‘Wicked’ Director Says Films Should Arrive as Scheduled Despite Actors’ Strike

The Hollywood double strike is sure to wreak havoc on the studios’ upcoming release schedules, but the director of Wicked has revealed that the musical adaptation’s two-part arrival “shouldn’t be affected.”

In an update on Instagram, director Jon M. Chu said that, due to the actors’ strike, production has been “paused until the strike is over,” with “the last pieces of the movie” left to shoot.

“We were only a few days away from being done so we were SO close,” Chu wrote. “It’s been very painful to put a halt to it all but we will be back! And we will finish properly strong when the time is right.”

Chu added that the scheduled release dates — Part One on Nov. 27, 2024 and Part Two on Nov. 26, 2025 — are still on target; barring an absolutely apocalyptic work stoppage, its conceivable that the second installment should finish up filming before its 2025 release.

Wicked has already faced years’ worth of delays as the adaptation of the Wizard of Oz-inspired Broadway musical — starring Ariana Grande, Cynthia Erivo, Michelle Yeoh, Jeff Goldblum, and more — was originally given a 2021 release date when it was first announced in 2019; the Covid-19 pandemic significantly postponed production, with filming not getting underway until July 2022. 

When filming on the two movies reached a midway point in April, Grande penned a love letter to the films and her character Galinda. “Savoring every millisecond left with my Galinda (although she’ll be with me irrevocably, forever). She shows me so many new things every day,” Grande wrote on Instagram.

“I am so grateful, I don’t know what to do or say… To be here in Oz where everyday is a life changing one… To be feeling, learning and growing so much at such a disarming speed… To feel so much love around me, to begin each day before the sun is up and to end after it set,” she continued. “To hold my brilliant twin flame / sister Cynthia’s beautiful, green hands every day… To work in the safest, most beautiful and loving, biggest-yet-most-intimate/tiny-feeling spaces…”