Wicked, whether it's the first one or the second one. John,
00:03:43do you have a favorite? Oh, you're going to get us in trouble, you see, because these
00:03:45girls are listening to this. And no, listen, I mean, Defying Gravity is the quintessential
00:03:53Wicked song. But ultimately, for me personally, it is for good that I go to for the last 20
00:04:01years. And I was most excited about it in terms of the movie really developing. How does a song
00:04:08that we've heard over and over again, covered by everybody on YouTube, done on stage many
00:04:13different times by many different people? How do you do that in a way so that it's as if it's the
00:04:18first time we're hearing it? And so that was really fun to basically develop two movies to get to
00:04:23this song and deliver it in a new way.
00:04:27Yeah. Jack, what about you?
00:04:29I mean, it's hard to argue with for good. It's such an emotional payoff, as John said,
00:04:35and you're building to it in so many ways. I'm going to do a little wild card here, which is
00:04:40No Good Deed, which is one of the big, powerful songs in movie two that everyone will will see
00:04:48is such a tour de force. And I remember listening to that song 10 years ago, 15 years ago, and just
00:04:57being awestruck by the actual mechanics of that song, the chord progression, how complex it is.
00:05:02And yet, in the face of how complex it is, it's still emotionally so satisfying, and it pays off
00:05:08so well. And Stephen Schwartz is just such a genius. And I think it really shows in that song.
00:05:12Yeah, Stephen Schwartz is amazing. I mean, you look at all the songs couldn't be happier, which is
00:05:16basically an anti I want song. And how that works in the context of the movie, or what is this feeling
00:05:24or so popular? I mean, there's so many, no one mourns the wicked, that theme in itself has so much drama
00:05:31and epicness, and melancholy. It's just, it's so all of it is storytelling.
00:05:39Yeah. And john, one of the most interesting things I've heard you talk about in previous interviews,
00:05:44is that when you were brought on to direct these two films, you sat down with Stephen Schwartz,
00:05:50and also, who was it? It was Mark Platt, Wendy Holtzman, and y'all went over why every single
00:05:57detail was included in the stage production, every line, every song. And I'm wondering what
00:06:03some of your biggest takeaways were from that meeting. And also, how did you work with that
00:06:09original crew to help expand the wicked universe into a film adaptation? Yeah, I mean, when I first
00:06:16got in here, I was already a fan, I had seen wicked before it was ever on Broadway, when they were
00:06:21workshopping it in San Francisco at the current theater. So I came in cold 20 something years ago, I had
00:06:28no preconceived ideas other than this was a new Stephen Schwartz musical, which I loved, I grew up on
00:06:34musicals, we go to musicals every weekend, it was a part of my life. So just to witness what
00:06:39his new work was, was a real pleasure and honor. So when I first joined this, even though I'd been
00:06:46chasing it for 20 years, and no one would ever call me back, when they finally came to me with this, I
00:06:50was like, I need to get into Stephen Schwartz and Winnie's head. So I'm, I could impose a lot of things, I
00:06:57have a lot of ideas, but I need to know what their true intention was with everything. And I need to
00:07:02know all what they've cut, what they've done, and why they did certain things. And I had certain
00:07:07questions on certain lyrics that I wanted to understand better. And so, like, I didn't know
00:07:12what a hoi ploi was, and things like that. So we sat down and for about several months, every day,
00:07:19for several hours a day, it was like a just a job that we would sit on zoom, this was during the
00:07:25COVID lockdown, so we couldn't go anywhere anyway. And we would go through every line. And it was a
00:07:31fascinating thing to hear, okay, we had to add this song, because at this point in the in a musical
00:07:36on stage, you need some rip roaring something. Or this song was really because we had to cut the
00:07:43song because our our the show was already too long. Or you know what, no one mourns the wicked,
00:07:49it was always meant to have this darker feel. But at the same time, it was a celebration. If you look
00:07:54at the reality of, of the munchkins celebrating. And yet it always came across as a little too dark
00:08:01on stage. So how can we can we do that? Can you help that? So these things were really great hints
00:08:06for me. And it also allowed me to just sort of pin moments and ask them questions about moments I knew
00:08:12I was probably going to come back to, but to absorb it all allowed me to be a passenger with them. So by
00:08:18the time we actually started digging in, they trusted that I knew where things were and how things
00:08:24were. So we didn't have to have that debate every time I wanted to move something or question
00:08:28something. Yeah, so when you decided to add in two new songs to this second part of the story of
00:08:34wicked, how did you work with that original crew to make sure that it felt like it still fit with
00:08:40their original intent of the musical? The original crew really being Stephen Schwartz and Winnie,
00:08:45plus Stephen or Remus. Those were the sort of core mute if you're talking about just the music side of
00:08:52that. And then I wanted to bring in someone to do the score, a composer to do the score,
00:08:57which could work, who could work with Stephen Schwartz. And so I brought in John Powell and that
00:09:04person, John Powell, who's an amazing, accomplished composer, of course, he had to have no ego because
00:09:12there are themes and things that are already written. And he had to be able to work with Stephen Schwartz
00:09:17and tried some of those themes in different ways. And credit to Stephen Schwartz, he also had to have
00:09:22such an open mind and not be precious about what he wrote and be open to new themes that maybe nod at
00:09:30it, but at the same time can give us some more. Because I knew by splitting the movie into two,
00:09:36one, that was a big decision, but we needed the room. Otherwise, too many songs would be cut in a one
00:09:42movie version and it wouldn't be wicked to me. And I knew this was the first time Wicked was going to
00:09:46be crystallized forever. And so I really wanted to be true to the musical. It is what I fell in love
00:09:52with. So I felt the duty to make sure it was Wicked in whatever form. And so splitting it into two,
00:09:58then you got into more questions in the second act, because that's where I wanted to get closer to these
00:10:05girls, not just be about Dorothy dropping in and the plot moving. I wanted to understand once they made the
00:10:11choice to go different ways at the end of movie one in Defying Gravity, how hard those consequences
00:10:18really are. And there was no room yet, or there's no scene yet of Elphaba, us understanding, getting
00:10:25closer to Elphaba about how it feels, how lonely it is to be courageous and make a choice.
00:10:32The questioning of why defend a home. And the same thing goes with Glinda, that how to watch her break
00:10:39and decide to pop her bubble. That was going to be such a long journey for her. We never get to see
00:10:46the moment. And so it was either going to be a scene or a song for those two moments. And of course,
00:10:51Schwartz is like, it's a song. I know what it is. Give me 48 hours. And he started sending me voice
00:10:57memos, which is a real fun thing to get in the middle of the day. I can't imagine getting a voice
00:11:02memo from Steven Schwartz. It's pretty epic. It's pretty epic. And he's playing on the piano,
00:11:09singing himself. I mean, and he's totally open. That's the thing about Steven that I don't think
00:11:14people know. Like, he is a great storyteller, not just writing music and lyrics, which are always
00:11:21fantastic. But he prioritizes storytelling and character before anything else. He doesn't care
00:11:29about the notes. If I'm telling him something, it's not about necessarily the melody for him.
00:11:36It's about, is this telling the story, the feeling that you need for this story? And I love that about
00:11:41him. He is still, even though he's the master, he is still a student of storytelling. And that's been
00:11:48really fun to mold with him. Incredible, incredible. And Jack, I want to kind of get to what your role is
00:11:56in all of this. I imagine you worked very closely alongside these two composers as a music editor.
