Imagine shooting two completely different versions of your character on the same day. Monday morning, you’re a bubbly college student singing “Popular” in a dorm room. Thursday afternoon, you’re devastated and broken, filming the emotional climax of “For Good” years later in your character’s timeline.
That was the reality for the cast of Wicked, and according to director Jon M. Chu, it was both the best creative decision they could have made and absolutely insane.
“One day we’d be filming in their dorm room at Shiz, and the next day we’d be at Kiamo Ko castle, which takes place years later,” Chu explained to Deadline. “One day we’d be working on ‘What Is This Feeling?’ and the next, it would be ‘As Long as You’re Mine’”.
The production filmed both Wicked movies simultaneously over 160 days, from December 2022 through January 2024, with only a brief interruption for the SAG-AFTRA strike. It’s a logistical nightmare that required nine months of pre-production just to map out the scheduling, but Chu insists that coming back to shoot the second film separately would have been even harder.
The Logistics of Building Two Movies at Once
Before a single frame was shot, Chu spent nine months in what he calls “insanity” mode, preparing both films down to the smallest detail. He created a secret war room with 3D-printed models, color stories, and emotions mapped on the walls. Every musical number for both films (more than 20 songs total) had to be choreographed, blocked, and rehearsed before production began.
The challenge wasn’t just creative. It was intensely practical. How do you schedule a massive production when your central location, Munchkinland, needs to look completely different depending on which part of the story you’re filming?
“Munchkinland is sort of our town square in Back to the Future where it’s constantly changing,” Chu told Gizmodo. “The house is now crashed in there, and the house is not there. It’s before the Yellow Brick Road is built there, and then when the Yellow Brick Road is there. So that became a centerpiece. We had to move in and move out of that location according to what part of the movie”.
The production couldn’t simply shoot part one, wrap, then return for part two. They needed to maximize the use of each elaborate set while they had it built. That meant filming scenes from both movies whenever they were on a particular location, regardless of chronological order.
Cast availability added another layer of complexity. Michelle Yeoh was nominated for (and later won) an Academy Award during production. The team had a limited window to shoot all of her scenes as Madame Morrible, which meant filming her part one and part two material in quick succession.
The Emotional Toll on the Cast
For Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo, the experience was thrilling but emotionally exhausting. Grande described having to access completely different versions of Glinda, sometimes in the same week. The Glinda at Shiz University is performative, bubbly, and desperate for approval. The Glinda in part two is hollow, questioning everything she thought she knew about goodness and herself.
“We’d be shooting scenes where Glinda is at her most superficial, then two days later filming moments where she’s completely broken,” Grande explained. To manage the rapid shifts, she developed an elaborate color-coding system with sticky tabs to track Glinda’s emotional state at different points in the story.
Erivo had her own challenges. She trained extensively for the physical demands of “Defying Gravity,” building the vocal and core strength needed to sing while suspended on wires. But because of the SAG-AFTRA strike, the production had to shut down with only 12 days of filming left, leaving “Defying Gravity” unfinished.
When they returned six months later, Erivo had to drop back into that intense physical and emotional space after months away. “She had trained a year to do those stunts and to know where to put her voice,” Chu said. “And suddenly for six months she’s not doing it. Then she has to come back.”
Chu worried the break would make it harder for both actresses to reconnect with their characters. Instead, both dropped back in “so quickly and easily,” he explained. “They were these characters, and it was not as difficult as I thought it would be”.
The Creative Advantages of Simultaneous Shooting
Despite the logistical nightmares, Chu maintains that shooting both films together was essential. The alternative would have been returning to England a year or two later to shoot the sequel, by which point sets would have been dismantled, cast schedules would have changed, and the creative momentum would have been lost.
More importantly, shooting simultaneously allowed Chu to understand both films as one complete story rather than treating them as separate entities. Just 12 weeks after wrapping principal photography, he assembled a rough cut of both films and watched them in one continuous sitting.
“I needed to see how they worked together,” Chu explained. “Part one is the fairytale. Part two is the reality. I couldn’t make those tonal choices without seeing how they connected.”
That initial assembly revealed what worked and what didn’t. Some choices that seemed perfect when Chu was planning the films felt wrong when he saw them in context. The film evolved, he said, or perhaps he did.
Crucially, Chu then made a bold decision. He showed the rough cut of both films to Universal executives, then insisted they not give notes on part two. He wanted them to see the complete vision, to understand why the sequel is darker and more psychologically complex, but he didn’t want their feedback to influence him before the first film was released.
“I asked them to just put it away,” Chu said. “Don’t think about it. Don’t give me notes. Let’s focus on part one.”
