Turning the Broadway blockbuster Wicked into two Hollywood mega-movies seemed like a feat fit for a wizard. Luckily, the voices of multi-hyphenate Cynthia Erivo and pop powerhouse Ariana Grande are more than strong enough to carry the beloved reimagining of L. Frank Baum’s Oz into a new era. The two actors’ portrayals of Elphaba (aka The Wicked Witch of the West) and Glinda the Good are, they told Apple Music, rooted in their own personalities—and that extends to the way they sing composer Stephen Schwartz’s songs. “Because of how our voices are set up, and how we are, and how we interpret music and how we hear it, it just ends up feeling like us,” Erivo says. Picking up five years after the first movie’s ending, Wicked: For Good finds Elphaba in exile and firmly established as an evil entity, while Glinda is ensconced in Oz’s upper echelons, working for Jeff Goldblum’s Wizard of Oz. The film follows Elphaba and Glinda on their separate paths that eventually intertwine once more, with songs like the bittersweet “Thank Goodness”, the vengeful mini rock opera “No Good Deed” and the enticingly campy “Wonderful” possessing a new-found vigour. While the first half of the Wicked diptych, which came out in 2024, had no new songs on its soundtrack, the music for the second instalment has two fresh tracks, both penned by Schwartz: “No Place Like Home”, an initially rueful yet ultimately resilient anthem about summoning inner strength in the face of adversity sung by Erivo’s Elphaba; and “The Girl in the Bubble”, a fluttery, regretful ballad performed by Grande’s Glinda. The emotional climax of the film is the storied duet “For Good”, in which Elphaba and Glinda look at the journey their friendship has taken and ruminate on how meeting each other altered their fates. The two actors’ performances are measured yet full of intensity, allowing complex emotions to bubble to the surface. “What I love so much about that is that it’s just two people connecting, and there’s no bells and whistles that someone might think to do in that moment,” says Grande. “People started to look at each other a little differently because of this, and look at themselves a little bit differently because of these characters,” says Erivo. “I think that’s a really special thing to be a part of. We haven’t just created something that was really entertaining, we created something that could sit in the hearts of people and open people up.” Below, Erivo and Grande break down some of the Wicked: For Good tracks, including the newly written Erivo showcase “No Place Like Home”. “Thank Goodness” Ariana Grande: “The moment where I feel like Glinda and I are most adjacent in certain personal ways is ‘Thank Goodness’. We have a little bit of commonality in that feeling that I’ve experienced in my own life. I didn’t even know in the moment because I was Glinda, but watching it back, I was like, ‘Oh my, why does that hit me differently?’ It’s nice. It’s special that we’ve been able to heal little pieces of ourselves with these witches and leave things there, and also take the best parts home with us from them.” “No Place Like Home” Cynthia Erivo: “There’s a wonderful call to action to make sure that you dive into the things that you believe, and really hold them strong, and take care of the people that you love. Even when your paths don’t end together, you still can keep love there, you can still hold on to one another. You can grow apart, but you’ll still grow together.” “Wonderful” Grande: “For everyone at home, the rollercoaster is what happens when we’re singing in the middle of ‘Wonderful’. Glinda puts the two brooms together and makes a little seat for them, and we take a little magical ride around the Wizard’s chambers.” Erivo: “And you sang something—we were in the middle of shooting, and I let out an involuntary sound of ‘mm-hmm’.” Grande: “It was the most validating moment of my professional life, singing something and Cynthia Erivo liking it and going, ‘Work!’ in the middle of a take.” “No Good Deed” Erivo: “‘No Good Deed’, for me, was very, very cathartic. That was just a big release of all of the things. It was really special. It also forced me to look back on some of the things that we’d already done, because it’s part of what happens in that particular number, so that was very freeing.” “For Good” Grande: “I remember halfway through the first day [of filming], I left my body because I was so emotionally drained. It feels so incredibly real, and all you can really do is sink into what those words are saying. We play these women that we love, and these women love each other. It was a ride.” Erivo: “I don’t even remember doing it, but I must have moved over to a window and I was just sat there facing the window on my own.” Grande: “I was hugging Arthur [Fenn]. He’s our sound operator. He was holding the boom and I literally was just latched on to him, sobbing, while you were by the window when we were waiting to roll. So dramatic, I can’t help it. What I love so much about that moment is that it’s just two people connecting, and there’s no bells and whistles that someone might think to do in that moment. It’s just a really connected moment. And I savour and wish that people knew about the in-between moments, too, while setting up for a different shot or whatever. Being there and seeing it, it feels so personal.”