00:12:01So can you tell me about, for those who are just not aware of what a music editor's job entails,
00:12:06what that looks like and how big your crew was? Yeah, thank you for the opportunity to talk about
00:12:11it. Because I think it's a role that perhaps not a lot of people are aware of or understand. And,
00:12:19you know, the music editor essentially is the person who figures out where music should go in a film,
00:12:25and what role it should play. I guess that's the sort of most broad abstract definition.
00:12:31That's a big job.
00:12:32Well, yeah. And I don't want to oversell it either, but that's kind of like the broadest way I can put
00:12:37it. But then when you get into the minutia of it, you know, with something like Wicked,
00:12:41you're dealing with so many different types of musical content. You're dealing with pre-recorded
00:12:48material that's played back on set. You're dealing with vocals that are recorded on set.
00:12:54You're dealing with temp music, which is used to help build the score before the composers get on
00:13:00board to sort of make the footage start working along aligning with John's vision. Then you get
00:13:07into the actual recorded music, composed music from the two composers in this case. So you're dealing
00:13:13with so many different moving parts, and the music editor really has to be responsible for making sure it's
00:13:18all working together in lockstep with the cut with the with the editor and what's going on in the
00:13:24cutting room. So on something like Wicked, it was very complex. We had a crew of three music editors.
00:13:32I worked with my incredible colleague, Katherine Wilson, and we had a vocal editor and vocal producer
00:13:37in the UK named Robin Bainton who helped with all of the the vocals and making sure that they were all
00:13:43kind of working together with dialogue and making sure that those transitions were seamless. So yeah,
00:13:50I guess the the easiest way to answer it is just to make sure that everything is working together
00:13:56in a way that aligns with the director's vision and the composer's visions at any given moment in the process.
00:14:02Wow, that's a lot. And I know that it's been said before that throughout the filming of Wicked,
00:14:07Cynthia and Ariana were singing live, but what's the mix between singing live versus maybe doing
00:14:13some pickups in the recording studio later to fill things out? I mean, there's very little of that kind
00:14:19of pickup material at all. I mean, we it was like being in a candy store all the time. I mean, you have
00:14:24these vocals and you have alternate visual takes and John can speak to this. The alternate visual takes are going
00:14:31to be chosen for performance, performance reasons for emotional reasons, but each one has these
00:14:36incredible vocals. And so how do you even begin to choose? I mean, working with with people singers at
00:14:43the caliber of Cynthia and Ariana is something that I don't know if I'll ever have the chance to be able
00:14:49to do again. And it just meant that you had this embarrassment of riches and that you could you could swap out
00:14:56one live syllable of a vowel in one word with another one. And it would it would embolden the
00:15:03character in that moment. Or you could swap out a consonant or swap out a line with a different live
00:15:08take. But it was all there from what we recorded on set. And it was just incredible to be able to work
00:15:14with that. Wow. Yeah. And John, I'm curious for you as you're trying to edit the film and create that final
00:15:19product for Wicked for Good. How did you make decisions based on the fact that maybe one vocal performance might be
00:15:25your favorite, but also maybe the shot was better in a different take? Tell me about that. Yeah, that was
00:15:31always that was always a give and take a little bit. You know, we have to go by when we get our
00:15:38dailies, it's attached to the live vocals. So we are going through the takes that actually happened. I also
00:15:44like to be reminded because it could be a combination of what it sounds like and what it looks like.
00:15:49Oftentimes it is. And so I'm looking at this sort of true version of it. And also the girls are doing
00:15:57things specifically because they are so good with their when you have the best singers in the world
00:16:01that have such control. You know, when you're on set, I'm not thinking wait, are they are they a
00:16:06little sharp or a little flat? Or are they on tempo or not? Like they're always on. And so it was great
00:16:12and freeing to let them be live. Something that we didn't necessarily expect in the beginning. I didn't
00:16:17know how much they wanted to. I hadn't worked with them before. But every time they did it live,
00:16:22they could go a little bit off tempo. We had a pianist every day there ready to play if that's
00:16:28how we were going to go. And we just did it every day. And it just it just became our sort of regular
00:16:34mode. But if you look at in terms of everything, you know, we're talking about all these different
00:16:40pieces. I think we all had to agree on how what our philosophy is on a musical movie,
00:16:47because I think anyone taking on a musical movie can do it in different ways. Some people
00:16:51want to have such clean tracks, no, no footsteps, no door closing, like, I just want to feel like
00:16:57it's an album when you go into songs. And that's just not my philosophy. That's not why I love music
00:17:02or musicals or movement. So to me, it was like, how do you make it feel like it is emerging from
00:17:10the character just as naturally as dialogue. So yes, it might be a little bit messier, you might hear
00:17:16the chair move. And yes, we have to decide like how loud that chair is. Is it on beat? Is it off? Is
00:17:22it okay that it's offbeat? And but that's all part of the fabric of what we're doing. And that's separate
00:17:28from the actual orchestrations of it, because we only have temp orchestrations when we go into this,
00:17:34because we know we're going to have a full orchestra later, we're going to build it out.
00:17:38What's that tone, we wanted to feel timeless and classic, we wanted this to be the definitive
00:17:44wicked track. And so we knew that we couldn't, we didn't want to pop it up hip, you know, make it all
00:17:50hip hop or something like that. We wanted to feel as if this movie musical was on your shelf all these
00:17:56years, and you never pulled it down. And we got to watch it. And it still holds up. That was the
00:18:01main thing. And then you add the score onto that. And you're like, Okay, the score, it's different.
00:18:06It's a different type of movie, because music takes up space, energy space in your in your in your movie,
00:18:12in your story. And so a score can't do what it usually does in a movie where it just like drives you
00:18:17through or bring it has to actually deliver you to the song. And each song is different of how it needs
00:18:23to be delivered. If you have, and we've done these versions where score was going 110%, music's going
00:18:30110%, sound effects, Foley's going 110%. And you're suddenly like overwhelmed. And we all have to,
00:18:39because we all agree, like, yes, we want this to feel real and raw. We have to then be careful with
00:18:44how we hold the hand of the audience into this. And every time we would question how much score,
00:18:52is it just a is it just a sustain that gets us in? Or do you have nothing? And when do you let the
00:18:59actor lead us into the song? And when does the song have an intro? So all of these were things that we
00:19:04were constantly always debating. This is why Jack is so important in the process, because he is the
00:19:09center, the thread between John Powell and Stephen Schwartz and the Steve and the music team, we are all
00:19:16working in concert. And Jack is the one who's actually in the edit room with us. So we're like,
00:19:22hey, here's what we're thinking. And then he goes and plays, or we don't know how to do this, go play,
00:19:28show us some options of how you think. And then he's, he's working with the music team and the composing
00:19:33team to, to piece the things together, at least even if it's just temp to get us what we think the
00:19:39movie is before we ever actually get everybody on and start to orchestrate and put these things
00:19:44together, because it's a massive deal once you start that. So it's an always ebb and flow between
00:19:50us. Wow. And so when you're on set, and you're filming these actors, are you hearing any music
00:19:58at all? Or are you just hearing their voices while they're listening, like with an in-ear piece?
