'Wicked' director gets honest about deleted scene

Jon M Chu, the director of Wicked, had deleted a scene from the film. After the film's digital release, he explains why he does that.

The scene involves an exchange between Elphaba and Glinda, as the latter is seemingly shown in a rare and vulnerable light.

“I would’ve helped you if you needed someone,” the Good Witch says in the scene after Elphaba makes her classmate sleep with a spell to escape Fiyero with a caged lion cub. “You could’ve picked me.”

“I’m sorry, it was a mistake. I won’t leave you behind again," the Wicked Witch replies.

Jon noted it "was one the hardest scenes to cut” from the movie because “it’s of the relationship and you really get to see Glinda’s side of things”.

“She sort of realises she doesn’t have this power even though she’s always pretended she has the whole time,” he told MTV UK.

“That she’s actually much smarter, and that she actually, genuinely wants to be Elphaba’s friend," the director added.

But, double downing his decision, Jon explained that the scene was cut to ensure that the emotions in another scene, which shows Elphaba inviting Glinda to Emerald City, were not overshadowed.

“You already know that if that’s Elphaba’s heart, she’s not going to leave her behind,” he continued.

“By holding it back, the audience doesn’t know, and that made the train scene much more exciting and more emotional when she does invite her. And that is ultimately her decision."

“When she looks back at her, she is saying with her eyes, whether we hear it or not, that I will never leave you behind again. So it sort of served a purpose in another way. We kept a little ahead of the audience there," Jon concluded.