Angela Weir went into a screening of “Wicked” on Monday night ready to be transported to the Land of Oz. But when Glinda (Ariana Grande) began to sing “Popular,” one of the musical’s early numbers, she was not the only one singing.
“It started slow. Then people heard each other — it was like they encouraged each other,” Weir said on Tuesday. “It was a beautiful scene, and then you’re taken out of it.”
As anticipation builds for the film’s release on Friday, some fans who have attended early screenings have ignored theater norms to sing right along with their favorite characters, much to the chagrin and annoyance of other “Wicked” enthusiasts. Many have taken to social media to issue a strict edict: Shush.
As a debate grew on TikTok and Reddit, a possible solution emerged this week: For those who want to join in on the duet “What Is This Feeling?” between Grande and Cynthia Erivo, who plays Elphaba, more than 1,000 theaters across North America will host singalong screenings starting on Christmas Day.
A representative for Universal said the company would not comment on the debate, and the off-key serenades have continued in the meantime.
Weir, 35, said the singing at a screening in the suburbs of Charlotte, N.C., was particularly distracting during the movie’s finale, when Elphaba belts out the show’s most famous ballad, “Defying Gravity.”
“There’s this incredible last scene of the movie, and I wasn’t even in it because I was so horrified that I could hear other people over Cynthia Erivo,” she said. “That stunned me.”
Weir, a product manager at a financial marketing firm, took to TikTok to warn other fans. Despite the background noise, she said, she loved the movie and planned to see it again later this week. She encouraged others to see it in a theater, too.
Some fans have said in comments on TikTok that they would wait until the initial rush waned before going to see “Wicked.”
“It’s so worthy of being on the big screen with big sound,” Weir said. “The idea that fans are waiting to see it because people can’t compose themselves is a bummer.”
“Wicked” tells the story of “The Wizard of Oz” from the perspective of the witches of Oz, Glinda and Elphaba, before Dorothy and her ruby slippers arrive, and imagines a world in which the two witches are friends. It is adapted from the long-running Broadway musical, which opened in 2003 with Idina Menzel as Elphaba and Kristin Chenoweth as Glinda, and quickly became a smash hit that broke box office records.
A second installment of the film is expected next fall.
This isn’t the first time in recent years that movie theater etiquette has been up for debate. In 2022, during screenings of “Minions: The Rise of Gru,” groups of young people, calling themselves “GentleMinions,” headed to cinemas dressed in suits.
Some theaters barred people who showed up in formal wear after some groups yelled and threw bananas during the film. (Some theaters also added special screenings for GentleMinions.)
Not everyone thinks the movie theater is just for viewing.
Leah Barnes, 28, a wedding planner and floral designer from York, Pa., said she identified as a “theater kid,” having performed in school and college productions for 15 years. Though she has never seen the Broadway production of “Wicked,” she has the soundtrack memorized.
Barnes said she cried the day she found out a “Wicked” movie was being released. Now, she’s excited to sing her heart out alongside some “amazing theater kids” this Friday.
“People who just are judgmental in that way — please wait to stream it,” Barnes said. During the first two weeks of the release, she said, moviegoers should expect singing. “Don’t go the first day and yell at people for singing, for sharing that kind of joy, when we’ve been waiting so long in anticipation for this movie.”
Barnes’s favorite song on the soundtrack is “For Good,” about two people who change each other for the better, which she said she used to sing with her twin sister.
“You can’t stop someone who loves it so much,” she said.
Jordan Cray, 35, grew up loving “Wicked,” and has found comfort in its soundtrack for years. When he notched his first year of sobriety, he listened to “Defying Gravity” and cried for two hours. He finally saw a live performance of the show in 2015.
But Cray is not interested in hearing anyone but the on-screen actors sing when he sees the movie in Maryland on Thursday. He went so far as to buy tickets for the seats immediately surrounding him so he could soundproof his experience to the best of his ability.
“There is a time and place for singing in movies,” he said. “People need to practice theater etiquette and act as if you’re at a Broadway show. You wouldn’t sing at a Broadway show, so why would you sing at this movie?”
Cray, a digital creator, is looking forward to deepening his “Wicked” experience with the film.
“I feel like ‘Wicked’ raised me in a way,” Cray said. “The story of being any type of other speaks to so many people. You always want to root for the underdog.”
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