00:20:03I'm, I'm hearing whatever I want to hear. Like I'll hear the piano, I usually hear the piano
00:20:09and their voice. Or if we have a track, I'll hear the track. Or if I just want to,
00:20:14or if we just have a thump track or something, you do a thump track on the, sometimes I want to feel,
00:20:19and I think the singers, the actors, they all get energy from hearing everything. And so,
00:20:27but in order to record it, Simon Hayes, our sort of production, production recorder,
00:20:34he had to make sure that everything we recorded could be used in the movie. Otherwise,
00:20:38what are we going to, what are we doing? And then we'd have to bring them in,
00:20:41re-record it. And that just took the spirit out of what we wanted to do. So it was his job to really
00:20:46protect that sound space. And for me, I needed to know how I was feeling, but I would mostly hear
00:20:53them. And I would have a track or a thump track that we could play out loud so that,
00:20:57you know, the crowd, our sort of background players could hear it. Or if we had a choir of
00:21:05singers there, they could all be involved together. And that would create an energy. If everyone was
00:21:10isolated, it would just, you wouldn't get the energy. And we've done that. We've done it like,
00:21:14let's do a pass where you can't hear everybody. So we can get really clean stuff. And then let's like,
00:21:19let it rip. Just everybody can sing over each other and whatever and cheer. And that is almost always,
00:21:25I would say 90% of the time that is the take, because you can't just, you can't help but be
00:21:32swept up in the energy in a room and it feels more natural.
00:21:36Yeah. Oh my God. There's so many things I want to dovetail on. I'm so excited to talk
00:21:40about all of this. I mean, one of the things that John said just then was, you know,
00:21:44capturing the live performance and what that means to the character. I mean, you have to remember,
00:21:50like, if you're, when you're watching a musical, you ask yourself the question,
00:21:53why does a character sing? Why does a character decide to sing in this moment?
00:21:57I guess the fundamental principle is a song in a musical should only exist if it's furthering
00:22:04an element of the story, or more importantly, an element of the, of the emotional arc of the
00:22:10character, the stakes of the character. And so when someone decides to sing in Wicked,
00:22:15it really needs to feel like this inevitable extension of, of their character in that moment.
00:22:20And so the transition from dialogue to singing is crucially important to make it feel as natural
00:22:26and emotionally compelling as possible. And, you know, John mentioned the on-set pianist,
00:22:35accompanist. And, you know, a lot of the times the singers would decide to sing with just a pure
00:22:42piano accompaniment without any sort of predetermined click track or reference to tempo.
00:22:47And that was for the simple reason that if you're singing naturally and letting the piano player
00:22:52accompany that natural performance, it's going to feel more of that kind of natural extension that I
00:22:57was talking about. And so that always gives us a big challenge in the cutting room, which is if we
00:23:02want to use that particular take, it's going to be different from the previous take. It's going to have
00:23:08a completely different tempo structure than the previous take, because it's just what the singer was
00:23:13feeling in that moment. And so when we torture Jack with this, by the way, he would always be like,
00:23:18well, okay, if I have to make that sound clear, then I'm stuck on this one track in this because
00:23:23it's the only time. And then we would go back and forth because the next cut would be on tempo in
00:23:27something else. And so, or a different time, if we, if we cut to Ariana twice and she's on two
00:23:32different live takes, then he has to make that work.
00:23:35Yeah, a hundred percent. And obviously John and our incredible editor, Myron Kirstein are thinking,
00:23:44I don't want to speak for John, but I'm guessing they're thinking 95% in terms of performance
00:23:49and emotion. And they're not thinking about, is this going to be doable musically as a first
00:23:58instinct? That's going to be an inevitable question to ask. But so part of the role of the music editor is
00:24:03to say, okay, now we have these two different takes that have been put together. And how do
00:24:07we maintain the musical integrity of the moment? And so you're clicking out, when I say clicking out,
00:24:13you're putting together a tempo map that encompasses all of these different live performances.
00:24:17And then you're having to sort of back into the orchestration and the instrumentation and making it
00:24:22all work later on. But it all stems from that idea, which is making sure that the decision to sing
00:24:29is as natural and inevitable and important and personal and internal to the character as possible.
00:24:37My favorite comment of when people watch the movie is, oh, I didn't even feel like it was a musical.
00:24:42That to me is like all the hours and days of work that we refine each immersion of song.
00:24:50That was what we were doing. And it pays off when people say that, you know, some people think that
00:24:55a musical, when they go into a musical, they're like, oh, I'm going to make it. It's song and dance
00:24:59and razzle dazzle. So that's a song starts and we razzle them. It's like from the outside in.
00:25:05And actually the power of a musical, the best musicals that I am drawn to or have moved me or
00:25:10stayed with me are the ones that it's actually not about being bigger. It's about being deeper.
00:25:15And the entry point is from the inside. And that's what we always were striving and struggling to do
00:25:22together. I've seen lots of movie musicals. Some are better than others, you know, and I honestly,
00:25:29I think a lot of it for me comes back to how good are the singers? Oftentimes you'll see people cast
00:25:34actors who are just maybe not prepared to take on the role vocally. But obviously, Cynthia Erivo and
00:25:39Ariana Grande can absolutely do these roles. I'm wondering for you guys, I'm sure you all have seen
00:25:46lots of movie musicals yourselves. What are some common pitfalls that you find when you're watching
00:25:51a movie musical? And how did you try to avoid it? I guess I'll start with John and then I'll throw
00:25:54it to you, Jack. Yeah, the one that I find is that when you can tell when someone doesn't love
00:26:03musicals, doesn't love, doesn't appreciate or understand the power of music, or doesn't understand
00:26:10the power of lyrics, or doesn't understand the power that they have in their hand when you're doing a
00:26:15musical with movement. I think all three of those things are what a musical movie can do that no other
00:26:23movie is allowed to do. The audience has given you permission to have more access to them than just
00:26:30dialogue and score. And to me, that is extremely powerful permission that you can go into Glinda's
00:26:40head when she's singing performatively couldn't be happier. And yet, even the way we mix the music,
00:26:49that the crowds clear out, and that she almost feels like for the first time in the whole movie,
00:26:55because everything's so raw, that you don't hear any of the crowd, that it almost feels like there's a
00:27:01spotlight on her. And, and that we're playing with when the mic, when you hear her from the microphone
00:27:07speaking out publicly, and we're slowly easing that down. So that then when she's speaking more
00:27:13privately to herself, you don't hear the echo of the mic, we are doing that so imperceptibly,
00:27:19that it is, we are deciding when and how and I'm not, and Ari doesn't know, because we're not doing
00:27:26that there, we're doing this in post. And so there is this thread, emotional thread that I,
00:27:31and we all have to understand what we're trying to say with music, in every frame, and it's not just
00:27:38how you shoot it, it's not just how you edit it, it's how you finish the day, that you actually even
00:27:44mix it in the way. I have never seen a number like For Good, which I witnessed here, maybe just a few
00:27:52weeks ago, go up 10 levels, just because of the mix. It became more, I mean, it was a beautiful song before,
00:28:00but there's something about the mix, and I'm not even quite sure what the secret sauce was,
00:28:05but they made it so, and it's not just raw, like, just throw it in raw, it's like,
00:28:11that when the wind comes in, when you hear their footstep creep forward on the gravel,
00:28:16when they actually can hear a breath, and when you're not on them, when you see the other character,
00:28:21do you hear another breath on the other side, or a sniffle or something. That mix is so freaking
00:28:27pristine. I was, like, blown away by how much a mix can change just a song, and that's after we've
00:28:34shot everything and thought we'd done all the work. So I think, to me, when I look at a musical,
00:28:38it is a love of this so much that you will go down, and you will tailor and bespoke every note
00:28:45and every word all the way down to its button and threads, so that when someone's watching it,
00:28:51they don't even know what's happening, but they are being moved in ways that you can't just listen to a
00:28:55song and feel, and you can't just watch a music video and feel, and you can't just see a dance
00:29:00video online and feel. It is the combination of all of those that is the power of the musical.
