Wicked's production designer explains how the sets were created for the film
Nathan Crowley reveals the mammoth effort that went into physically building Wicked's huge sets, and why it was better than using VFX.
“You don’t hire me for VFX films!,” says production designer Nathan Crowley. “I get a lot of complaints like, ‘This set is too big,’ but at the end of the day, everyone comes back and says, ‘Actually, it’s perfect.’ I get a lot of flak, and when I sit in a production meeting and say, ‘I think we should plant nine million tulips,’ everyone looks at me like I'm insane.”
That’s precisely what he did for Wicked, where pretty much all the sets were physically built. “I had to persuade Universal Pictures to write a cheque and to trust me.”
The tulips were planted in Norfolk with help from local farmers, who sourced bulbs from Holland. “With Munchkinland, there were so many traps design-wise, like images of Hobbits and French Alpine villages. The first thing was, ‘Well, what do they do apart from sing and dance?’ We gave them a business – they grow tulips and then they use the dye to make cloth, so every house is a different colour,” Crowley explains.
“[Director] Jon [M Chu] said he wants you to feel happy when you’re in Munchkinland, because that’s how he felt watching The Wizard of Oz.”
We should expect no less from Crowley – practical effects are what he’s known for. He’s worked with a fellow enthusiast of the craft, director Christopher Nolan, on The Prestige, The Dark Knight, Interstellar, Dunkirk and Tenet, which Crowley has received Academy Award nominations for.
“We do everything for real, for many reasons. One of them is because of shooting on IMAX cameras [they’re among the highest-resolution cameras in the world].” Crowley studied interior architecture at the Brighton School of Art and went on to Bram Stoker's Dracula (1993), embracing practical in-camera techniques.
Wicked was filmed entirely in the UK, mainly at Sky Studios Elstree in Borehamwood, near London. All 13 sound stages across 27.5 acres were used, but even that wasn’t enough, so another six were utilised at Leavesden Studios.
Crowley and his construction crew, who he’s worked with for 20 years, built three giant back lots for exterior sets. These took up to 20 weeks to build, and the sets themselves were 35-50 feet high.
They were tasked with building Shiz University, the Ozian Woodlands, and the Emerald City, alongside many more notable Wicked locations. They filmed both Wicked and Wicked: Part Two (releasing in 2025) across a year-and-a-half.
“Design is about, ‘OK, how am I getting to Shiz? We can’t go by airship, because then we’d be stepping on the territory of the Wizard, who uses hot air balloons. We can't go by carriage, because the animals are free, and that would be enslaving them, and that would destroy the story. Then you realise we need a river to get there, but the problem with that is then you need water,” Crowley says. That meant some of the sets were built complete with water tanks to hold water for boats to cross.
Crowley was greatly inspired by the themes of Americana and “romantic” automatons. “The Wizard of Oz is more than just a showman, he’s an illusionist. He uses automatons, so his technology is clocks and clockwork, so the train is a clockwork train. You can't have a steam train, because it’s a very Earth-bound technology.”
Every inch of the 32-tonne Emerald City Express, which actually runs, was created to transport Galinda, later Glinda (Ariana Grande) and Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) to meet the mighty Wizard. “I thought, ‘What if it's just like Lady Penelope’s car in Thunderbirds? It's just one continuous object and only houses one or two people, because you need a special ticket to get to Emerald City.
“The Wizard of Oz is an American fairy tale, so you need America in it. A big train in an endless Midwestern barley field is a very American image, so then I was in the business of growing barley as well!”
When Elphaba and Glinda reach the Emerald City, the Wizard is first represented as a scary 15-foot animatronic head with eyes that light up, with expressions controlled by a puppeteer and a hydraulic arm to move him through the curtain.
Crawley is a bit like the Wizard, pulling the strings behind the scenes. “I like to sit in the shadows and watch people interact with the sets, because I've been working on them for months, so things move and there are surprises.” Unlike the Wizard, though, it’s not just smoke and mirrors with Crawley’s production design.
Among everything else, he’s also managed to defy gravity. For Kiamo Ko, a castle in the sky, there are a series of inverted arches, their points reaching skyward, making for a gravity-free interior. “You have to believe you’re in Oz. You have to just watch it and not question it.
“I always push to do as much practically, until we can't. With crews and actors, they get into character and it brings the story to life. It's very important to me – I believe it looks better [than VFX].”
Read more:
- Wicked's Jonathan Bailey reveals the one thing that makes his Fiyero unique
- Strictly Come Dancing legend confirms surprise role in Wicked movie
Wicked: Part One is in cinemas now.
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Authors
Laura Rutkowski is the Junior Commissioning Editor at Radio Times magazine, where she looks after a column called "What it's like to…", which spotlights behind-the-scenes roles within the TV and film industry – from stunt coordinators to costume designers. She loves finding out how productions are made and enjoys covering a wide variety of genres. Laura is half-American and half-British and joined Radio Times in 2022. She has a degree in Psychology and a Master's in Magazine Journalism.
