Outside one of Leicester Square’s main cinemas, small crowds gathered in shades of green, pink and glitter, a loose palette of fairies and witches.
As Wicked: For Good lands in UK cinemas on Friday and this weekend, some fans have decided that simply watching the film isn’t enough. They want to wear it.
For Nicola Deane, 33, and her sister Chloe, 27, that instinct comes naturally. The pair travelled from Ireland for what they describe as “a full weekend of dressing up”, part of a long-running tradition between them.
Dressed in matching green and pink coordinated sets today, the pair wanted to channel the Wicked characters. “Elphaba’s a bit of a badass, and I think I am too,” says Nicola, while Chloe, the “more girlie” sister, opted for pink.
For them, themed dressing is a shortcut to community. “We have the same feelings for the film, we’re all in it together,” Nicola says. Chloe smiles: “It’s magical.”
Elsewhere, another group has gathered in matching Wicked T-shirts. Coralie, her best friend, Atlanta, her mother, Sarah, and family friend Alison have come from Leicester for the weekend to mark the occasion.
Coralie and Atlanta bonded over the musical last year and each have three tattoos referencing it, with plans for more. “I felt like we needed to express how much I love it,” Coralie says.
For her mother, Sarah, Wicked is part of a longer history. “My mum first introduced me to The Wizard of Oz,” she says. “It resonated because it’s a different story that you don’t see very often. It’s really important for women to connect.”
“We’re sparkly girls,” Alison nods in agreement. “Any excuse to get a bit of glitter out.” Atlanta admits she would have “worn a pink ball gown” if she didn’t also need to go shopping afterwards. Even so, she says, “today needed something fun”.
It is a sentiment shared by many in the Wicked crowd. For Courtney Harrington, 38, dressing up offers permission to bring “a bit of whimsy” back into the everyday. She has come in pink trousers, in what she calls “a Glinda moment”, but laughs that her green jacket has accidentally channelled Elphaba. “With the state of the world, it’s just really nice to add some whimsy to your life,” she says.
Recent sales data analysed by SumUp shows just how much that whimsy has spread: a 375% jump in Wicked-related costume searches at Smiffy’s, a 20- to 25% surge in themed nail bookings reported by Cynthia Erivo’s nail artist Shea Osei after the viral “holding space” moment, and a 32% rise in karaoke renditions of Defying Gravity at Lucky Voice.
While many pre-planned their costumes, others prefer to improvise. “When else do you get the sequins out?” says Zoe Dobell, who arrived in a mix of green and a pink hair bow pulled from her wardrobe.
“Part of the fun is finding clothes I thought I never had.” For her, Wicked’s colour story is something emotional. “There’s a kind of yin and yang, isn’t there? We have moments where we feel defiant, like Elphaba, and times where you just want to wake up and be Glinda.”
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Not everyone stuck strictly to the colour palette. Holly Inch, a performer, and her friend Tamar Hopkins, an actor, stepped sideways into the wider Oz universe, Holly as the Cowardly Lion, Tamar as Tin Man, with another friend dressed as Scarecrow.
“That’s what Wicked is about, not being afraid to stand out,” Holly says. Tamar sees it as an extension of the film’s “magic beyond the screen.” “It makes our friendship stronger,” she says. “It reminds us that we have been changed for good by seeing each other.”
According to trend analyst J’Nae Phillips, this shift toward event dressing isn’t coincidental. “Films have become powerful fashion catalysts because they now function as shared cultural touchpoints,” she says. Their aesthetics spread quickly, being “easy to adopt, easy to remix,” and give people “an emotional palette they can wear.”
Phillips says there’s also a post-pandemic desire for communal experiences. “Dressing up for films creates a hybrid experience – part ritual, part fandom, part community gathering. It signals a desire for collective joy in an era where much of life feels solitary,” she says. People want to be part of the worlds they watch on screen and “Dressing up is one of the simplest, most accessible ways to do that”.
Later in the evening, fans in shades of pink and green cluster eagerly outside, Leicester Square buzzing as the sold-out screenings draw near.
