How One Wicked Character Becomes The Cowardly Lion In The Wizard Of Oz

Major spoilers for the entire story of “Wicked” — yes, the entire Broadway musical — lie ahead, so proceed down the yellow brick road with utmost caution!

Throughout “Wicked: Part One” — Jon M. Chu’s delightful adaptation of Stephen Schwartz and Winnie Holzman’s acclaimed (and wildly successful) Broadway musical “Wicked” — we meet a fair number of characters whose stories will take some intense twists and turns in the movie’s second half “Wicked: For Good.” The most obvious, of course, is Elphaba Thropp (Cynthia Erivo), a green-skinned and ambitious young sorceress who ends up enrolled at Shiz University and will eventually become the Wicked Witch of the West; right by her side is Galinda Upland (Ariana Grande-Butera), a peppy and pink-clad student who may or may not have legitimate magical abilities and who goes on to become Glinda the Good Witch. What you may not realize, though, is that we’ve also already met the Cowardly Lion (Bert Lahr), the Scarecrow (Ray Bolger), and the Tin Man (Jack Haley), Dorothy Gale’s (Judy Garland) three companions in the 1939 film “The Wizard of Oz.” So which characters will transform into these three beloved movie characters?

We already know which characters become the Scarecrow and Tin Man, and we’ll circle back to them shortly — but the truth is that the poor Cowardly Lion gets pushed aside somewhat in the “Wicked” musical. He does appear in “Wicked: Part One,” though, so here’s where you can spot him.

In “Wicked: Part One,” Elphaba realizes something sinister is happening while she attends Shiz University … which is that Oz seems to be subjugating and tormenting speaking animals, which have spent years apparently roaming freely amongst the human populace. Elphaba, who knows a thing or two about being different, becomes close with one of her professors at Shiz, Doctor Dillamond (voiced by Peter Dinklage), a goat who teaches “Life Science” at the school and goes to great lengths to tell his students about how speaking animals are being oppressed all over Oz. This becomes abundantly clear when Doctor Dillamond is dragged away during one of his classes, horrifying Elphaba and her fellow students; he’s summarily replaced by the brisk and cruel Professor Nikidik (Colin Michael Carmichael), who pulls out a cage containing a lion cub and proceeds to tell the class that he can experiment upon the small creature and ensure that it will never speak.

Elphaba isn’t great at keeping her magical abilities in check, especially when she feels strong emotions — and as a result of her fury, she accidentally casts a spell involving a bouquet of poppies she gave to Doctor Dillamond before his imprisonment, putting everyone in the room to sleep except for Elphaba herself and Winkie prince Fiyero Tigelaar (Jonathan Bailey). The two steal the lion cub, run away — stashing him in a bike basket very reminiscent of Toto’s main form of transport in “The Wizard of Oz” — and set him free in the woods, ensuring his safety before returning to school. Not only is this an important scene for Elphaba and Fiyero’s relationship, but the lion cub is very clearly the animal that becomes the Cowardly Lion, which gives us context for the character.

Unfortunately for this cute little lion cub, his time in “Wicked: Part One” may well be the most screen time he gets in Jon M. Chu’s two-part film. The truth is that the Cowardly Lion barely appears in the “Wicked” musical — in fact, both he and Dorothy are sidelined in favor of the Tin Man and the Scarecrow, largely because those characters experience enormous transformations. The Tin Man is first introduced into the musical’s storyline as Boq, a Munchkin who falls in love with Glinda but is coveted and ultimately controlled by Elphaba’s younger sister Nessarose, who is played in the movie by Marissa Bode and becomes the Governor of Munchkinland after her and Elphaba’s father dies. To try and keep Boq by her side, Nessarose oppresses the Munchkins, and when Boq tries to leave, the future Wicked Witch of the East casts a spell that goes horribly wrong and almost destroys his heart; Elphaba saves his life by turning him into a man made of tin who doesn’t need a heart. The brainless Scarecrow, meanwhile, is Fiyero, and he’s also transformed by a spell that Elphaba casts to try and save him from harm.

In fact, the Cowardly Lion only shows up in the Act 2 number “March of the Witch Hunters” in the Broadway musical … sort of. Now the Tin Man, Boq, angry at Elphaba, tugs on the Lion’s tail and accuses him of being “cowardly” and unable to share what the Wicked Witch of the West did to him with the furious crowd. Based on this, we can safely assume that the lion will probably play a small role in “Wicked: For Good,” which hits theaters and concludes Elphaba’s story on November 21, 2025.