Jon M. Chu’s ‘Wicked’ is the over-the-top distraction America needs right now

After months of relentless promotion (remember the Olympics?), “Wicked” has finally landed in theaters, delivering a lavish and stealthily political adaptation of the beloved musical. Yet beyond hoping to defy the box office gravity of the streaming era, the film’s brightly colored explosion of pink and green makes it the movie a lot of people can surely use right now: buoyant escapism from a bruising election cycle and the uncertain future left in its awake, with a whole lot of heart — and not incidentally, a message.

Movies take years to produce (director Jon M. Chu told NBC’s “TODAY” show he had three kids during the process of making the film), so they’re a highly imperfect instrument to address, or divine, public moods. Still, “Wicked’s” arrival, along with sequels to “Gladiator” and the animated “Moana,” could tell us quite a bit about how festive the holidays will be for Hollywood as well as how eager Americans are to embrace distractions right now.

Like “Barbie” (which also featured lots of pink and earned a whole lot of green), “Wicked” is a showcase for its female leads, Cynthia Erivo as Elphaba, she who will become the Wicked Witch of the West in the Oz story ; and Glinda (Ariana Grande), the popular fashion plate. Initially defined by hostility — or loathing, as the song goes — their relationship serves as the backbone of the film as they gradually and sweetly bond, until Elphaba’s opportunity to meet the legendary Wizard of Oz (Jeff Goldblum, the one questionable casting choice) sets them on very different paths.

Much of the audience will surely know most of the songs by heart, but as with any musical translated to the screen, film allows Chu to expand upon the scope of the visuals in dazzling ways. The two-part format also enables this first chapter to probe Elphaba and Glinda’s characters more deeply, although at two hours and 40 minutes, the length and more leisurely pace might be the most obvious quibble. (The distributor of the film is Universal Pictures, like MSNBC, a unit of NBCUniversal.)

On its face, “Wicked” serves as a character-driven leap into a fantasy grounded by friendship and female empowerment, as the shy, disrespected Elphaba finds her voice (and then some, thanks to Erivo) and sense of purpose. While it’s hard to match the theatrical experience, don’t be surprised if opening-weekend audiences occasionally erupt in spontaneous applause.

Again like “Barbie,” with its resonant feminist message, “Wicked” will surely provoke political conversations the wholly escape-minded might wish to avoid. Because drawing from the underlying book by Gregory Maguire (while taking certain liberties), the story incorporates “a powerful allegory of how societies can sleepwalk into fascism,” as the Toronto Star noted, where a disenfranchised group gets exploited to achieve those ends. That includes, in the most chilling line, the observation that if the goal is to bring folks together, “give them a real good enemy.”

Some of that nuance might get overlooked when Erivo (whose stage credits include a Tony Award for “The Color Purple”) unleashes that Broadway belt, but “Wicked’s” wickedly clever approach to turning the classic story on its head, making us question what we think we know about good and evil, and the origins of these characters, feels both timeless and inordinately timely.

For Elphaba, that includes taking a principled stand, even if that means challenging authority and personal sacrifice. It’s a classic hero’s journey, but again, it has undercurrents that won’t be lost on anyone who has spent the last two weeks doomscrolling headlines.

Although the movie lands with positive reviews, a known title and a marketing onslaught, some have sought to replicate that strange summer of “Barbenheimer” magic by touting “Wicked” and “Gladiator” as an unlikely double feature (“Glicked,” as Variety put it).

The pairing actually seems unlikely, even a bit lazy, since the two seem particularly well matched, demographically, to complement each other. Where director Ridley Scott’s long-delayed Roman Empire sequel revels in visceral thrills, the musical, while offering epic qualities, strikes other emotional nerves.

In her show-stopping number, Elphaba famously notes, “Everyone deserves the chance to fly.” Whether viewed as a flight of fancy or something deeper, “Wicked” deserves the chance to be seen and shared, which, given the film’s charms and the current cultural moment, could leave the holiday season’s other box office hopefuls feeling green with envy.