JONATHAN BAILEY As Fiyero In Wicked: Part One (2024)

WICKED (2024)

JONATHAN BAILEY as FIYERO Wicked Part 1 (2024) dir. Jon M. Chu

WICKED (2024) dir. Jon M. Chu

Jonathan Bailey as Fiyero during the last part of 'Dancing Through Life' in the library (WICKED Part 1)

♫ let them know the wicked witch is dead ♫

Elphaba Thropp

JONATHAN BAILEY Behind the scenes of WICKED (2024)

Thoughts on Fiyeraba and Touch

Based on the Fiyeraba February prompt "Touch"

-It's interesting that each of them has a line where they invite/give permission to the other one to touch them "Kiss me too fiercely, hold me too tight" and "Go ahead, touch".

-It's also interesting that As Long as You're Mine is not just a beautiful love song, but is very centered around sex (or other physical intimacy). Clearly touch and sex are important to their relationship and a way they show love for each other.

-They are both characters so defined by their bodies and the ways others see them, but they both see through the outer appearance others have chosen to define them by. They care about the other one's body because it's the other one's body. Their bodies are a way to connect to each other, not something to be focused on the appearance of.

-Elphaba has been really deprived of touch due to her uncaring family and the way others avoid her. Fiyero has likely had at least a handful of sexual partners and he has physical contact with a lot of strangers in Dancing Through Life, but he hasn't been touched with love and care before.

-It's obvious, but when she touches his hand in the lion cub scene it's a very defining moment in their relationship. The way it feels to touch the other one surprises and overwhelms them and makes the connection between them incredibly obvious to both them and the audience. Even if, from the outside, they may seem like an unlikely couple, the feeling they get from this contact is like a shining beacon.

-When she touches his face moments later it is an act of love and care and reestablishes the intense connection between them. They barely know each other, and yet she still feels this draw towards touching him. I'm Not That Girl shows she feels like she's not even allowed to have romantic feelings for anyone, but, in that moment, the draw towards him is so strong and natural it supersedes her insecurity.

-During As Long as You're Mine they are all over each other holding each other's faces, kissing each other's hands. There is a big sense of "this is your hand, it is a part of you and I get to touch it".

-Fiyero is a character who really believed that most of if not all of his value came from his looks, but, even after being changed into the scarecrow, Elphaba is still lovingly cradling his face in her hands as he has lovingly cradled her face that she believed no one could love

What is Elphaba and Fiyero favourite date night activity?

(This made me want to do a quick little sketch 🙈)

Elphaba and Fiyero never really got the chance to have a date night while Fiyero was human. His new straw form makes some (albeit cliché) date night ideas a little impossible. A romantic, candlelight dinner for example. Already being a romantic in every day life makes it even more difficult for him to think of a date night idea that feels truly special.

However, there’s one thing he found that seems to make them both feel the exact intimacy and warmth of their relationship.

Stargazing

Every important, vulnerable moment of their relationship happened under the stars. It’s under the light and watch of the stars that allows them the peace of being themselves - together.

𝐅𝐈𝐘𝐄𝐑𝐀𝐁𝐀 𝐅𝐄𝐁𝐑𝐔𝐀𝐑𝐘 ━ 𝑑𝑎𝑦 2. 𝑑𝑎𝑛𝑐𝑖𝑛𝑔 𝑜𝑟 𝑐𝑎𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔

Today I'm holding space for the idea that in the context of the movie, dancing is a coping mechanism for Fiyero. While caring is a cure and a solution and an answer. I mean it is nothing new, but it needs to be said.

There will be a separate post on Dancing Through Life later today, but for now, we're starting from later. At history class, Fiyero voluntarily steps up to help the lion cub, and they make it all the way to the forest. Shortly after they are safe, and start talking, Elphaba says, "I know my life would be much easier if I didn't care, but—" and Fiyero cuts her off at exactly this point in her sentence. And I think that moment is crucial. Up until now, he’s never interrupted her before—but now he does and not because he’s frustrated with how much she talks, but because of what she’s saying. He doesn’t want to hear her talk about caring. That’s a pain point for him.

Because he knows it’s easier not to care. That’s the story he tells himself.

The lyrics in Dancing Through Life go: "Why think too hard when it's so soothing?" Soothing what? You don’t need to soothe something that doesn’t hurt. Soothing is only necessary when there’s an ache. To me this means he has cared before, and he has been hurt by caring before, and now he's coping with that by dancing through life. He is soothing his pain from secretly caring just too much, by dancing. Not because he doesn't care anymore about anything, but because he can't stop doing it, so he has to keep dancing. Dancing is loud, and visible. If he dances, people don't ask questions about his personality about what he thinks or how he feels. Maybe they haven't been doing it anyway, so he distracts them by doing his little dance, and as soon as they get too close, he pushes them away. But what he believes to be true for now is that caring = painful and dancing = a way to cope with that pain

But Elphaba just saw him care—deeply. She knows he’s capable of it. And she knows how unbearably sad it must be to choose to pretend otherwise. At the same time, she also understands how painful caring can be, she just highlighted is. In that moment, they find common ground.

But Fiyero’s façade—his carefree persona—is what he assumes people value in him most. So the second he realizes Elphaba doesn’t see him that way, he panics. He thinks that if she can see through him, it means she doesn’t want him there. No one has ever appreciated him for anything beyond the image he projects. So if that mask is gone… what’s left? Why would she still want him around, if he's not fun and happy and carefree? So he starts to leave.

And then she proves him wrong.

Not only does she say "she does (want his help)," but she physically holds onto him, keeping him there. The shock on his face (second gif from the bottom) says everything—he never expected someone to want him without the act. And later, when she touches his face so gently, you can see him struggling to process it. This is the most vulnerable he’s ever been, and it terrifies him. Not only that, but Elphaba sees a scar on his face, and sees that he has been hurt, without him noticing it. She reaches out and touches him gently, not really wanting anything, and he just can't bear it.

Her caring for him is not painful, it's soothing.

His Freudian slip a few beats later—"I better get to safety."—isn’t just about physical danger. This doesn’t feel safe. Being seen, being wanted for real, is the opposite of what he’s used to. Caring and being cared for are equally scary, but only the latter seems like a completely new experience for him. However, after feeling it, he finds something so real that he just yearns for it from now on. Yearns to be seen and touched and to be needed for something he did instinctively, without a thought, something he did because it felt right.

That’s why the later scene with Glinda is so important. When she holds his hand, the shot mirrors the moment with Elphaba—but with one key difference. Glinda is pulling him away, back into the world of pretense. But he can’t go back, not after this, and you can see him looking back at where he came from, back to the forest, back to Elphaba, back to being seen. For once, caring was not painful, and someone cared for him as well.