Wicked: How Jeff Goldblum's Wizard Of Oz Is Different From Previous Versions

This article contains spoilers for "Wicked."

L. Frank Baum's 1900 novel "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" stands as one of the most adapted novels ever published. As early as 1908 — practically the dawn of cinema — "Oz" was being translated to the screen, and the titular character of the Wizard of Oz has appeared in each of those adaptations. As such, the Wizard is a character who's been interpreted in a variety of ways, given that he's been portrayed by actors ranging from Richard Pryor, Jeffrey Tambor, Christopher Lloyd, Vincent D'Onofrio, and James Franco. When it comes to the portrayal of the Wizard in the new film version of "Wicked," two actors in particular leap to mind: Frank Morgan, who played the Wizard in 1939's "The Wizard of Oz," and Joel Grey, who played him in the original stage production of "Wicked."

When Jeff Goldblum was announced to be taking over the role in Jon M. Chu's cinematic adaptation of the Stephen Schwartz/Winnie Holzman musical (itself an adaptation of Gregory Maguire's novel "Wicked: The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West"), it initially sounded like a cute bit of stunt casting. After all, Goldblum had recently portrayed another sort of bumbling, clueless, charmingly fascist dictator: the Grandmaster in "Thor: Ragnarok." While all Goldblum had to do in order to cash his paycheck was cross out "Grandmaster" on his call sheet and write in "Wizard," his work in "Wicked" is proof that he's too consummate a performer to merely phone in a "quirky Goldblum"-esque riff.

Goldblum's performance in "Wicked" does what great actors continually do with material that's been around for centuries and done numerous times before: it breathes new, distinct life into it. Of course, Goldblum is helped by "Wicked" taking a (relatively) fresh look at Oz and its iconography. Even so, there are little nuances to his characterization that make his Wizard a fascinating man behind the curtain.

A large part of the lasting charm of Victor Fleming's "The Wizard of Oz" is its beguiling ambiguity regarding its validity. In other words: is it really happening, or is it all the dream of Dorothy Gale (Judy Garland), her traumatized noggin creating a fantasy land within her mind that's been populated by faces from her humdrum Kansas life? Given this approach, and how influential both it and the film that features it have been, the character of the Wizard has generally been a reactionary one. That is to say, he is typically used as a stand-in for another character's hopes and/or fears. In Dorothy's case, it's both, as his initial appearance as a foreboding projected image represents a domineering parental figure at first, changing to Morgan's bumbling "humbug," someone who means well and can help provide advice to her and her friend's plight.

While alternate takes on the Wizard in such media as the series "Once Upon a Time" have allowed the character more autonomy, most of the direct adaptations of Baum's books keep the Wizard as a goal, a wild card, a deus ex machina, or some combination of the three. Before "Wicked," the adaptation that sees him as his own character is the film where he's the protagonist: Sam Raimi's "Oz the Great and Powerful." A reaction to the success of the "Wicked" stage musical, the film takes a different approach to a "Wizard of Oz" prequel, with this version of the character (Franco) being a magician and con artist named Oscar Diggs who leans into the "man behind the curtain" trope, making his character akin to some of Raimi's other coward heroes, like Ash in "Army of Darkness."

Goldblum's take in "Wicked" is, at its core, a variation on all that's come before, as is unavoidable with such well-worn material. Yet his function in the story is almost the antithesis of how he's used in the 1939 film. Although Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) and Glinda (Ariana Grande-Butera) see him as a goal and a bit of a deus ex machina, this man is neither. He's a turning point that they must now react to, and it's this Wiz's own personal aims that cause conflict with them, Elphaba in particular.

As much as it's based on a beloved stage musical, a popular novel, and, of course, on Baum's fictional world and all its attendant adaptations, "Wicked" is a tricky bit of material. Chu and his fellow filmmakers double down on this trickiness by leaning into the connection to the 1939 "Wizard of Oz," revealing right from the opening moments of the film that their story will lead directly into the events of that movie in some fashion. Thankfully, none of the cast (including Goldblum) is being called upon to do imitations of the actors from the 1939 movie, but the very intention of "Wicked" is to reconfigure what we thought we knew about the story and these characters so there's still an expectation that these figures should behave somewhat like their 20th-century counterparts.

To that end, Goldblum's turn deftly threads the needle of those expectations. Of course, he can turn on that signature Goldblumian quirk with no problem, bringing his special brand of charm to the bumbling wizard. Yet this is also the actor who brought such menace to his performances in "The Fly," "Deep Cover," and "Hideaway," and when the Wizard is revealed as being behind the oppression and enslavement of the realm's animal population, it's not an arbitrary shift. In other words, Goldblum doesn't need to reconfigure his performance and suddenly laugh manically or shout or anything of the sort. Instead, he allows what previously seemed cute and endearing about the Wizard to suddenly seem tainted, unsavory, and even broken.

Again, this is all within a relatively short amount of screen time for his role in "Wicked: Part One," but Goldblum does so much of the heavy lifting to allow for the necessary turn in the plot, the tone, and the direction of the film just before it breaks for its cliffhanger. All signs point to Goldblum having much more to do in next year's "Wicked: Part Two," and after Elphaba and Glinda, he is the character I'm most looking forward to seeing more of. Who knows — in the way that it combines Goldblum's biggest strengths as an actor, the role of the Wizard of Oz may turn out to be a career-best for him.

"Wicked" is in theaters everywhere.