Jon M. Chu Shut Out of Best Director Category Despite Strong ‘Wicked’ Showing
Despite having the second-best showing for a film overall, Wicked director Jon M. Chu was shut out of the best director category for the 2025 Oscars.
The beloved stage musical turned beloved box office hit managed to snag 10 nominations at Thursday’s announcement ceremony, hosted by Wicked’s own Bowen Yang and comedian Rachel Sennott. Wicked has been nominated for best picture, actress in a leading role and actress in a supporting role for Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande, respectively.
The film also raked in a slew of crafts nominations including production design, sound, visual effects, costume design, editing and hair and makeup styling. However, Chu was not the film’s only snub. The film’s writers, stage musical book writer Winnie Holzman and Dana Fox, were also shut out of the adapted screenplay category. Chu, Holzman and Fox did not receive any Golden Globes nominations for their respective categories.
Chu, who considers himself “a huge fan” of the stage musical, guided Wicked through its process to the screen, after initially having to turn the project down due to a scheduling conflict. “We started doing daily Zooms, three or four hours a day, where we would go through every line of the Broadway script and the movie script, which wasn’t quite there yet, and they would tell me why Stephen wrote the lyric this way, or how the number ended up this way,” the director told The Hollywood Reporter ahead of the film’s release last year.
You Might Also Like
“This took months and months, of just sitting there listening to all their stories,” he continued. “I didn’t talk much.”
Chu has been working consistently as a director since his college days when his USC student short When the Kids Are Away was noticed by the likes of Steven Spielberg. The director verged into household name status by directing the 2018 film adaptation of Crazy Rich Asians, a critical and box office hit.
Wicked tells the untold story of the witches of Oz. The film and the forthcoming second part, Wicked: For Good, set to hit theaters in November 2025, are based on the 2003 musical of the same name, which was originally adapted from the best-selling novel by Gregory Maguire. Academy Award-winning composer and lyricist Stephen Schwartz returned to the show to adapt the musical for the screen. Idina Menzel and Kristin Chenoweth originated the roles of Elphaba and Glinda on Broadway, and made cameos in the film.
