Writer’s block

A wicked political statement

Exploring the correlations between the hit musical “Wicked” and our country’s lack of popularity in the Middle East

By Paul Banks

Recently, I was lucky enough to be in the same V.I.P. room of a Rush Street establishment with the three authors of “Wicked.” (Currently running open-ended at the Oriental Theater, “Wicked” is now the all-time highest box office grossing play in Broadway history.)

A friend of a friend introduced me to Gregory Maguire, author of the 1995 novel that inspired the spell-binding production. After a couple of stiff drinks, I worked up enough courage to ask Maguire about the story’s hidden meaning, bringing up his quote in “Wicked: The Grimmerie. A behind the scenes look at the hit Broadway musical.” Maguire remarked how the media buildup preceding the first Gulf war influenced his work. “I found myself riveted by how the British press vilified Saddam Hussein to galvanize public opinion in support of the military action against Iraq,” he said.

I then questioned Winnie Holzman and Stephen Schwartz, who wrote the play’s music and dialogue. As the night continued, the conversation deepened, and the writers revealed their true artistic intentions. The allegorical truth came out with only this journalist there to record it.

“The Wonderful Wizard of Oz,” L. Frank Baum’s classic novel, is an allegory of 1890s U.S. history. In 1964, a prep school teacher named Henry Littlefield wrote an explanation of its metaphors, which was eventually published in the scholarly journal, American Quarterly. Over the years, scholars, economists, writers and many others expanded upon these ideas.

Littlefield‘s allegory of Gilded Age economic and social issues:

Dorothy = ordinary American people.
The Kansan represents the good natured but naive “Joe six packs” who have been led astray and seek the way back home.

Tin man = industrial workers dehumanized by capitalists.
He represents the American working class who were treated as commodities by the robber barons of the era. He seeks a heart because big business views him (labor) as replaceable machinery.

Scarecrow = American farmers.
He needed a brain to realize their political action was unfavorable to their economic self-interests. Recently, Thomas Frank wrote the immensely popular book “What’s the matter with Kansas?” which tells us that not much has changed in 100 years. Rural people still vote in a self-defeating manner.

Wicked Witch of the East = Eastern bankers and capitalists.
The “captains of industry” kept the “little people” (munchkinland residents) under their thumb. The symbolic identity of the the Wicked Witch of the West has been disputed over the years, but was likely a different set of “robber barons,” who made their fortunes off the backs of ordinary people.

The cyclone = political revolution.
This symbol was used by political cartoonists of the 1890s to represent political upheaval. In this case, a hopeful change of power moves away from big business and toward populism.

Yellow brick road = gold standard leading to nowhere.
The populists were in favor of the silver standard for currency, opposing both the gold standard and greenback paper currency. Judy Garland’s ruby slippers were originally silver in the book to represent the silver standard and the way to get home.

Emerald City = Washington D.C.
The setting depicts what would happen if the capitol adopted the greenback standard.

The Cowardly Lion = William Jennings Bryan
Bryan became a hero within the American left for his famous “Don’t crucify me on a cross of gold” speech, but he was ultimately all roar and no bite, never finding the courage to defeat McKinley.

The Wizard of Oz = President McKinley
The ruler in the Land of Oz, perceived to be all-powerful, but in the end is exposed as a fraud who maintains his power through deception. President McKinley was said to have enchanting political skills, using elaborate image manipulation, not ideological substance, to stay in office.

Allegory of current events and foreign affairs, represented by the characters in the play “Wicked”:

Elphaba, the Wicked Witch of the West = America’s presence in the Middle East.
In this prequel, set before Dorothy’s arrival in Oz, the Wicked Witch of the West (now named Elphaba) is the heroic protagonist; and we learn how she was misunderstood and unjustly vilified by a fear-mongering authoritarian Wizard. Despite the best intentions within American ideals of freedom and democracy, our recent foreign policy mistakes in Iraq have made us the Wicked Witch of the West in the eyes of most of the world. Elphaba sings a piece entitled “No good deed goes unpunished,” in which she laments how a cruel world and ruling elite have deemed her evil in spite of her benevolent actions. She is still a diabolical villain in the eyes of Oz due to the real villain (Wizard) behind the scenes.