00:29:04When I watch a musical and all of that works, I'm like, holy shit, this person gets it,
00:29:09and they're using all of these tools. Yeah, and Jack, I'm wondering for you,
00:29:14what are some common pitfalls you see in movie musicals, and how did you guys try to avoid those?
00:29:19Well, maybe not pitfall, but missed opportunity, for me would be the, this is a little bit more
00:29:26technical, I guess, or detailed, but the music between the songs, the scoring, the interstitial
00:29:33music, can sometimes feel in movie musicals like a, choose my words carefully,
00:29:42like a derivation of stuff that's in the songs already. And, you know, maybe an afterthought in
00:29:51some way. And one of the things I'm the most proud of, by proxy, because all credit goes to John
00:29:59Powell and Stephen Schwartz for this, is the way that the cinematic use of music was leveraged in Wicked
00:30:07between the songs, and to get into the songs, and to come out of the songs, and also within the songs.
00:30:12But I think one of the things that John Powell and Stephen Schwartz did so beautifully was that the
00:30:17themes from the stage musical are used in our score, but they are given a totally new color,
00:30:29sometimes harmonic DNA, orchestration. And so you end up feeling like you're watching a piece of cinema
00:30:37rather than a Broadway show that's been superimposed into the medium of cinema. So it's,
00:30:43it becomes another, another ingredient of, of cinema. I mean, we're making a film. And so I think
00:30:50that John Powell and Stephen Schwartz did such an incredible job of bringing this music into a completely
00:30:57new dimension. And I can't think of many film musicals that have, that have done that with the
00:31:04score between the songs. And also the songs are transformed as well. But I think that's one of the
00:31:11big successes of, of both Wicked films. This episode is brought to you by the National Music
00:31:18Publishers Association, or the NMPA. You know that song you can't get out of your head? Someone wrote
00:31:24that. And behind every hit song is a songwriter who deserves to be paid fairly for their work.
00:31:29That's where the NMPA comes in. The National Music Publishers Association is the trade organization
00:31:34representing all American music publishers and their songwriting partners. And every day,
00:31:39the NMPA's mission is to protect and increase the value of songs. Based in Washington, DC,
00:31:46the NMPA works on the front lines, shaping legislation, handling litigation, and navigating regulations,
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00:32:13NMPA.org. That's NMPA.org.
00:32:18John, I wanted to ask you about how you've worked with a lot of top tier musicians in your time as a
00:32:26director. In the film world, you've just worked with so many great players in the music world,
00:32:31from Justin Bieber, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Cynthia, Ariana, all these big characters. I'm wondering,
00:32:39has there been anything that has surprised you with how these people work?
00:32:43Yeah, I've been very, very lucky. You know, I learned a lot from each. When I think about
00:32:51Lin-Manuel Miranda, I do not believe in genius. I think people can make genius things, but I don't
00:32:56think people are just geniuses. However, Lin is pretty as close as you can get. His voice messages
00:33:03of songs and stuff are amazing and insane. And his understanding of language, I think that's the
00:33:09thing that I learned the most is how important lyrics are. I had done dance movies, and I had done
00:33:15movement stuff. And so I knew how to find the lyricism or the musicality, I guess, in cuts and
00:33:23in dance and even music. But lyrics were so important in the Heights. And I had to make room for that.
00:33:34And I had to understand that. And he had to teach me a little bit of like, you got to hear these three
00:33:38words, John. I know you want to feel real, but you got to hear those things. And they mean so much.
00:33:43So I've loved working with him. And it comes so instinctively from him. It can happen at any
00:33:49moment. I think I felt that similarly with even Justin Bieber, even at 14 years old.
00:33:56No matter what you say about him, even at that time, he was doing big shows and we'd be in the
00:34:02in the tour bus and he'd be alone playing video games because he's coming down from the show.
00:34:07And then he would go just naturally a kid to his computer and he would start writing music in every
00:34:14city he was. And he had a folder from every city. And in those folders were tracks and tracks of stuff
00:34:20that he was doing alone. None of this was ever going to be released. This was him as a 14 year
00:34:25old doing some amazing stuff. But it wasn't, quote unquote, part of his brand or whatever he was at
00:34:29that moment. So I knew very early, oh, this kid is like the real deal. He loves music. He's going
00:34:35to do this for the rest of his life. This is not a performance. This is what he does. And I feel that
00:34:41with Ari and Cynthia as well. I mean, obviously those two. But what I love about someone like Ariana
00:34:48is she's also a tech nerd. She gets in that Pro Tools and gets down. She wanted to talk about
00:34:56craft with me and in the tech of it all. And I didn't even know half the things she was saying.
00:35:02But when she sees that computer and she sits down, it's like she is fast and she knows exactly where
00:35:08to go. And I thought that was so beautiful. And then the two of them together, I mean, Cynthia
00:35:14obviously knows her stuff and has such great tastes and opinions about how her voice is.
00:35:20So all of them were different in a way, but all of them were about craft. It was not about the
00:35:27performance of being a star at all. All of them I could see being doing whatever show that would
00:35:34fulfill them as a musician and not necessarily the red carpets, even though they do that very well.
00:35:40That's awesome. I'm wondering, did you and Ariana ever work together on some sort of like editing
00:35:46processes? She came in to do a little bit of comping of vocals on Popular at one point and taking a look
00:35:57at some of the options that we had. But we, you know, once we recorded the the vocals and live and
00:36:06then had them sort of in the box, a lot of it flowed from what decisions were being made inside
00:36:12the Avid, inside of the picture cut. And so that kind of dictated a lot of the options that we we
00:36:18chose. But I just I wanted to also mention just about process and witnessing people's process. You
00:36:24know, working with Stephen Schwartz was very illuminating for me because I've worked with a lot
00:36:29of composers. And, you know, Stephen's been doing this for such a long time. And he's I do think
00:36:34there are geniuses. I think he's one of them. We got some disagreement. But despite his great genius
00:36:43and his incredible talents, his ability to just be a storyteller like John was saying, but also
00:36:51let his instincts and his compositional choices be a kind of fluid reaction to whatever was going on
00:36:58with John's vision or or with the shape that the movie was taking and letting his fingers on the
00:37:03piano just sort of like naturally go to places that were in the service of that while also keeping
00:37:10the integrity of his songs intact. I've never seen anything like that before. And it was it was
00:37:18incredible to work with him and to witness that. That is so cool. And one of the things that always
00:37:23kind of blows my mind about Wicked as a project is that you're adapting a musical, but you're not only
00:37:27adapting that the musical is an adaptation. And also in Wicked for Good, you're also rubbing up
00:37:32against Wizard of Oz and Wizard of Oz is also an adaptation. So you've got like just like a Russian
00:37:37doll of different source material. So, John, I'm wondering, what bits and pieces did you take from
00:37:44each of those projects, whether it's the books that these two great movies slash musicals were based on?
00:37:51Tell me a little bit about what you took away.
00:37:53Well, in a weird way, it felt very instinctual because I'm a child of all of this. I grew up in,
00:38:02my family came over from Taiwan and they, Wizard of Oz was a huge part of them raising us. I'm the
00:38:12youngest of five. And this, the American fairy tale about the American dream. They started a
00:38:17Chinese restaurant and lived the American dream. They still there, 56 years, the restaurant's still
00:38:23there. And so I understood the power of what Wizard of Oz is. And the L. Frank Baum books,
00:38:29the Denslow drawings are huge points of contact of our, in our culture already. Even the colors of the
00:38:37yellow brick road or the green, like all of it is so a part of how I understood the world growing up.
