Wicked questions?

Question:I just have a few questions i cant figure out...
1) Why is elphaba green? I know in the musical they make a referance to "green elixir", does this have anything to do with it?

2) In "Defying Gravity", why does glinda tell elphaba to say youre sorry?

3) In the second verse of "No Good Deed", who is elphaba talking about when she says let his flesh not be torn,
Let his blood leave no stain...? Why is she saying this?

im sure ill have some more questions later...thanks

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: I just have a few questions i cant figure out...
1) Why is elphaba green? I know in the musical they make a referance to "green elixir", does this have anything to do with it?

2) In "Defying Gravity", why does glinda tell elphaba to say youre sorry?

3) In the second verse of "No Good Deed", who is elphaba talking about when she says let his flesh not be torn,
Let his blood leave no stain...? Why is she saying this?

im sure ill have some more questions later...thanks

1) The Green elixir is a drug that causes a birth defect (her green skin).
2) Glinda is what we would cal a "goody two shoes" and she wants to be liked by all the citizens of Oz, while Elphaba just wants to dance to her own beat. Glinda wants to be with the Wizard because he will make her famous. She is selfish in that way, not thinking of her friends wants and needs.
3) She is talking about Fiyero. She means that she does not want him to die, which he will if the Ozian guards kill him.
Maybe you should see it again when it comes back to town or on your next trip to somewhere where it is playing. Yes, it is expensive but it may trigger your memory and you thinks by seeing it again. I had a lot of the same questions when I first saw it, but when I saw it again, I said, "Oh, that's why!"

She's green because of some odd birth defect...it comes out in the first scenes. You DO get that she's the Wicked Witch of the West from the old Darryl F. Zanuck production (1939, you know, the one with Judy Garland) and that was how HE depicted her...doesn't come from the original books?

I would have to get the album out to figure out your second question.

And the third is Fiyero, the munchkin or maybe he's a winkie, who becomes the Tin Wood man in the Books by Baum.

You do get where Elpheba comes from, don't you? The name? from L Frank Baum, who wrote the original books?

*edit* I'm going to see what I can search out...So far, all I can figure out is that something happens between the Wizard asking Elphaba to train with him, and the beginning of the song. Elphaba has done something wicked.

As for the Green Elixir, the only thing I know is where Elphaba fantasizes about being asked to work with the Wizard and hopes he will "de-greenify" her. She has always hated being different, and the fact that her parents (father, esp.) shunned her because she's green.

*edit 2*
When she is born, she is green because of a drink her mother purchased from the salesman and drank during their affair.

They meet the Wizard and he introduces him self to them, saying that he wants to make Elphaba his right hand man, so to speak, and that to prove herself she needs to give his assistant, a monkey named Chistery, the ability to fly (Sentimental Man). She opens up this ancient and immensely powerful sorcery book called the Grimmery and proceeds to chant out a spell. To their amazement, Chistery grows wings. The wizard then shows Elphaba her power by opening a curtain and showing her a cage full of monkeys with wings, and that she had done that, and now they would be perfect spies. Elphaba now realizes that she's been duped into helping the Wizard exploit and harm animals, such as Dr. Dillamond (in Oz, animals are normal citizens like people and munchkins, etc.), making them the "common enemy", just so that he could be popular and beloved. She also understands that he has no power at all and needs someone with power, like her, to do things for him, using the Grimmery. She steals the Grimmery and escapes. She says goodbye to Glinda, vowing that she now knows her destiny, what she is meant to do, and how she'll fight the wizard with every last ounce of strength (Defying Gravity).

It was the stealing of the Grimmery...that's what she should apologize for.

Wow. I had to read through that whole long thing Sue typed and edited and edited. Oy.

(1) Ephalba's mother drank a green elixir when she had an affair, so the baby it produced came out green.

(2) They were fighting, but Glinda doesn't want to be the first to say she's sorry. She's trying to teach Ephalba to be more civilized.

(3) I'm not sure which point is the second verse, but she tries to protect Fiyero, her lover, by turning him into a scarecrow. That part of the song is her incantation.

I hope that's more succinct.

Wow! That was a long first explanation. Here's what I can offer.

1. She's green physically because of the elixer. There are other references to this in the book "Wicked" by Gregory Maguire.

2. Glinda tells Elphaba to say she's sorry to the Wizard, thinking that will make everything better and will keep the citizens of Oz from turning against her via the word of the Wizard and Madame Morrible.

3. She is casting a spell to save Fiyero. He had been taken into captivity by the Wizard's guards when trying to protect her. She loves him in return, so to keep him alive she casts a spell which, in turn, turns him into the scarecrow.

1) she's the WIcked Witch of The West and her father was teh Wizard but in his younger days he gave Elphaba's mother, melena, the green elixer to drink and it made her green

2) elphaba cast a spell on a monkey and made it fly then she screamed at the wizard and stole the grimmerie so glinda tells her to say she's sorry and she can still work with the wizard

3) she's talking about Fiyero who was taken away because he was in alliance with Elphaba who everyone figured was wicked so the guards put him on a stake to die and she cast a spell that turned him into the 'scarecrow' from the wizard of oz. and in no good deed she is basically casting the spell and saying how she feels like nothing she has done has ever helped anyone and how it only makes things worse