Oscar winner Michelle Yeoh bewitches in 'Wicked'

Fresh off her Best Actress Oscar victory for "Everything Everywhere All at Once," film legend Michelle Yeoh has boarded a bullet train bound for Oz.

Yeoh co-stars in "Wicked," the big-screen adaptation of the bewitching Broadway blockbuster. Buzz surrounding the movie musical — which stars Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande as the witches of Oz — has been steadily building for months, and this weekend’s box office opening is expected to be massive.

"It’s a movie that really deserves all that hype and all that attention on it," says Yeoh.

Based on the 1995 novel by Gregory Maguire, "Wicked" opened on Broadway in 2003, becoming an instant hit and taking home three Tony Awards out of ten nominations. Although the stage version has been seen by tens of millions of people worldwide, Yeoh wasn’t one of them – that is, until she’d scored the role of "Madame Morrible" in the film version.

"Because of ‘Wicked,’ I went in New York to see it and then I went to London to see it, and it brought back all my memories of why I love the theatre," says the actress. "It’s so generational; from the ages of the audience…it was like, young and old and older and younger. It was just a great mixture."

The character of "Madame Morrible" has been played on-stage by a long list of celebrated performers, including Carole Shelley, Carol Kane, Sheryl Lee Ralph, and Miriam Margolyes — but Yeoh says she purposely didn’t study any previous characterizations ahead of filming.

"I went into it totally fresh. Those ladies are so amazing at what they do, and I didn’t want to try and imitate any of them," she says. "I think I went into it with a fresh mind because I knew I had [director] John Chu, I had [producer] Marc Platt, who was always there when you had to keep to the legacy of ‘Wicked.’"

"Wicked" opens in theaters nationwide Friday — and the film’s sequel is set to open in November 2025.