Bowen Yang has spoken out about a deleted scene from the Wicked movie that we think fans are going to want to hear about.
The Saturday Night Live comic recently sat down with YouTube personality Trisha Paytas for a wide-ranging interview, in which the host confessed to being a long-time “stan” of Wicked cast member Ethan Slater.
“Look, he is jacked under that shirt,” Bowen revealed, prompting Trisha to reveal exactly how he acquired this information.
And that was when he let slip that there is a deleted scene from Wicked which saw both Ethan and his co-star Jonathan Bailey “ripping their shirts off”.
“They shot a whole montage after Popular… just to show the audience, ‘these are all friends now, Fieryo, Glinda, Elphaba, Nessa and Boq’, the five of them, running around in the fields, hanging out,” Bowen said, pointing out the reason Elphaba has poppies in the classroom scene is because of a deleted scene set in a poppyfield.
He continued: “There was one moment – and there were paparazzi shots of this because they had to shoot in, like, a park in London – of them hanging out, where it’s Boq and Fiyero, Jonathan Bailey and Ethan Slater, ripping their shirts off. And so you were supposed to see Jonathan Bailey in his full shirtless glory, like flexing.
“And then Boq, in the story of the movie, being insecure, and wanting to look hot too, and take his shirt off. But then it’s like, ‘wait, Ethan’s got a great body’...”
In the end, Bowen added, the scene was cut because, at 160 minutes, Wicked is already a lengthy enough watch.
However, Trisha insisted: “I think people would have loved a three-hour movie if that’s what was included. That’s what people wanted! What??”
“I might get in trouble for saying that,” Bowen concluded. “But the movie’s out, it’s fine.”
Jonathan shot Wicked at the same time he was also filming both Bridgerton and Fellow Travelers, which he admitted had a rather unpleasant side effect.
Meanwhile, Ethan made headlines during filming of Wicked when it was reported that he and co-star Ariana Grande had begun a relationship on set, which they have since both spoken out about.