For evidence of how people from Morocco to Pakistan feel about Americans, consider the highest grossing film in Turkish history. The Iraq war film, “Valley of the Wolves – Iraq” is currently playing in 13 nations and stars Gary Busey, (yes, someone actually gave him work) as a Jewish-American doctor who harvests the organs of Iraqi children and then gives them to American, British and Israeli patients. Billy Zane co-stars as a homicidal Christian American soldier targeting all Arab Muslims. (Perhaps Billy should consider hiring a new agent?) Viewers in other parts of the world (even Britain) have been waiting for weeks to see this movie with its distorted view of America. Despite this hostile political climate, you can still backpack through Europe this summer and avoid confrontations with Yankee despisers. You’ll be fine as long as you point out the Canadian flag stitched on your sack, flaunt your knowledge of the Stanley Cup, and mispronounce the words again as “a gain” and about as “a boot.”

Glinda, the Good Witch of the North = Saudi Arabia.
The play’s logo features the good witch dressed in white, whispering (and presumably revealing secrets) to the black-clad wicked witch. The close friendship of the two witches begins with a mistaken roommate assignment, but endures through romantic rivalry over the same man, intense personality clashes and opposing views. The major plot of the play revolves around these two protagonists maintaining their relationship despite Glinda being deemed good and Elphaba being ostracized from Oz. A very close friendship also exists between the ruling elite of our country and The Saudi royal family. According to the book “House of Bush, House of Saud,” Saudi Arabian interests have given $1.4 billion to firms connected to the Bush family. The democratic U.S. has maintained a complex and sometimes contradictory friendship with a monarchial nation that stands opposite on many critical issues, including separation of church and state, religion, human rights, gender issues, the role of government and criminal justice.

The Wizard = The Project for the New American Century.
The Project for the New American Century is a neo-conservative Washington think tank whose members include some of the most powerful people in our government: Donald Rumsfeld, World Bank chairman Paul Wolfowitz, Dick Cheney, Scooter Libby, Iraq ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, Jeb Bush, billionaire Steve Forbes and the aptly nicknamed “Prince of Darkness,” Richard Perle. Their core policies and beliefs include: “American leadership is good both for America and for the world,” “such leadership requires military strength” and “too few political leaders today are making the case for global leadership.”

Critics say the Iraq war is part of some secret agenda for global domination, but there is nothing hidden about their imperialist motives. It’s available for anyone to read at www.newamericancentury.org and includes this statement of principles: “The United States stands as the world’s pre-eminent power. Having led the West to victory in the Cold War, America faces an opportunity and a challenge. … Does the United States have the resolve to shape a new century favorable to American principles and interests?”

Much like the PNAC’s aims and policy initiatives (unilateralist actions, support for pre-emptive war and hostile regime change in Syria and Iran) have made us the most disliked nation in the world, the Wizard is the entity responsible for making Elphaba public enemy No. 1 in the land of Oz. The story of “Wicked” tells us that he, not the Wicked Witch of the West, is the authentic villain in Oz, and the PNAC neo-cons are the true villains in our world. After meeting Elphaba, the Wizard reveals that he has no legitimate power. The PNAC agenda pulls the strings in the government, but their power is also illegitimate, as they were not elected by the people.

Fiyero = Large, powerful oil companies
In Act II, Elphaba and Fiyero sing “As long as you’re mine,” a duet professing their love for each other. Similarly, our government has professed its love for big oil by granting it $16 billion in federal subsidies. President George W. Bush was a Texas oil man. Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice was a member of the board at Chevron (she also has an oil tanker named after her), and vice president Dick Cheney was the former CEO of a drilling company, Halliburton. With Exxon Mobil and other gigantic oil companies reporting record profits every quarter (and CEO Lee Raymond receiving a $400 million retirement package), it’s easy to picture the big oil corporations singing love ballads for the administration that helped make it possible. A whopping 84 percent of oil industry donations go to the Republican Party.

