| The Wizard Of Oz | |
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Posted by: |
steven_stuart 01:56 am UTC 11/07/10 |
| Ryan, (or anybody who knows), have you heard anything else about ALW's "Wizard Of Oz" musical? I haven't heard much since they announced that Michael Crawford was going to play the Wizard. I am guessing that ALW and Tim Rice are planning to write new songs for Crawford. Surely this will be a golden opportunity for ALW to score another hit single. Has he had one since Jim helped him to write "No Matter What"? I don't think there was a "Love Never Dies" hit (although feel free to correct me if I'm wrong). Ryan, I was very interested to read what you wrote at the bottom of the board about "Wizard Of Oz". I wonder if anyone else on the board is as much of a fan as you are. I have been a fan of Judy Garland and the MGM film since I was a kid but I have never thought much about the wider "Wizard Of Oz" world that you are talking about. I wrote: "Ha ha. I meant Oz as in "Wizard of Oz". I am talking about the far off land of McDonaldland (where burgers and fries grow out of the ground, without killing any cows), not ordinary McDonald's restaurants. Even a veggie like me can eat the burgers in McDonaldland." You replied: "I thought that you'd meant that (It's interesting, in musical theatre, when the Peter Allen show "The Boy from Oz" was moving to Broadway, there were audience members who mistook it to be a sequel to "The Wizard of Oz".) Speaking of sequels to "The Wizard of Oz", are you aware that the original book L. Frank Baum wrote and published in 1900 spawned 39 official sequels? 13 were written by Baum, before his death, and Ruth Plumly Thompson and then Baum's illustrator John R. Neill and some other writers took over the series from then on. I can't remember what the last sequel was, "The Merry-Go-Round of Oz" perhaps. Now, doesn't it make you wonder why Warner Bros. haven't realized that this could be another enormous franchise like Harry Potter? Well, the audience has always taken to the MGM original and half of that audience have complained that they want a new film that's more faithful to the book. You see, Oz was never a dream. Dorothy really went there. And in "The Emerald City of Oz", Dorothy, Toto, Uncle Henry, and Auntie Em, all move there, permanently. "There's no place like home..." indeed." I remember the Peter Allen show when I was living in New York. Didn't he die? I think he was married to Liza Minnelli. If he was big in New York, he must have been absolutely massive in Australia. How odd that people thought his stage show was a sequel to the "Wizard Of Oz". I had no idea that there were 39 sequels, although I do seem to remember something called "Return To Oz". I see what you mean by the studios failing to realise that it could be an enormous film franchise like "Harry Potter". Do Warner Bros own the rights? I know it was MGM who made the classic. Apparently MGM made it at the same time as "Gone With The Wind" and the profits from "Gone With The Wind" covered the finacial failure at the box office of "Wizard Of Oz". "Wizard Of Oz" has now made a fortune from television (it is the most broadcast film in history) but I was amazed to find out that it lost money when first released. You wrote: "Well, the audience has always taken to the MGM original and half of that audience have complained that they want a new film that's more faithful to the book." I love the MGM original and not just because of Judy Garland's wonderful performance. How different is the book? I read it when I was a kid but I can't remember. I wonder if the ALW stage show will be more faithful to the book. I would have thought that Tim Rice might have tried to make it more legitimate by insisting on that. You wrote: "You see, Oz was never a dream. Dorothy really went there. And in "The Emerald City of Oz", Dorothy, Toto, Uncle Henry, and Auntie Em, all move there, permanently." Cool. Now that would make a great film. Is the Wizard there when they move? He takes off in a hot air balloon at the end of the MGM version. BTW, do you think ALW is attracted to the story because of the gigantic success of "Wicked"? | |
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