Glinda Is a Gift That Keeps on Glittering for Wicked Star Allie Trimm

The bubble comes full-circle for Allie Trimm, who currently stars as Glinda in Wicked on Broadway. She remembers falling in love with the spellbinding tale many years ago when the hit musical’s national tour played in her hometown of San Diego, California. As cinemas across the country prepare to roll out the emerald carpet to commemorate the release of Wicked: For Good in just a few short weeks, Trimm is taking in the view from the best seat in the house. After all, there’s no place like Broadway.

The Broadway Show’s Tamsen Fadal sat down with Trimm to talk about her experience making magic on stage. Trimm never wields the wand lightly, she knows that she’s dancing in the garments of greatness. It says so on the tag. “When you are the standby, or an understudy, or an incoming member, you typically are using costume pieces that have been used by previous performers,” Trimm explained. She joined the cast as a standby for the role of Glinda in 2021. Though playing the good witch full time now comes with its own set of custom costumes, Trimm hasn’t forgotten those hand-me-downs. “You could look at the history of tags. So I could see that I was wearing Megan Hilty’s corset, and Katie Rose Clarke’s Act II skirt, and all of these different people’s literal fabric that they embodied. So there’s a very tactile, real way of feeling a part of the lineage, and I think that’s just so special and cool.”

The Wicked: For Good producers hosted a private screening for the current and original Broadway companies of the musical, as well as the film’s stars, to watch the final chapter together. It was a happy reunion. Trimm and Ariana Grande both made their Broadway debuts together back in 2008, playing Patrice and Charlotte in the Jason Robert Brown musical 13. “We were teenagers together on Broadway and she’s soaring as Glinda now,” Trimm said.

The musical has already been performed in more than 100 cities in 16 countries around the world, but Trimm notes that the film adaptation takes the story even further. “A whole new audience is coming in to see the show,” she said, “because it opened 22 years ago, and now with the movies coming out, I feel like there’s such a wider net that Wicked can reach worldwide.” The current Broadway company, which Trimm leads alongside Lencia Kebede as Elphaba, has enjoyed seeing new Wicked audiences learn the ending for the first time, as everyone eagerly awaits the film’s final chapter.

Trimm’s earliest Wicked memories involved watching tour leads Kendra Kassebaum and Stephanie J. Block perform. The second time she saw the show as a tween, Trimm recalled wearing a hand-bedazzled t-shirt that caught Kassebaum’s attention at the stage door. “She took me backstage with a friend of mine, she showed us behind the scenes and she Galinda-fied us. She put glitter on my eyes and let me hold her wand. I remember thinking, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m in Wicked right now. I’m in it. This is what I want to do.’ I was so impacted by her generosity with her time, her space, and energy.”

That experience has shaped the way Trimm shows up in the rehearsal room and at the stage door. She’s committed to paying it forward. “For a long time we weren’t allowed to do backstage tours because of Covid restrictions, so I started making these little pink flower barrettes,” Trimm said. “If I did have the capacity to go to a stage door on a certain show, I would put these little barrettes in little kids’ hair as a way of honoring that experience that I got as a child and trying to keep that cycle moving forward as well. Because it was just so special to me and it changed my life.”

Watch the interview below!

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