00:38:46And then I saw Wicked when I was in college, when it first came out. And so for me, it was at a moment
00:38:54where I, my life was changing. I was leaving home. I was looking back at my own fairy tales and
00:38:59deconstructing them. And that's exactly what Steven and Winnie were doing in the show. They were taking
00:39:04this story of our youth and shattering it and saying, what if you looked at it in a different way?
00:39:11What if those rules were not necessarily meant for us? What if that road was not meant for us? What if
00:39:18there is no man behind the curtain? I love that. It sparks my brain so much. And the idea of this
00:39:26friendship, you know, there's a lot of movies about romance, but no, almost no movies about friendship,
00:39:31because friendship doesn't have a nice clean bow on it. You can't get married and you don't have kids
00:39:36and now and happily ever after. Friendship is consistency. Friendship is nuance. Friendship is
00:39:42showing up time and time again, disappointing each other. Maybe some having some resentment,
00:39:48forgiving each other, and then growing from there. And some friendships even just end. And that's it.
00:39:54And yet there is a value to that. So I love that this musical did that. So I had these very big
00:40:00pick points for this. And of course, the movie, the 1939 movie has been around. It's a giant icon in
00:40:09cinematic history. It is why a lot of the language that we do is in cinema. And going to film school,
00:40:17you can't escape that idea. So all of those things were sort of in me. So when I was doing this movie,
00:40:22I think for me, it was just trying to make it as of this time of where I'm at, of where we are all at as
00:40:31possible, because I knew the timeless truths would stick. Those have persevered. And yet, when Cynthia sings
00:40:40Wizard and I are Defying Gravity, when she sings it, it feels like I've heard those words for the first
00:40:45time in my life. And I'm seeing this character for the first time in my entire life. When Glinda comes in,
00:40:49when Ariana comes in and she's singing popular, or she's singing Couldn't Be Happier, or she's singing
00:40:55For Good, I look at her and I'm like, I know these songs. I've seen every cover. I've been lifted to
00:41:02it over and over. And she does it in a way that feels, in a weird way, she would say, I know Glinda
00:41:08better than I know Ariana Grande. I know what it feels like to where people want light from you.
00:41:13And I don't even know who I am to give that light. To me, the more we dug into the truth,
00:41:21the more the timeless nature of this timeless tale served everything up. I mean, I guess that's
00:41:28the testament to why this story has persevered. It taps on everything that we are told, everything that
00:41:34we question, and especially at this time. And so, so yeah, that it was, it was, it was, it felt very
00:41:41natural. And everyone had their own version of this. Cynthia, Ari, even Jack, even Powell. I mean,
00:41:49and especially Steven and Winnie, like everyone had their own thing. And so for me, it was like
00:41:53understanding everybody's sort of in on this and learning and trying to incorporate some stuff,
00:41:58but also really following my own instincts. Yeah. And interestingly, I didn't realize this
00:42:03quite at first, I probably should have been able to pick up on it. But the melody for Unlimited,
00:42:09when you're singing Unlimited, kind of harkens back to Somewhere Over the Rainbow with that kind of
00:42:13octave jump. I'm wondering, are there, Jack, are there any other like kind of musical callbacks or ties
00:42:19that you can tell between Wicked and The Wizard of Oz? Yes, there are little Easter eggs sprinkled
00:42:25throughout. Yeah. It's actually, and this is publicly known, you know, Unlimited is the first
00:42:32seven notes, I believe, of. Really? Somewhere over. So, Unlimited, somewhere over the rainbow. Unlimited.
00:42:43Amazing. My future is over the, you know, so it's actually the first seven, I think I've got that
00:42:48right. And then you have little homages in, you'll see in Wicked For Good in the second movie that the
00:42:54song Thank Goodness or Couldn't Be Happier, the melody goes, couldn't be happier, which is a sort
00:43:00of love letter to follow the yellow brick road. Amazing. And there's a lot, I'm not going to keep
00:43:06singing. Oh, no, I love your voice. We're just going to turn this into a vocal performance for
00:43:11Jack. John, you can leave, it's fine. Sorry, John, sorry, sorry. But there are, there are little
00:43:17Easter eggs love letters sprinkled throughout. And he, he's a, he's a trickster, Steven, with that
00:43:23kind of stuff in it. It's pretty cool. The fan, the fans will know. Yeah. And then, of course,
00:43:28I mean, of the two original songs that you guys put into Wicked For Good, one of them is called No
00:43:34Place Like Home, obviously a callback to Wizard of Oz. I want to go over these two songs since they're
00:43:39both new. So let's start with No Place Like Home. For those who haven't seen the movie yet, like,
00:43:44what can you tell us about where it sits in the movie and why it was so important? Well, I'll,
00:43:48I'll, I'll, I'll just kind of say a couple things and I'll let John go into the bigger narrative
00:43:54picture of it. But No Place Like Home sits at a moment of conflict for our lead Elphaba.
00:44:02She's struggling with being hunted at that point in the film. She's struggling with where she is in
00:44:08her journey, what she wants, what's important to her. And so it is a hugely important,
00:44:14song for her arc, her character's arc in, in the second film.
00:44:19I will also add that No Place Like Home is, is, is a nod to the book, the L. Frank Baum book,
00:44:27not the movie, because we don't have the rights to the movie. So none of those things are for the,
00:44:33our inspiration was always the L. Frank Baum book. That said, it is, it is something that has endured
00:44:39over all these years. And I think for us, and especially Steven, because Steven really brought
00:44:45it to the table and said, you know, what happens to the moment where you, when you question the
00:44:51thing that you've been fighting for? Your home doesn't even want you alive. And is home a place
00:45:00or is it an idea? And if it's the, if it's an idea, then why do you need to be here for it?
00:45:06And should we just leave? Like, I think those questions that we've, and at least for me,
00:45:11I've always wondered about where Elphaba sits. These are the questions that, um, I sort of wanted to
00:45:16understand. And so, uh, and Steven already had an insight exactly where it was. So it was really cool to
00:45:21hear the, um, the first time, um, the girls had ever heard it. Um, the first time we, it was the
00:45:27first time we all got together at my house for dinner. And I happened to have a, uh, I was leaving
00:45:34for London. So everything was moved out, but there was a piano in there because the person moving in
00:45:38had brought their family piano and moved in early. And so we all had dinner. It was again, sort of at
00:45:43the end of the COVID lockdown. So we hadn't all seen each other in person and Steven Schwartz, Winnie,
00:45:48and the two girls were there. It's the first time those two girls are together in front of us. They
00:45:52never did chemistry reads together. And Schwartz got on the piano and started playing, uh, the song,
00:45:57their new songs for them. And so they got to listen to it in front of us. And, um, they just, I mean,
00:46:04there was lots of tears. And as he sang it out loud, it was just one of those great moments. And then
00:46:08he sang the other one for, for Ari. Um, and then he started playing, uh, for good. And he's like, shall we?
00:46:14And they just did it for the first time together. And that, that moment I brought, I took my kids out
00:46:21of their bedrooms. Like, you better watch this thing right now. It's history. Um, but when they
00:46:26sang, it was like a revelation, like, oh my goodness, the world does not know what's about
00:46:32to happen with them. Wow. Wow. I didn't realize that those two songs were written so early, so early
00:46:38that this is still COVID lockdown time. Y'all might not have even met in person. So did Stephen
00:46:44Schwartz take into account Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo's voices specifically when writing these extra
00:46:49songs? Yeah. At that point they had already been cast, but he, we just didn't say anything to them
00:46:54yet. I don't think maybe they knew, but they didn't know what the song was or how it was going to be.
