“Wicked” is currently in pre-production on Broadway. Apparently, it’s had a successful run in San Francisco, and will be coming to Broadway shortly with Kristen Chenowith (Of “You’re a Good Man, Charlie Brown” fame), Norbert Leo Butz (of “The Last Five Years” fame, a little-known, but highly praised off-Broadway show…a friend and I are absolutely in love with this guy from when we saw him in it…his voice gives me goosebumps) and Joel Grey (Does he even need an intro?). I’m so excited - we have plans to see it in December and if it’s half as good as the book, it’ll be fantastic. Previews start October 7th and it opens October 30th (how fitting;)).
Glad to hear Gregory Maguire has another book coming out - I wasn’t a huge fan of “Confessions of an Ugly Stepsister”, but I’m hoping this new one will be as good as “Wicked”.
And have I mentioned how excited I am about the musical version?
Paul Simon once said; “It takes you 18 years to write your first album and the record company wants the second one in six months.”
I think Maguire suffered from this. “Wicked” was so good, “Confessions” and “Lost” seemed to just be thrown out there. Maybe “Mirror” will redeem him.
Aside; I have owned an un-edited copy of the brothers Grimm for more than 25 years now, I raised my kids on it, (as well as Edith Hamilton’s Greek Myth.), and they loved every scary evil moment of them.
I loved “Confessions,” from plot and location to characters and theme. Growing up non-beautiful, I guess I have “issues.” And the Dutch setting was really inspired.
On the basis of “Confessions” I have recently bought “Wicked” but haven’t read it yet. I hope it lives up to your reviews!
I loved Wicked. I have given it as gifts to friends and family since. I hated Confessions. It just seemed to drag. I wasn’t going to read Lost and now know that was a good plan. However, I think I will venture out for the Snow White one. I wonder how he deals with the dwarves? Perhaps they are a travelling circus or outcast dwarves who were horridly mutilated like the dwarf with a permanent fake smile carved into his face in the old medieval courts (what was his name?).
Or maybe they’re just a family of dwarves. It’s been a long time since I saw them last, but around my neighborhood used to live a family of dwarves, about eight of them - I don’ know if they were all siblings, mother father and adult children or what, but they were definately family - all very dour, with constant frowns, all with the same weird lumpy misshapen heads.
They went everywhere together, always taking the bus wherever they went, and they all had the same weird limp, with one leg slightly shorter than the other, so that when they were walking together they fell into this pattern and looked like some weird army of carnival folk marching off to battle.
It isn’t nice to laugh I suppose, but they were a source of constant amusement around the neighborhood back when they were around.
I think you may be conflating Gwynnplaine of The Man Who Laughs, with Poe’s Hopfrog.
IIRC Gwynnplaine was born to a noble family. One of his father’s rivals paid a gang of comprachicos, profesionals who abducted children then mutilated them and sold them to freak shows, to take Gwynnplaine.
Hopfrog was born a humpbacked dwarf. His appearance and powerlessness amused the king, who forced him to become the court jester. The king and his court enjoy humiliating and torturing Hoprfrog until (Believe me, this is no spoiler) he takes one of the most deserved, best executed, and chillingly described revenges in all of literature.
I saw Wicked, the Musical here in SF while it was being workshopped. The music didn’t stick with me, but bear in mind I’m not a huge musicals fan (sorry!). But it was compelling-- Maguire worked closely with the writers, and many of his themes show up in the musical.
Without spoiling it I can say that it is in many ways a much different story than it is in the book. The ending is far less dark, and the focus is on the relationship between Glinda and Elphaba. That part was sweet-- you don’t see too many works of any art focus on close friendships and how they evolve.
Wicked the book is one of my favorites. It’s so dense thematically. Confessions is in my reading cue somewhere, but after hearing about Maguire’s sophomore slump I’m not in that big a hurry to read it.
Please let us know what you ultimately thought of Mirror, Eve. Good or bad, I’ll definitely read it, but I’d like to at least know it’s worth my time.
I’m looking forward to it. I’m one of those people that usually HATES books-to-movies or books-to-musicals because 98% of the time, they’re not well-done. I’m hoping since Maguire worked with this one, we’ll get one that’s very well-done. At least we know the cast is first-rate.
I enjoyed most of Wicked and Confessions, but felt that both fell completely apart at the end. Maguire seems to have very little finish to his writing.