- Wicked was nominated for 10 awards at the 97th Academy Awards ceremony
- Nominees included stars Cynthia Erivo and Ariana Grande
- Wicked faced strong competition from other movies including Anora
Wicked was one of the biggest grossing films of 2024, but as seasoned Oscar watchers know, box office revenue doesn’t equal award success – and so it proved.
Wicked was nominated for 10 Oscars, including for Best Picture, Best Actress (Cynthia Erivo) and Best Supporting Actress (Ariana Grande) at the 97th Academy Awards ceremony.
However, Wicked was up against strong competition across the board and in the three highest profile awards, they were beaten to the award. Sean Baker’s anti-fairytale Anora took Best Picture, Mikey Maddison was named Best Actress for her role in Anora, while Zoe Saldana received the Best Supporting Actress award for her role in Emilia Perez.
Indeed, it was generally a disappointing night for the cast and crew of Wicked. Despite being nominated in 10 categories, they were only successful in two.
Wicked historic Oscar win
However, the successes were reward for the costume and production design teams who had helped to make the Wicked world come to life on screen to such great effect. Nathan Crowley and Lee Sandales took the Best Production Design gong, while Paul Tazewell scooped Best Costume Design.
But Tazewell did make history with his win – becoming the first Black man to win an Oscar in the Best Costume Design category.
The other categories that Wicked was nominated in were: Best Original Score, Best Visual Effects, Best Editing, Best Sound and Best Makeup and Hairstyling.
Oscars 2026 potential return
Wicked has taken more than $729 million at the global box office since it was released on November 22 last year, according to The Numbers. This meant it was comfortably in the top 10 highest grossing films of the year – and the only one that wasn’t a sequel, even though it wasn’t an original IP.
While Wicked wasn’t a big winner at this year’s Oscars, they could be back again in 2026 as the second chapter in the series, Wicked: For Good is released in theaters on November 21.
Anora turned out to be the bigger winner on the night, scooping five awards in all – beating Wicked in three of those categoies. If you want to check out what all the fuss about Best Picture winner Anora is, you can find out where you can view it here.
You can read about all the big moments at the 2025 Oscars here.