00:46:58They just, um, and we had, and when they came in, I was sharing sort of like, um, costume designs and
00:47:03some production designs. So they were getting a lot that day, um, uh, just sort of dumped on them
00:47:09just to, just to get a sense, even though everything would evolve. I mean, the songs would evolve. Our
00:47:13images would evolve over time, but it was just sort of the starting point to get us there.
00:47:17So yeah, it was pretty, it was a pretty magical moment. What is a musical moment that you hope
00:47:22that people pick up on Jack? Um, I'm wondering if there's anything that maybe your average viewer might
00:47:28not have picked up on, but y'all put a lot of care and time into. The way that the
00:47:34the, the more kind of, um, connected songs that have lots of different pieces within them are put
00:47:40together and flow. It's, it's hard to recognize how hard that is when you see it because it just
00:47:47works. But the opening number, for example, every day, more wicked is kind of like a, let's, um,
00:47:53remember where we've come from, where we are, what our characters are up to. It's one of those songs
00:47:57that kind of takes us around the horn of the whole world and all the characters. And it's a very
00:48:03complicated song. It has many different parts. It references many different elements of the
00:48:08glossary of Stephen's themes from the, the musical. And so making it work like a seamless,
00:48:15um, free-flowing piece of music that feels like a piece of music, but also does everything that
00:48:20we need it to do narratively, um, took a lot of, uh, you know, a lot of work to, to, to find.
00:48:28And especially in the orchestration of it, um, shout out to Jeff at Majin, the song orchestrator,
00:48:33just an incredible job of figuring out how to change the tone within that song for all the different
00:48:39things that it references, but also maintain a kind of just overarching integrity for that piece.
00:48:46So yeah, look out for that when you watch the film. Yeah. John, do you have any musical
00:48:50moments that you hope that people pick up on? I mean, the whole thing is a, a beautiful, uh,
00:48:57tableau of soundscape. I mean, every inch of it, I mean, I hope they don't notice it. I hope it
00:49:04becomes invisible and it feels so easy, but deep down within myself, when I, I smile, when it works,
00:49:10um, there are things like, um, even John Powell's score in their fight at the yellow brick road
00:49:18is this, this sort of ballet. And it's, we could have easily gone with comedic music,
00:49:25but he did this really fun. I don't even know what the style of it is, um, that just elevates it. And,
00:49:33um, and, and he incorporates, um, I don't know if I should spoil this, but he incorporates a song
00:49:39from their past. And so it's a beautiful sort of blend of that too. I also think this, um, I mean,
00:49:45this, we do this thing with the wedding that it intercuts with something else. And I won't again,
00:49:50go into the spoilers of it, but it is not just a wedding. It is two roads colliding in this moment.
00:49:59And it is so difficult. We did many versions of it, but John Powell, um, and, uh, and Stephen Schwartz,
00:50:06finding this delicate, razor thin edge of how to be two different tones at the same time and make it
00:50:15feel like one piece and they're opposite ends of the spectrum. That is when you watch this, I think
00:50:21when you watch the sequence, you're like, wow. Okay. That is like, that's cinema. That's what cinema can
00:50:27do that no other medium can do. But deep down that music is really supporting that. Um, and of course,
00:50:33when you see no good deed, I mean, it's going to rip the roof off of wherever you're watching.
00:50:38I have never watched it and not felt the need to like run around the theater and run outside
00:50:44and yell and then come back in and keep going. I also want to, I want to point out one other
00:50:48thing to answer that question, which is the end of this film, which of course I'm going to say nothing
00:50:52about, um, was a very tricky thing for us to get tonally with the music. Um, and, um, I think that
00:51:02what we were able to achieve in the end gives you a sort of feeling of that could lead to this
00:51:10incredible saga sort of propelling you emotionally into the future in some way. I think that was the
00:51:16big thing that we unlocked was that there's an opportunity to say when people leave the theater
00:51:21after seeing wicked for good, they're going to take the story with them forever. And how do we through
00:51:26the music somehow achieve that? Yeah. No small task. Especially considering the fact that you have
00:51:32this incredible collection of 10 songs leading up to that point, what do you do to get that satisfying
00:51:39feeling? So it took a lot of, um, experimentation, but I'm really happy with how it turned out. And I
00:51:45think people will be excited by that. Yeah. And I love that you pointed out one of the ensemble numbers.
00:51:50Um, John, I'm curious for you. You've, you've worked on step up, which had tons of choreography
00:51:55to deal with. Um, you know, you worked on in the Heights, um, which also prepared you for these
00:52:01moments. I'm wondering what did you take away from those previous experiences that helped you with
00:52:06these gigantic ensemble numbers for wicked for good? Well, I think a lot of it was, um, finding my taste
00:52:15with how camera works with movement or how camera works with music. I think part of it was understanding
00:52:22the technical aspects. You know, when you're doing the step up movies, it's a, uh, you can make
00:52:27mistakes. I was a young filmmaker. I was thrown into, okay, we're getting tracks from artists and we're
00:52:32using that in our choreography. And we're maybe getting temp tracks that we're recording with all
00:52:36these dancers. And then we're getting the real tracks later in the edit. And then how do you cut it
00:52:41together? So it builds an emotion. And I think it's something like in the Heights of even Crazy
00:52:45Rich Asians to me is like a musical. It's, it's, it's built like a musical. We found these amazing
00:52:50songs by like Grace Chen and, and these, and these, and these singers from like the sixties and the
00:52:55fifties. And, um, and we incorporated them into scenes as if, if it was a musical, um, and in the Heights,
00:53:02I, to me, it was about, um, all right, so how do we actually do a musical?
00:53:07Um, an actual singing, dancing musical. Um, we, that's where I really first had a pianist
00:53:14on set and that we're doing live things. That was the first time where we had, um, you know,
00:53:21background people singing with the track. You're bringing in actual singers to, to be on camera for
00:53:27that, um, where your actors, um, you're trying to help your actors find the entry point to these songs.
00:53:34And so it just helped me find my taste ultimately in wicked by understanding all these pieces and
00:53:39making a lot of mistakes previously. It allowed me to come into wicked with a much more, um,
00:53:46I don't know, uh, more focused, um, clear idea of how to do things so that I could only really
00:53:53focus on why we're doing things. And I could help with this, you know, giant army of people and help
00:53:59guide that and not get, get, not get swept away by, oh my gosh, the VFX. And then you have a digital
00:54:05character in the room and it's blue screen. So like you can easily on the day, you have 12 hours,
00:54:1010 hours, eight hours to shoot. You can be thinking a lot about other things than just
00:54:16the story you're telling. And so I think all those experiences, I was meant to do this movie at this
00:54:19moment in my life, um, I took my 10,000 hours. And so it was great to be able to wield those, that
00:54:26knowledge coming into here. Yeah. And the, the, um, ensemble pieces, um, are incredibly complex
00:54:32editorially and musically. You have choreography, Chris Scott's incredible choreography. You have
00:54:39Foley and people's feet moving. You have vocals, ensemble vocals, you have the lead vocals.
00:54:45And so one of the things that I was really proud of with both of these movies was that we would
00:54:50distribute the click track, the tempo map to all of the different parts of the sound department.
