Wicked the Musical

The brief

Wicked the Musical – twice voted Best Theatre Production for Schools by teachers – has an extensive programme of activity designed for and with schools. This includes: 

• Key Stages 2, 3 and 4 resources for teachers to use before and after a school trip to the show.  
• Activities and lesson plans exploring the themes of the show linked to literacy, art and design and PSHE 
• Anti-bullying workshops and resources developed with the Anti Bullying Alliance 
• The Wicked Young Writer Awards – annual writing awards for children and young people aged 5 to 25, with a judging panel headed up by best-selling author Cressida Cowell and with First News as a media partner.  
• Resources to support the study of Defying Gravity, which is a set work in the Edexcel Music GCSE. 

The show’s producers wanted to engage a specialist education marketing and PR agency to work alongside its entertainment agency, to reach and engage more schools’ and teachers’ in  the show’s education programme.   

Our response 

Communitas is engaged in a strategic capacity to identify and explore all opportunities to grow Wicked’s engagement with schools, including partnerships with exam boards, multi academy trusts and other organisations. We plan and deliver all Wicked Education content, which includes creating a marketing plan to promote and sustain interest in Wicked’s schools' programme.

This has included launching dedicated Wicked Education social media channels and developing bespoke education digital content linked to an ongoing social media plan. 

Our work is focused on a number of key strands.  

Promoting education resources and GCSE work – examples of our work include: 

• Briefing the Wicked design team to produce video messages for the hundreds of Music GCSE students who are studying Defying Gravity for their Pearson Edexcel course. The show’s two leading ladies wished students good luck and encouraged them to revise hard. The Glinda video received more than 5,300 views and an overall engagement rate of 12%. 
• Sharing links to encourage teachers to download Wicked’s resources for schools. Tweets with links to schools’ resources that support Year 6 transition to secondary school have achieved 10% engagement rates.  

Promoting careers in the creative industries – examples of our work include :

• Identifying an electrician working on the Wicked Tour and interviewing him for a tweet thread about his route to a career in theatre. This was shared to coincide with National Careers Week. 
• Creating content to share on Inspiring Future Theatre Day and to promote the First News Careers with Wicked video series.    

Driving interest and entries to the national Wicked Young Writer Awards – examples of our work include:

• Liaising with bloggers and past winners to produce original blog content  
• Interviewing teachers and winners for 'on the day' social media content  
• Monitoring the education and literacy landscape for tactical opportunities to promote the competition