With just about two months left on the 2024 movie schedule, it’s clear that the Wicked release date will be bringing a lot of audiences to movie theaters – when it opens alongside Gladiator II on the same day. Ahead of experiencing the movie on the big screen next month, the movie’s costume designer has shared an interesting detail about Cynthia Erivo’s Wicked Witch costume, and it’s worth pointing out, especially because its inspiration is so unexpected!
Paul Tazewell served as the movie’s costume designer after dressing Erivo for 2019’s Harriet, Steven Spielberg’s West Side Story and a ton of Broadway musicals over the years. While speaking about creating the iconic costume for Elphaba once she becomes the Wicked Witch, Tazewell shared that mushrooms was actually the key inspiration behind the black costume. In his words:
It felt appropriate and how I wanted to represent her. She’s an advocate for animals, and because she’s marginalized, she finds solace in nature more so than in the people that are surrounding her.
The lightbulb started glowing for Tazewell regarding putting his own mark on the fit while he was watching a documentary about mushrooms. (Hey, there’s more than you might think!) He told Variety that he became aware of the “beauty” of an assortment of types of mushrooms and was inspired by their textures and colors.
Yes, I find Tazewell’s use of fungi as inspiration quite random, but as he explained it, he actually felt it went quite well with the character of Elphaba. Along with the witch apparently being very in touch with nature in the movie, her mushroom-like qualities can also be attributed to her arc as a character. As the costume designer shared, she’s also an “oppressed” girl who is “ostracized” for the color of her skin by even her family. As he continued:
In holding mushrooms and seeing that pleated quality, it became about interpreting that into fabric and texture… The way we were able to manipulate it, created the idea of the underside of a mushroom.
With Paul Tazewell’s insights in mind, you can see how he wove in mushroom textures into her Wicked Witch dress. Check it out in the poster below:
Paul Tazewell also said he ended up using felted fabric, gauze and chiffon to create Elphaba’s dress for the film. Tazewell is an Academy Award nominee for his work in West Side Story. CinemaBlend even spoke to him about the deeper meaning behind Rachel Zegler’s dress when he was up for the award. With all the thought he’s put into the Wicked costumes, we wouldn’t be surprised if Best Costume Design was something the movie got recognition for. Apparently Universal already has an Oscars strategy for its actors, so why not talk about this aspect of Wicked early, too?
The insight about Elphaba’s iconic Wicked Witch costume definitely has me excited for what other details the Wicked cast will have in the movie, and the second part coming out next fall. Wicked hits theaters on November 22.