One question that has been on many fans’ lips in the lead-up to the release of Wicked For Good was just who would be playing Dorothy in the film.
Anyone who has seen the stage musical Wicked knows that Dorothy, the iconic character from The Wizard Of Oz, does play a role in the story, although the character never actually appears on stage.
It’s a running bit that Dorothy is never seen, although she is spoken to off stage, and appears in silhouette form – and this trend is largely followed in the big screen adaptation.
For the past year, Matilda actor Alisha Weir had been heavily rumoured to be playing Dorothy after she walked the red carpet at the first film’s premiere in November 2024.
Alisha already has plenty of experience in musical theatre both on stage and on screen, and would have also been the perfect age to play Dorothy. She even fuelled the speculation when she refused to confirm or deny whether the rumours about her taking on the role were true.
However, it’s now been revealed that it is actually Bethany Weaver who plays the character first made famous by Judy Garland in the new screen musical.
Bethany is an English choreographer, dancer and actor who trained at The Urdang Academy in London. She appeared in a number of theatre productions, including Rumi the Musical and Broken Wings the Musical, as well as choreographing the West End musical play Asmahan.
Although Bethany has not yet spoken directly about the exciting casting news, What’s On Stage claims her Spotlight casting page has been updated to include both the original Wicked film (in which Dorothy appears for a few seconds during its introduction) and its sequel.
According to members of the press who have seen Wicked For Good, Bethany appears for just over a minute on-screen, but has no dialogue, and her face is always obscured.
Director Jon M. Chu has a very specific reason for keeping Dorothy’s face concealed in the film.
“I didn’t want to step on who you think Dorothy is in whatever story that you came into this with,” he told People, adding that the new film “is still Elphaba and Glinda’s journey, and [Dorothy is just] a pawn in the middle of all of it”.
Elphaba herself, Cynthia Erivo, also approves of hiding Dorothy’s face and believes it helps maintain the legacy of the original film. “I think that’s such a wonderful thing to do because then everyone gets to keep the Dorothy they know,” she told Empire.
Ariana Grande also spoke to Empire about Glinda’s relationship with Dorothy, admitting her character isn’t helpful to the young girl when it comes to giving directions to the Yellow Brick Road.
“I love the little bit of shadiness that Glinda has towards Dorothy,” she told the magazine. “There’s a lot going on, and she doesn’t really have time to deal with this. She could have told her to take the Emerald City train! But she didn’t. That’s a little shady, Glinda! So I leaned all the way into Glinda sort of having an eye roll for Dorothy whenever she has to deal with her,” she added.
Wicked For Good hits cinemas on Friday 21 November.
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