The Nita Mukesh Ambani Cultural Centre has made something of a habit of importing spectacle. After hosting crowd-pullers like The Sound of Music, Mamma Mia!,West Side Story, Life of Pi, The Phantom of the Opera and The Nutcracker, it now welcomes its ninth international showcase: Wicked, which runs from March 12-29. And not just any Wicked, but an entirely new production that carries the same beloved score and script while reimagining the direction, choreography and design for a fresh generation.

Globally, Wicked has drawn more than 65 million people across 130 cities in 16 countries. Its songs — ‘Defying Gravity’, ‘Popular’, ‘For Good ‘— have become cultural shorthand for ambition, friendship and the kind of heartbreak that still leaves you standing. The story, based on Wicked, with music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz and a book by Winnie Holzman, takes us back to Oz long before Dorothy’s neat pigtails and ruby slippers. It asks a far more unsettling question: who decided one woman was wicked and the other good?