'Wicked' Stays True to Its 1900 Roots as Ruby Slippers Flip Back to Silver

The eagerly anticipated, star-studded Wicked just had the biggest box office launch of all time for a Broadway adaptation, bringing in $163 million globally during the weekend of November 22. While Wicked is often described as a prequel to 1939's The Wizard of Oz, conspicuously missing from this year's blockbuster release are Dorothy's iconic ruby slippers. Instead, costume designer Paul Tazewell reimagined the shoes in silver, glittering with more than 1,000 crystals in a swirling, tornado-inpired motif.

The choice of silver slippers remains true to L. Frank Baum's original 1900 novel, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz.

Thirty-nine years later, with MGM's big-budget The Wizard of Oz set to film in vibrant Technicolor, screenwriter Noel Langley feared that silver slippers would fall flat against the vivid Yellow Brick Road. According to film lore, the screenwriter tasked chief costume designer Gilbert Adrian with creating ruby slippers for maximize visual impact.

The silver slippers seen in the current release align with the silver ones used in the long-running Broadway production of Wicked, as well as in the novel of the same name penned by Gregory Maguire.

The shoes play an important role in the story-telling as they give Elphaba’s sister, wheelchair-bound Nessarose (later to become the Wicked Witch of the East), the ability to walk. The same shoes give Dorothy the power to return to Kansas.

“I have the heel starting as a tornado of jewels that swirls up and then wraps over the foot, and swirls around the foot,” Tazewell told Women's Wear Daily (WWD). “We also used short socks on Nessarose when she’s wearing the shoes, which is how we see them on Dorothy in ‘The Wizard of Oz.'”

Tazewell told WWD that the shoes were 3D printed and then hand-jeweled with 1,165 Preciosa crystals. As with Dorothy's ruby slippers, a number of versions were fabricated.

Dorothy’s Ruby Slippers in the 1939 film were originally adorned with the bugle beads that prop designers used to simulate rubies. When they proved to be too heavy, the solution was to replace most of the bugle beads with sequins, 2,300 on each slipper. The butterfly-shaped bow on the front of each shoe is rimmed in 46 rhinestones, surrounding 42 bugle beads and three larger rectangular faux jewels, according to Footwear News.

Tazewell told WWD that he wanted the shoes to resonate as a piece of jewelry, seeking inspiration from the design of crowns, such as the Boucheron Wave Tiara made in 1910.

“I was looking at the movement of those wave shapes… but I really just sank into the world of spirals because that seemed to be the best way to represent the most whimsical shoe that I could," he said.

The spiral motif is a nod to the tornado that swept Dorothy out of Kansas and into the Land of Oz.

Entertainment Weekly pointed to an Easter Egg in the new release. During the "Popular" number, Glinda (Ariana Grande) selects clothes and shoes from her wardrobe as options for Elphaba (Cynthia Erivo) to wear. The first item is a sparkly pair of ruby red heels, which Elphaba rejects.

It is rumored that the silver slippers will have an even more prominent role in the second half of Wicked, which is set to release a year from now.

In an interesting turn of events, one of the five known pairs of Ruby Slippers to have survived the 1939 production will be sold this Saturday via Heritage Auctions. The current online bid is $1.15 million ($1.43 million including the buyer's premium).

Credit: Screen grab from Universal Picture's Wicked Official Trailer 2.