gervase_fen | It's not easy being green

I've wanted to see "Wicked" for a while, ever since I heard (on Russell Davies' Sunday programme on R2, I think) Kristin Chenoweth performing "Popular". I've also wanted to organise a theatre trip to the West End for Ottakarian colleagues, especially now that the journey time from where I live is more feasible.

So back in August I took a deep breath, and pre-booked the tickets for the earliest matinee possible - and so six of us ended up in Row H, centre stalls, pretty much the best seats in the theatre.

(A word or two in praise of the Apollo Victoria - it looks stunning following its recent Back-to-the-1930s refurb ; the seats were comfortable, the legroom generous, and it feels intimate - there's a real sense of being part of a rapt audience. I've been to three other musicals at other West End venues - the Adelphi, the Lyceum, and the Dominion - and it's leagues ahead.)

The first thing you notice is the resplendent wooden dragon hovering above the stage, the two quasi-medieval turrets either side, and the safety curtain - which is a parchment map of Oz, with a green, shimmering Emerald City at the centre. Then the lights go down, and Galinda descends from the sky to tell us that the Wicked Witch is dead...

There's a lot of story to tell, and the first act does it very well - it moves like a train. I was impressed with the slickness of the scene changes when I saw "His Dark Materials" at the National, but "Wicked" barely pauses for breath between songs and wonders. It's a visual feast, and the story itself is engrossing - how a sweet, lonely outsider becomes an idealist, and then a crusader - and then a hate-figure. Along the way there's power politics, dreaming spires and the odd wry allusion to the film ("What's in the punch?" "Lemons and melons and pears." "Oh my!").

Idina Menzel as Elphaba is terrific - whether she's young and gauche, impassioned, embittered or in love, she commands attention and she has a beautifully deep singing voice. Helen Dallimore's Glinda nearly matches her, and the production takes time to give both performers moments of complete silence as Glinda and Elphaba betray and are betrayed by each other.

Most of the (mixed) reviews have had little time for Nigel Planer as the Wizard, but he was breezy and charismatic : Miriam Margolyes' Madam Morrible owns her role so completely I can't envisage anyone else doing it. (David Benedict, reviewing for Variety noted that the reviews have been grudging, partly because "There's nothing London critics like less than being told they're sitting down to a Broadway triumph: It leaves them nothing to discover for themselves.")

Criticisms? Perhaps the same as with "His Dark Materials" - there's so much story to get through in Act Two that there's a feeling of boxes being ticked rather than drama being unfolded. And nothing in Act Two quite matches up to the technical tour-de-force that ends Act One.

Finally, I think one of the highlights of the afternoon for me was that we all got so much out of it.

girlygoth, her other half Bob, Bryony (poised to take over children's publishing in ten years time if her career trajectory with Usborne keeps up), Emma and Matt. Emma, who came up with her boyfriend from Portsmouth to join us, didn't mind the changes made to Geoffrey Maguire's original (as she pointed out, adapting "Wicked" faithfully, as written, would necessitate two of the principals being murdered on stage).

A shame though that, once outside the theatre at 5.30, Victoria and its environs are so bleak - there was nowhere to sit down comfortably to relax and chat.