When the much-anticipated “Wicked: For Good” film opens today on movie screens across the country, a Lancaster County native’s contribution will be on full display.
Academy Award-winning New Holland native and Garden Spot High School alum David Shirk was an animation supervisor on “Wicked: For Good,” which is the second piece of a two-part musical movie based on the popular stage show that’s been running on Broadway for 22 years.
Shirk, an animation supervisor for the Industrial Light & Magic (ILM) special effects firm based in San Francisco, was part of the visual effects team nominated for a 2025 Academy Award for the 2024 blockbuster film, “Wicked.” The team was also nominated for Critics Choice and BAFTA awards.
While the visual effects team from “Dune: Part Two” won the Academy Award at the awards ceremony in March 2025, Shirk had previously won an Oscar as part of the visual effects team for the 2013 film “Gravity.” And he and his colleagues scored another Oscar nod for work on 2018’s “Ready Player One.”
A 1985 graduate of Garden Spot, Shirk won Scholastic Arts awards as a high school student who loved to draw.
Shirk also acted in theater productions with Garden Spot Performing Arts, and was directed by English teacher Stan Deen.
(The story of how Deen mentored a troubled student is the subject of the 2023 film “Brave the Dark,” which was shot in Lancaster County. Deen died in 2016.)
Industrial Light & Magic — founded by “Star Wars” creator George Lucas and owned by the Walt Disney Co. — and a company called Framestore are both listed as contributing animation supervisors to “Wicked: For Good.”
The second film continues the “Wicked” story of college friends Elphaba and Glinda, whose lives are taking different paths now that Elphaba has discovered sinister information about the Wizard of Oz and is hated and feared as the Wicked Witch of the West. Both movies were directed by John Chu.
Screenings of “Wicked: For Good” begin today, Thursday, Nov. 20, at Lancaster County theaters Penn Cinema, Regal Manor, Reel Cinema and Kendig Square Movies 6.
