Backstage at Wicked

Backstage at Wicked

UPDATE: EAST LANSING - Most of us know the the story of the "Wizard of Oz" when Dorothy Gale falls into a magical world with munchkins, wizards, and witches. But what happened before that? Well, I went to the Wharton Center for the upcoming show Wicked, to find out.

"Wicked is a huge spectacle of a musical. It's staring all the characters that you're familiar with from The Wizard of Oz. Of course there's the wizard, the flying monkeys, and the Wicked Witch of the West. But it's sort of this story of how they became who they are in those familiar characters that we know today, it's sort of the pre story. We say before Dorothy dropped in." Said Company Manager, Erica Norgaared.

But what you don't see are the people behind the scenes that make Wicked Possible.

"We travel 75 people on Wicked with us on the road. We have a support staff in New York. We have another 25 30 people. And then we hire another 80 people locally, and during the run of the show about 40 to 50 people locally. We have 5 of our own musicians, but some of musicians in the pit are local. We have our own crew guys back stage, but other crew guys are local. We hire wardrobe dresser, someone to do laundry, we travel with our own physical therapist, there are just tons and tons of people you don't even see because they're not on stage." Said Norgarred.

Wicked will be playing at the Warton from June 27 to July 8th. Tickets are still available, but there will be no show on July 4th.

ORIGINAL STORY: EAST LANSING - Something wicked this way comes to the Wharton Center.

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