First trailer for Wicked musical adaptation teases classic song

Wicked has dropped its first official trailer, and it of course features a brief snippet of the film's version of 'Defying Gravity'.

Following the first half of the incredibly popular stage musical, the trailer showcases all of the major characters at Shiz University, and a little bit of the Emerald City.

Theatre legend Cynthia Erivo's green-skinned Elphaba and Ariana Grande's Glinda are the main focus here.

The trailer shows some of their initial meeting, and the moment where Elphaba decides to go against the Wizard and makes her debut as The Wicked Witch of the West.

Related: Wicked star Cynthia Erivo says her "heart broke" filming iconic musical scene

There are also brief glimpses of Jonathan Bailey's Fiyero and Bowen Yang's Pfannee, among others, as well as Toto and Dorothy's slippers (in their original silver, as was the case in the books, rather than the ruby version seen in the 1939 movie).

Jeff Goldblum's Wizard of Oz is heard giving a slightly sinister speech, and Michelle Yeoh's Madame Morrible talks about the sky being the limit – which ties quite nicely into 'Defying Gravity'.

We hear part of the intro with the "Something has changed within me, something is not the same" lyrics, before a bit of epic trailer music.

The first look concludes with another musical teaser – some of the song's big climactic notes.

In addition to the trailer, a first-look poster for the movie has also been released, featuring Erivo and Grande against a bright green background.

While the trailer does showcase a lot of what happens in the first half of the Wicked musical, Universal isn't giving fans the chorus just yet.

Originally announced as one movie, Wicked was eventually split into two parts, with the first part ending where the stage show's first act ends.

Related: Kristen Chenoweth addresses the potential of a cameo in the Wicked movie

"As we prepared the production over the last year, it became increasingly clear that it would be impossible to wrestle the story of Wicked into a single film without doing some real damage to it," director Jon M Chu previously explained.

Filming for the second part wrapped up last month, after production was shut down last year due to the Hollywood strikes.

Wicked: Part One is scheduled to release on November 27, while Wicked: Part Two will be released a year later.

Joe Anderton is a freelance news writer and resident Welsh person at Digital Spy, having worked there since 2016. 

In his time he's covered a host of live events, interviewed celebrities big and small and crowbarred a countless amount of great/awful (delete as appropriate) puns into articles. 

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