00:54:56So, um, Nancy Nugent title, who was our dialogue sound supervisor and John Marquis, um, who supervised
00:55:03sound on the sound effect side, and also was one of our mixers, they had access to all of our tempo
00:55:07maps. So what we were able to do was keep everything sort of in lockstep with the, the tempo, whether
00:55:14it's offscreen sounds that you might hear that correspond to people walking in the distance or more
00:55:21present, um, footsteps, um, that are on camera, or maybe it's crowds that are vocalizing certain chants
00:55:28in a song, um, or even the movement of, of cloth on, on the costumes, all that stuff, um, is it's so
00:55:36important to, to maintain the musical shape within those big ensemble numbers so that it's affecting
00:55:43every single part of what you're seeing and hearing. Um, so that was something that I think helped make
00:55:49these big ensemble, um, numbers feel more kind of, um, realized and, um, convincing musically.
00:55:57Yeah, and I just have a couple more questions for you guys before we go, um, but I wanted to ask you,
00:56:03John, I heard that you're working on an adaptation of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat,
00:56:07so another musical on the way for you. Um, is there anything you can tell us about, like,
00:56:12where y'all are at in that process and what it's like to work with another incredible Broadway composer
00:56:17and Andrew Lloyd Webber? Yeah, working with, uh, Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber and, and Tim, Sir Tim Rice,
00:56:24uh, that has been like a dream. I mean, Joseph's one of my favorites growing up
00:56:29and it's a tough one because, um, there's a lot of absurdity in it and the tone is very tough and
00:56:34so that's where we're at. We've been, um, I have Dana Fox has just been rewriting the script who,
00:56:39who, who, uh, did, uh, did Wicked with us and so we've just been finding that. We're in, um, we're,
00:56:46yeah, we've, we've, I think we've cracked it and we're just sort of, I'm just sort of sitting on it
00:56:50for a second as I, um, release Wicked for good and decide what I'm gonna do next. So I don't know
00:56:56if that's next or what, but I am working on an animated movie right now, Oath Places You'll Go
00:57:02with The Seuss Estate and Warner Brothers animation, feature animation and, uh, J.J. Abrams with Bad
00:57:09Robot and, uh, Pasek and Paul are writing the music. It's a musical. And so working with those two dudes
00:57:16has been like a blast as well. Um, so I feel like I'm like the luckiest theater kid in the world
00:57:22that I get to work with all these people. Um, and, but each one, you know, when you have,
00:57:29what I found with composers is that each one has their, also their own philosophy of why music
00:57:35works for them. And so I may have my own thoughts and I know that, that, but we get to influence each
00:57:40other and finding new ways to connect the dots in a movie musical and or animated movie musical.
00:57:47And so I think that's been like amazing that we can play and that I live at a time where all these
00:57:53greats are here. Um, and that I get to know personally and creatively. Yeah. I mean, and also,
00:58:00I heard you're also working on the Britney Spears adaptation of her, uh, yeah. The Woman in Me,
00:58:05uh, her memoir. Um, I'm wondering, what is it, what is it like to work with Britney?
00:58:11Um, I, I won't say too much right now because we're, we're really under wraps of it right now.
00:58:17And we're in the early stages. Um, but I will say, I, I, I, I love the story and, um,
00:58:23and I'm very protective of it all. Yeah. I read the book. It was incredible. So I can't wait to see
00:58:28that. It's an incredible book. It's an incredible book. Yeah. To end things off. I have a couple fun
00:58:33little rapid fire questions for you guys. And then we'll do our playlist. What is your favorite
00:58:39movie musical of all time? And you are not allowed to say something that you've actually worked on
00:58:43singing in the rain. Like, I don't know how you cannot say singing in the rain. Um,
00:58:49so of course that, but I, I think also Chicago is like insane. Like when, now that I know what it's
00:58:56like to make a movie musical these days, I look at that. I'm like, wow, he really nailed it.
00:59:03It is, it is extraordinary. I love that answer. Okay. What about you?
00:59:07Yeah, I was going to go with Chicago and West Side Story.
00:59:09Great ones. Which wicked song gets stuck in your head the most?
00:59:13Um, well right now for good, for sure, over and over and over again, but usually it's,
00:59:18what is this feeling?
00:59:20Yeah, it's gotta be, um, Defying Gravity for me. Um, and also, uh,
00:59:26uh, also for good. It just, for good is now in my soul and heart forever. So it'll always be on
00:59:34repeat in some way. Uh, green or pink? John?
00:59:38No, I can't answer that one.
00:59:40No, that's off limits for sure.
00:59:42This is off limits. I finally hit the point where I asked a question that's off limits and it's about
00:59:47color. Yep. That's it. I know better. Um, if you could cameo anywhere in both of the Wicked movies,
00:59:55where would you insert yourself?
01:00:00I, um, uh, um, I would be, um, standing behind Stephen Schwartz at the gates of the Emerald City.
01:00:09The wizard will see you now.
01:00:10Oh, John keeps on taking mine. Okay. I'm gonna, I'm, I will be the goat, Dr. Dillamond,
01:00:15because he's got such a beautiful, heartbreaking story. And I wish that I could be as good of an
01:00:20actor as that Peter Dinklage slash visual effects goat. Perfect. That is a great answer. What is one
01:00:27scene from Wicked or Wicked for Good that still gives you chills? The end, uh, Oz does in the end
01:00:32of Defying Gravity, of course. I mean, but Defying Gravity, I just watched it again. It's the first time
01:00:37I've watched it in maybe a long, long time. And it even overwhelmed me more now than I did back then.
01:00:44Maybe I was just too in it, but now I'm like, oh, wow. I felt like I knew what the audience felt
01:00:49at that moment that we cut out to black. I mean, it's hard to argue with Defying Gravity. When we
01:00:54played it on our final mixing stage before we wrapped the first movie, I remember it ended and
01:00:58John fell off his chair onto the floor. Oh, you're right. You're right. And we were all,
01:01:03I mean, but for this movie, For Good, uh, it makes me cry every time. I mean, maybe I'm sappy,
01:01:09but it just, I will never tire of that song. And, and the way that it works in this film,
01:01:15it will just break your heart. It's so beautiful. But what's interesting about For Good, and we talked
01:01:19about this a lot was, you know, there are songs that work as musical theater pieces and there are
01:01:24songs that work as like pop songs that are songs within this movie. And For Good is basically built,
01:01:32architecturally like just a song. It's like you, this is the moment where the two leads come and
01:01:37sing a song and it's very built, uh, as a straight song. And so it's harder to work into the story
01:01:45naturally. And so I think that the work that was done in just the little slight details to make it
01:01:50feel like it's emerging from them. And yet it's still the song we know and love was like brilliant inches,
01:01:57um, by our whole sound team, um, from Jack to, to Andy, to everybody on this and Schwartz and, and
01:02:04everyone, Jeff, they, what they had to do to break it from what we know is, uh, really extraordinary.
01:02:12That is so interesting. Do you have anything to add to that about how you were able to weave For Good
01:02:17into the story? I would just say, you know, uh, space is the place, you know, it's about ebbing and
01:02:23flowing and not letting the song feel like a needle drop. You know, you certainly don't want
01:02:28For Good to be a music video in the middle of, it needs to be the emotional payoff of both movies
01:02:34in a way. I mean, um, I hope I'm, that's accurate. I mean, that's how it feels to me.
01:02:39Yeah. You know, it feels like score, it feels like score under dialogue, which is crazy to think.
01:02:44Yeah. Um, and it comes, it comes in singers to hit. That's right. And it, and it, it emerges
01:02:51so delicately and, and it takes a while to get into that kind of pop song feeling that John was
01:02:58alluding to. But even once it gets there, it still feels like part of the fabric of the story,
01:03:03of the emotions and of the, um, of the score. And, uh, yeah. And what's beautiful about it too,
01:03:08is, you know, we've planted seeds of For Good throughout movie one and movie two, but very much,
01:03:12very little, little things. And then once you do the song and it becomes a part of the fabric of
01:03:16the movie from then on, it's a part of the score itself. Um, and even in For Good, there's a moment
01:03:23and I don't want to spoil this too much, but there's inklings of another song that are woven into it.