Before running off with Elphaba, Fiyero fell in love with and married Glinda. Likewise, the Saudi monarchy’s wealth and power are largely contingent on having the world’s largest-known oil reserve.

Madame Morrible = War profiteering American corporations.
Morrible works beside the Wizard to comprise a duo of detestable antagonists in contrast to the two heroines (Glinda and Elphaba) The Jack Abramoff scandal reminded us of how much the special interests control Washington. These unelected lobbyists represent the interests of private corporations (clearly beneficiaries of the Iraq invasion), not the American people. Morrible has considerable influence over the development and reputation of Elphaba, just like the handful of wealthy and connected conglomerates (Halliburton, Carlyle group, multiple defense contractors) influence the development of American foreign policy and our reputation abroad. See the documentary “Why We Fight” for more elaboration on how our largest national budget expenditure — defense — shapes both our foreign and domestic policy.

Nessarose, the Wicked Witch of the East = Great Britain.
After Israel, the two least favorite countries in the Middle East are the United States and Great Britain. During a recent discussion on “The Chris Matthews Show,” Katy Kay, Washington correspondent for the BBC, explained British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s unpopularity thusly: “You (Americans) like Blair because he stood by you as a friend. We (the British) dislike him for standing by you as a friend.”

Tony Blair’s Britain is isolated in the European community because it supported the extremely unpopular invasion of Iraq. Despite all the chaos surrounding Elphaba’s fall from grace, the two sisters, Nessarose and Elphaba, remained loyal to each other. Nessarose’s vilification and subsequent assassination is a casualty resulting from her closeness to Elphaba.

The animals = The Iraqi occupation.
The Wizard explains to Elphaba that in order for his regime to be beloved by Oz, he needed a common enemy to bring everyone together. The animals represent the current enemy — all the post-regime insurgents, jihadists, terrorists we “fight over there so don’t have to fight them over here.”

Elphaba’s involvement with and support for the animals leads to her demonization, courtesy of the Wizard’s malicious propaganda campaign. America’s occupying presence in Iraq has resulted in our nation’s horrible P.R. in most of the Eastern hemisphere. Americans have not been greeted as liberators for toppling Saddam’s brutal and tyrannical regime. A recent poll on “Meet the Press” stated that 45 percent of Iraqis polled think its OK to kill Americans, and close to 90 percent want us to leave immediately. A similar example occurs in the play, when a lion cub (who will one day become the Cowardly Lion) previously freed from oppression by Elphaba, joins the witch hunt against her.

Boq = Osama Bin Laden.
Romantically rejected by Glinda, (Bin Laden was exiled from his native Saudi Arabia) Boq settles for Nessarose, but later turns on her. He leads the witch-hunting mob against both sisters (depicted by the song “March of the Witch Hunters”). Similarly, Bin Laden is the most vocal and violent spokesperson of anti-American sentiment in the world. Boq is a misfit in the land of Oz, but he views himself as a freedom fighter representing the munchkins, who he believes had their rights stripped away from them by their “wicked” governor Nessarose. Similarly, Bin Laden and his Al-Qaeda followers are rejected by almost all Islamist governments and fundamentalist groups. Despite his marginalization, Bin Laden still views himself as a revolutionary struggling against Israel and the presence of American military bases in Saudi Arabia.

 

OK, so is this (over) interpretation too elaborate, the allegory too absurd? Well, I never did meet Maguire, Schwartz or Holzman in real life. And, of course, no part of that conversation ever occurred. However, I’m not the first writer to suspect that “Wicked” is intended to mean something on another level. According to theatermania.com’s David Finkle: “In upending many of Baum’s conceits, Maguire seems to have had something of an outlandish allegory in mind.”

On the surface, the overall theme of “Wicked” is obvious to anyone who attends the play: good is not always good, evil isn’t always completely evil and good and evil are complicated, nuanced things, not completely black or white, but rather shades of gray. And this segment of stage dialogue invites further food for thought: Glinda, the good witch, refers to the killing of the Wicked Witch of the East as a “regime change.”

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