When Chu returned to finish part two in January 2025, he felt liberated. The first film was already generating incredible buzz. Audiences loved Erivo and Grande. Critics were praising the world-building and emotional depth. Chu knew the foundation was solid, which gave him confidence to take bigger risks with the sequel.
“The audience loves these girls,” he explained. “They’re paying attention to every detail, so every detail we put in this movie is going to play.”
The Scene They Almost Didn’t Film
One of the most important additions to Wicked: For Good is a flashback showing Glinda as a child, illustrating how her mother’s teachings about image and goodness shaped the woman she became. This scene provides crucial context for Glinda’s transformation in part two, similar to how flashbacks to young Elphaba and Nessarose establish character motivation in the first film. The problem? They didn’t film it during principal photography.
“We had that scene in the script and I knew we should have kept it, but we didn’t film it at the time due to various pressures,” Chu admitted. Producer Marc Platt had promised they could revisit it if necessary, and when Chu returned to finish the sequel, he realized it was essential.
Filming additional scenes a year after principal photography wrapped is expensive and logistically complicated. But Chu felt strongly that the audience needed to see baby Glinda to fully understand adult Glinda’s choices. The scene was shot and added to the final cut.
This willingness to go back and get what the story needed, even after “wrapping,” exemplifies Chu’s approach to the entire production. He wasn’t locked into decisions made during the chaos of filming. He remained open to what the movie was telling him it needed.
The Strike Became a Hidden Blessing
When the SAG-AFTRA strike shut down production in July 2023, the Wicked team had been filming for over seven months straight and had completed 160 days of shooting. They were exhausted. Only 12 days of work remained, primarily the “Defying Gravity” sequence.
At the time, the interruption felt devastating. But looking back, Chu believes the forced break actually helped. “For us, it actually really helped in the end because we got to gather our energy again,” he explained. “We had been shooting for 160 days at that point.”
The break gave everyone time to recharge physically and emotionally. When they returned in January 2024 to complete the final scenes, the energy was different. Fresher. More focused.
The production wrapped on January 26, 2024, completing a journey that began with casting announcements in November 2021. From auditions to the final day of shooting, the Wicked films consumed more than three years of Jon M. Chu’s life, not counting the additional year spent in post-production on the sequel.
What This Means for Other Productions
The success of Wicked’s simultaneous shooting model has important implications for how Hollywood approaches multi-part adaptations. Traditionally, studios would wait to see if the first film succeeds before committing to a sequel. But that approach creates problems. Sets are dismantled. Actors age or take other projects. Creative momentum is lost.
By committing to both films upfront and shooting them together, Universal took a significant financial risk (the combined budget is estimated at $300-350 million). But they also ensured creative consistency. The first Wicked earned $756 million worldwide and became the highest-grossing Broadway adaptation ever. That success validates the risk.
Chu’s approach of cutting both films together early, watching them as one continuous story, and then setting the sequel aside until after the first film’s release is particularly innovative. It allowed him to understand the complete emotional arc without getting lost in the details of either individual film.
Other directors attempting similar projects could learn from Chu’s willingness to remain flexible. He went back to film additional scenes when necessary. He trusted his instincts about tone and pacing, even when they diverged from the stage version. He created an environment where his actors felt safe to take risks and explore different approaches to their characters.
Wicked: For Good Is Now in Theaters
As Wicked: For Good has officially released, early reactions suggest that Chu’s gamble paid off spectacularly. Critics who’ve screened the sequel have called it “heartbreakingly tender” and “sheer musical greatness,” with many noting that it surpasses the first film emotionally.
That wouldn’t have been possible if Chu had taken the safer route of filming part one, waiting to see how audiences responded, then returning later to shoot a sequel. The tonal shift from fairytale to reality, from hope to consequence, requires understanding both halves of the story as one complete journey.
Ariana Grande and Cynthia Erivo gave two and a half years of their lives to these films, living in England, accessing profound emotional depths, and switching between different versions of their characters sometimes daily. That level of commitment creates performances that feel lived in rather than acted.
Jon M. Chu spent nine months in pre-production mapping every detail, another seven months filming in a state he describes as “insanity,” then an additional year refining both films in post-production. By the time Wicked: For Good releases, he will have spent over three years of his life immersed in Oz.
Was it worth it? The record-breaking advance ticket sales, the overwhelming critical praise, and the genuine emotional connection audiences have formed with these characters suggest yes. But the real answer will come when audiences sit down on November 21 to see if the conclusion lives up to the foundation.
One thing is certain. The decision to shoot both films simultaneously, as chaotic and exhausting as it was, created something that wouldn’t have been possible any other way. Sometimes you have to embrace the insanity to create magic.
Jon M. Chu understood that from the beginning. Now the world gets to see if he was right.