01:03:28And we had some debates about, Hey, are, is that distracting? Like you're now in For Good. Like
01:03:34we are starting for good. Are you, are you allowed? Is that throw the audience off when you hear the three
01:03:41notes of a song, you know, very well, and does that trigger it or does it empower the character?
01:03:45Are we saying, so that's what I mean by blurring the line between the song orchestrations and the
01:03:51score, because you cannot just do that in a song, but you have space and time to do that in, um, in,
01:03:58in this sequence. And so that was that those little touches are just brilliant to me.
01:04:03Totally. And also just one last thing on this,
01:04:06the lyrics are just, I don't understand how lyrics are written to begin with. I've never understood
01:04:11that. It's a, it's a mystery to me, but you'll be with me like a handprint on my heart. I feel like
01:04:17if I tried to write lyrics for 75 years straight, I would never, and, and there's so many beautiful
01:04:24lyrics like that in, in that song and all the other ones. And they just, uh, a sea dropped by a skybird.
01:04:30Oh my gosh. It's like, Oh yeah. He's just, um, incredible. Um, yeah. Anyway, that was the longest
01:04:38rapid fire answer of all time. Sorry. This is actually crazy because what you just got into
01:04:42was my next question, which is like, what's a lyric that has really changed you, um, from this film.
01:04:48And I think y'all both just answered your answers. So great work. That was part of the rapid fire.
01:04:53Um, and the last one is finish the sentence. Wicked for good is best experienced when you
01:05:00see it in theaters in Dolby Atmos on a huge screen. There we go. Lots of people with all
01:05:07your friends and strangers. Yes. Not at home, not on your iPhone. Maybe even dressed up as one of the
01:05:12characters. Why not? Yes. Yes. The pink and green people can, people can pick y'all won't pick,
01:05:17but other people can go to a sing along version. I don't know what the plan is, but I really hope
01:05:21there's sing along versions again this time around. Cause some of that footage,
01:05:24I remember sitting in the cutting room with John actually, and he was showing me some of
01:05:27the footage from the singalongs. Like people went all out and it was just so joyful to see that.
01:05:33That's so exciting. This is so exciting. I can't wait for this movie to come out. I did get to see
01:05:37a screener and it was just absolutely fabulous. I mean, it was jam packed with stuff. I felt like every
01:05:42scene there was so much going on and I'm so excited for everyone else to see it. Um, and at the end of
01:05:49every episode of on the record, I like to ask my guests to help me make a playlist. So we have
01:05:54three prompts and we need to pick three songs each. So the first question is, what is a song you can no
01:06:01longer gatekeep? I don't know if this is considered a gatekeep because it's probably really well known,
01:06:06but I didn't know it until just recently. And I've just like listened to it over and over again.
01:06:11And that is John Baptiste's, um, Butterfly. It is like the lyrics, the way it's, I don't know,
01:06:18we play it every morning in our household. I have five kids and they're all eating breakfast and
01:06:22it just makes the whole day better.
01:06:24On Haim's Women in Music part three, which is, I think one of the best
01:06:28records in the past 15 years, there's a song on there that like, it took me a while to
01:06:33really like, um, fall in love with and it's all that ever mattered. And it's a little bit deeper.
01:06:37It's a deeper cut. Maybe it's actually like one of the top songs on that album.
01:06:41I actually don't think it is. I do love that album, but I don't think that's,
01:06:44you know, a single or anything. So that's a good pick.
01:06:45Yeah. So I love them. Love that song.
01:06:48Yeah. Great picks. Okay. So second one is a favorite throwback. So a song over 10 years old.
01:06:54Um, well, I'm listening a lot to, uh, Billie Joel. She's always a woman to me specifically,
01:07:01because I, I watched the doc and I did not, I, I never connected. It's just always been a song
01:07:07to me. And I just loved that story and that love story in there. And I, um, so I've been listening
01:07:13to that a lot right now. I mean, honestly, I've been listening to one album since I was a child
01:07:18and I've probably listened to it, um, I don't know, a hundred thousand times. And that is Diva
01:07:23by Annie Lennox. And the song on that album that, that gets me every time is called Cold. People might
01:07:29not even know that album now, but check it out. It's one of the greatest albums of the past, um, 40 years.
01:07:35I love it. Wow. Okay. And finally guys, a guilty pleasure.
01:07:41Well, my honest guilty pleasure is this is the best burrito that my children sing in the car all
01:07:49day long, but I'm not going to say that I'm going to say it makes me ill by NSYNC. I just think I,
01:07:56um, you know, I was hanging with the fellas, you know, all that, that whole thing is just
01:08:01gets me hyped. Perfect. Don't tell anyone. Don't tell anyone, please. Okay. I mean,
01:08:06the first thing, no one listens to this, right? Yeah. Yeah. The first thing I was going to say
01:08:10was the, the soundtrack album to Waitress. Um, all the music is, is by Sara Bareilles and I'm
01:08:16absolutely in love with her, but like, that's not a guilty pleasure because I genuinely love that
01:08:20musical and I love that show. So I guess a more guilty pleasure would be like, I dropped my daughter
01:08:25off at school. We were listening to Sabrina Carpenter in the car. Now she gets out of the car. She goes to
01:08:29school. Sabrina Carpenter is still on in my car and I let it play because man, child is a great
01:08:34song. Child is a good song. You don't, you don't play. This is the best burrito. I haven't heard
01:08:39that one, John. I mean, it's a classic now. Wow. That is a, that is a kid's classic. Um,
01:08:44well, thank you so much, John M. Chu, Jack Dolman. This has been so much fun. Thank you for coming to
01:08:49On The Record to talk about all things music and wicked. Thank you, Kristen. This is great.
01:08:53Thank you. Thanks guys. Another thank you again to Jack Dolman and John M. Chu for coming on the show
01:08:58today and sharing all of their insights with us. Up next, we're going to dive into our chart roundup
01:09:04where we will highlight this week's biggest movers and shakers. Here's the Hot 100 top 10 countdown for
01:09:10the week of November 8th. Coming in at number 10 this week is Mutt by Leon Thomas. Number nine this week
01:09:19is I Got Better by Morgan Wallen. Elizabeth Taylor by Taylor Swift comes in at number eight.
01:09:29Folded by Kehlani comes in at number seven. Number six is Daisies by Justin Bieber.
01:09:40Five is Man I Need by Olivia Dean.
01:09:43Nine. Number four this week is Opalite by Taylor Swift.
01:09:52Ordinary by Alex Warren comes in third again this week.
01:09:58Golden by Huntrix from the K-pop Demon Hunter soundtrack comes in at number two again this week.
01:10:05And finally, the song in the top slot this week on the Billboard Hot 100 chart
01:10:11is The Fate of Ophelia by Taylor Swift in its fourth week at number one.
01:10:17Thanks for listening to this week's episode of On The Record and another big special thank you to my
01:10:21guests this week, Jack Dolman and John M. Chu where we talked about all things Wicked. It was so much
01:10:25fun. If you liked today's show, please consider hitting us with a rating, a follow, a thumbs up,
01:10:30all those good things. They really help a show like ours to grow and reach new people. Again,
01:10:35I'm your host Kristen Robinson and tune in next week for another peek behind the curtain of the music
01:10:40industry. I'll see you then.
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