Marissa Bode Falls Backward in Wheelchair While Filming Wicked Dance Number ‘Dancing Through Life’
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Marissa Bode, who makes her movie debut playing fan-favorite Nessarose in 2024’s Wicked, is dishing on an “epic” on-set mishap.
The actress, 24, described the incident while speaking to Entertainment Weekly in a recent interview, explaining that she fell out of her wheelchair while filming the dance number “Dancing Through Life” with her scene partner Ethan Slater (who plays Boq in the film).
“I did fall backward one of the times. It was really epic,” Bode said, noting she was “laughing a lot” while “everyone else around me looked so concerned.
“When anyone falls, it’s the most terrifying thing,” Slater, 32, chimed in. “But there was also something disconcerting about how much [Marissa was] laughing as it happened. We were like, ‘That’s got to mean that it’s bad.’ “
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The specific scene features Boq asking Nessarose to dance in an attempt to impress Glinda (Ariana Grande). He also takes the moment to tell Nessarose that she’s “beautiful.”
“It’s such a pivotal point in the movie when they form a friendship,” Bode told EW. “To Nessa, maybe a little bit more than a friendship. But what’s established in that moment carries through the rest of the film.”
“That’s actually a big moment in the [ballroom] … realizing that what he’s done in asking her out as a friend could seem as though he were taking pity on her,” Slater added. “There’s a moment of realization of, ‘Oh, that’s actually not the right way to treat people, and I didn’t mean it that way.’ There’s a genuine connection in that moment that I’m really grateful for. There’s a real bond that they form. It just means a different thing to each of them.”
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The scene’s choreography was also specifically designed to emphasize the importance of this moment for Nessarose.
“[Director] Jon [M. Chu] made it very clear early on: This moment is about her feeling like she’s flying,” Christopher Scott, the film’s choreographer, told The Los Angeles Times about the scene.
“This is the happiest moment of her life,” he continued, “and she needs to feel all the things that she carries with her throughout her life, that we all do, just disappear.”
Along with Slater, Bode and Grande, the cast of Wicked includes Cynthia Erivo, Michelle Yeoh, Jeff Goldblum, Jonathan Bailey, Peter Dinklage and Bowen Yang.
