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There’s no place like home!

“Wicked” will fly back to San Francisco next year, my pretties.

The outrageously popular “Wizard of Oz” prequel, which made its world premiere in San Francisco in 2003 before becoming a Broadway phenomenon, will return March 9-April 16, 2016, as part of the SHN series. Based on Gregory McGuire’s 1995 novel, the Tony-winning musical traces the untold story of the wicked witch of the west, Elphaba, with a crowd-pleasing mix of girl power, ” Oz” puns and soaring tunes, such as the anthem “Defying Gravity.”

Perhaps the biggest smash in recent Broadway history, “Wicked” launched the careers of stars such as Idina Menzel and Kristen Chenoweth. The iconic musical, which won three Tony Awards and a Grammy, also became a tween magnet, turning a whole new generation onto the magic of Broadway. Crowned “the best musical of the decade” by Entertainment Weekly, the musical has also rekindled interest in the original L. Frank Baum mythology.

Tickets, $60 to $238, go on sale Dec. 4. 888-746-1799. www.shnsf.com

Contact Karen D’Souza at 408-271-3772. Read her at www.mercurynews.com/karen-dsouza, and follow her at Twitter.com/karendsouza4.

Originally Published:

“Wicked” isn’t anything new, but it’s still worth seeing again.

Based on Gregory Maguire’s novel about the secret history of Oz, Stephen Schwartz and Winnie Holzman’s musical is a blockbuster in every sense of the word. It’s big, flashy, loud and accessible, all flashing green lights and giant animatronic dragon heads. It’s been on Broadway for seven years running, and touring for five.

All that dazzle and pop could almost make you forget that “Wicked” is something else, too: smart. The spangles all come to rest on a story with multiple levels of appeal: political allegory, fantasy adventure, teen comedy and, most importantly, a genuinely moving, artfully rendered story of friendship.

The story begins years before the events of “The Wizard of Oz.” Future Wicked Witch of the West Elphaba (Jackie Burns) is a student at Hogwarts-esque Shiz University. She’s intelligent and acerbic with grass green skin, so naturally she’s a social pariah. And naturally she’s forced to room with perky queen bee Glinda (Chandra Lee Schwartz), who’s as grossed out and fascinated by Elphaba as Elphaba is with her.

The two form an unlikely friendship tested by a combination of boy troubles and political upset in Oz. Creepy, Nazi-esque treatment is being visited upon Oz’s talking animal population, and it turns out the Wizard (Richard Kline) isn’t exactly as advertised.

The show is filled with probably the best music and lyrics Stephen Schwartz ever penned, poppy as hell but not without musical merit. But for every great song (the clever and hilarious “Popular,” the show-stopping “Defying Gravity”), there’s a middling one (the synth-y love duet “As Long as You’re Mine”). The group numbers are nothing to write home about; Elphaba and Glinda’s assortment of solos and duets are what stick.

The relationship between the

Elphaba (Jackie Burns) gets schooled on how to be “Popular” by her new insistently-imposed BFF Glinda (Chandra Lee Schwartz) in the Broadway musical blockbuster “Wicked,” playing at the Cadillac Palace Theatre in Chicago through Sunday, Jan. 23.

The antenna atop Chicago's Willis Tower was illuminated bright green Friday night, a coincidental welcome back to Elphaba (aka the Wicked Witch of the West) on the press opening night of the musical “Wicked” at the Cadillac Palace Theatre.

“Wicked's” triumphant Chicago return is via one of two national touring companies of the 2003 Broadway blockbuster, and it still proves itself to be a well-oiled machine that delivers a heady dose of theatrical spectacle and touching (if somewhat muddled) storytelling.

Now, some die-hard “Wicked” fans will note slight changes in the physical production from the musical's record-breaking run of more than 1,500 performances from 2005 to 2009 at Chicago's Ford Center for the Performing Arts Oriental Theatre.

Eugene Lee's Tony Award-winning set design feels a shade smaller in this touring incarnation, with not quite as many twinkling lights in the “Ozdust Ballroom” scene and a more-mechanized hovering dragon above the stage. Also, the built-in stage framing staircases are now gone in favor of elevated platforms wheeled on from the wings.

But aside from these minor physical changes, “Wicked” retains director Joe Mantello's staging magic in depicting a revisionist take on “The Wizard of Oz.” And it's all lushly illustrated throughout by Susan Hilferty's whimsically plush costumes and Kenneth Posner's color-saturated lighting design.

This “Wicked” cast is also uniformly strong, with some members finding small ways to break out of the vivid templates of the show's many memorable predecessors.

As the green-skinned Elphaba, Jackie Burns cuts a more diminutive figure and doesn't pow

I have a fairly illustrious history with the musical “Wicked,”  the inventive prequel to “The Wizard of Oz.” I had bought tickets to attend the open-ended run in San Francisco back in 2009, and was on my way to the restroom when I found out I had been hired for a website to cover theatre in San Jose. So “Wicked” was one of the last shows I attended where I didn’t have something to articulate for a reader when the curtain closed.

But the more illustrious part of the history comes courtesy of my daughter Veronica, who first experienced the musical a year later at four-years-old. Both my daughters love the show, in all its glorious, Ozian excess. And both were floored by the show, amazed by both the simplicity of many punny and warm jokes courtesy of Winnie Holzman’s book, as well as the complexity of pure Broadway spectacle that “Wicked” offers.

Both of my older girls have enjoyed different musicals at different points in their life, while my two-year-old bounces her head to anything. Right now, my oldest is all about “Bring it On” and “In the Heights.” At a time, they were both feeling “Annie,” sure to make a return with the new movie on the horizon. But their biggest phase has most certainly been about “Wicked.”

Veronica has always been a good sleeper and a good napper. One time, she actually slept until noon. For my wife and I, that concept exists in a foreign land a few bedrooms away. So as one could imagine, waking her up early has always been a challenge. But we found something that worked like magic.

In Galinda’s opening number “No One Mourns the Wicked,” about halfway through the song, a midwife begins to sing about Elphaba being born. “The baby’s coming” shouts the midwife.

I don’t know exactly when it happened, but I was playing the soundtrack early one morning, and at that very moment of the midwife’s lines, Veronica woke up running around the house