It's easy to look at the almost $2 billion in ticket sales for "Wicked" and assume it was always destined to be a hit, but it started as a risky musical adaption of a not-so-famous novel that was a reframing of an extremely famous story. Mixed reviews of musical numbers and songs that demanded serious vocals meant there was no room for error. Where did this future Broadway cash cow first test whether audiences were ready to root for the green girl?
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Correct Answer: San Francisco
(Source)Elphaba cast her first spell in public at San Francisco's Curran Theatre in 2003. The show officially opened on June 10, 2003 (Happy birthday!), and ran through June 29 before the creators packed up their giant dragon and headed to New York's Gershwin Theatre that October. The San Francisco run saw a slew of changes, including an expanded role for Elphaba and a complete retooling of the introduction of Fiyero, which is how we got the number "Dancing Through Life." Script changes were happening so fast that Idina Menzel was literally reading new lines off Post-It notes in the wings. But it all paid off and now "Wicked" makes enough money that if Elphaba really wanted to defy gravity she could probably just buy a private jet.
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