Like many other characters in the musical adaptation of "Wicked", Nessarose is portrayed very differently from the novel. In the musical, she is not chosen to be a sorceress by Madame Morrible, and was not born armless, but is instead was born with damage to her legs and uses a wheelchair. As in the novel, she is very beautiful and requires her sister's assistance on occasion, but the adaptation presents her as a more tragic character. In an effort to shoo away a persistent love-struck Munchkin named Boq, Glinda arranges a date between him and Nessarose. Boq pretends to be genuinely interested in Nessa, hoping to impress Glinda by his kindness to a disabled girl, but Nessarose becomes inordinately attached to him. After becoming the Governor of Munchkinland, following the death of her father (the former governor), she strips the Munchkins of all their rights (though they never had very many rights in the first place) and prevents them from leaving the Eastern province, all in her efforts to make Boq stay with her. This earns her the title "Wicked Witch of the East."