How Wicked Connects to The Wizard of Oz

Ariana Grande as Glinda in <I>Wicked</I>. Credit - Giles Keyte—Universal Pictures

When L. Frank Baum published The Wonderful Wizard of Oz in 1900, it seems unlikely that he could have had any idea just how significant a role the story would come to play in pop culture. In the nearly 125 years since the novel's debut, it has evolved from a beloved book series to an enduring film classic to a reimagined villain origin story to a mega-hit Broadway musical to a highly-anticipated two-part movie adaptation.

With the first installment of director Jon M. Chu's Wicked film saga now in theaters, the iconic characters brought to life by Baum more than a century ago have reached their current, if not final, form. But while Wicked puts a revisionist spin on the earliest Ozian tale, the story's connection to its original source material remains integral to its appeal.

Based on the award-winning 2003 Broadway musical, which itself was loosely inspired by Gregory Maguire's 1995 novel Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West, the Wicked movie tells the story of the unlikely friendship between Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) and Glinda (Ariana Grande) and how they came to be known as the Wicked Witch of the West and the Good Witch of Oz, respectively. The stage show and film both open with Glinda descending from the sky in a bubble to announce to the residents of Munchkinland that the Wicked Witch is indeed dead. But then, as Glinda prepares to depart, a question rings out: "Is it true you were her friend?"

From there, we flash back in time to the young pair's tenure at Shiz University, years before Dorothy Gale of Kansas crash-lands in Oz. The entirety of the first Wicked movie, which is drawn from Act I of the musical, takes place in this relative timeframe, with the closing number of "Defying Gravity" soundtracking the scene where Elphaba and Glinda's paths diverge at the Emerald Palace. But that doesn't mean there's any shortage of nods to The Wizard of Oz, from the reveal that the Wizard (Jeff Goldblum) is a charlatan with no actual magic to the planned construction of the Yellow Brick Road to Elphaba (unintentionally) creating her future cohort of flying monkeys.

Act II of the Broadway musical, which will play out on screen when Wicked Part Two arrives in theaters next November, more directly ties into The Wizard of Oz timeline, with Dorothy's arrival ultimately resulting in Elphaba's downfall. But, while we won't spoil too much here, prepare to have your expectations upended about the roles Dorothy and her pals (namely, Scarecrow, Lion, and the Tin Man) play in the events surrounding Elphaba's ruin if you don't already know what happens in the musical.

As for why stories about Oz and its inhabitants have continued to resonate with audiences for so many years, Chu chalks it up to the idea that "The Wizard of Oz was always sort of prophetic in a way."

"[The 1939 movie] was written at a time of America in transition," he told NBC News. "At that point, the Depression had just finished and they’re about to go into war. And so it’s always a question of about what the American dream looks like when the road ends and what are the possibilities of the next thing."

Write to Megan McCluskey at megan.mccluskey@time.com.