The Wizard of Oz

To help with Wicked withdrawals

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I finally FINALLY convinced my family to see Wicked with me. They are all traitors and had already seen it WITHOUT me, so they “graciously” took me to see it.

As a theatre kid, I obviously love Wicked. It’s easily a top five musical for me, this despite the fact that while there are really good songs there are also quite a number of TERRIBLE songs. It has become a family joke how much I despise the musical number “Something Bad.” If you ask any member of the family to name the two things I hate most, they’ll tell you “Something Bad” and Matt Damon. And I stand by it.

Well, the movie version of Wicked is so AMAZING, they somehow got me to not hate “Something Bad.” This is as big an endorsement as I can give anything.

The movie is fantastic, and I can’t wait to see it again. I am one of those unusual people in that I’m even more excited for Part II. In my experience, most people like the first act of Wicked more than the second (which is wrong but everyone is entitled to their opinions), but I prefer act two because it has my favorite song. I will let you guess what song that is.

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Yes, it seemed like the entire world saw Wicked before me (Can you tell I am still upset? My four favorite people all saw it without me. SEPARATELY. FOUR PEOPLE ALL SAW IT AT DIFFERENT TIMES WITHOUT ME). But once we all saw it, we decided to watch The Wizard of Oz together. The source material if you will.

Well, first we had to convince my sister to watch it with us. Ever since she listened to a podcast about the filming of The Wizard of Oz, she refused to watch the movie. She only agreed to watch it with us this time on the condition that she be allowed to point out horrific details of how certain scenes were staged. It turned out to be almost EVERY scene.

This led me to do my own investigation into The Wizard of Oz. It turns out she was right for not being on board with this movie.

So let’s take a look into the making of The Wizard of Oz. Grab your broomsticks and also maybe a drink because it is a whirlwind (tornado-wind? There is a joke in there somewhere, I’m sure).

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The Wizard of Oz is an all-time classic; The American Film Institute has rated it one of the 10 greatest movies ever made in each of its two polls (it was number 6 in their 1998 ranking and number 10 in their 2007 ranking).

How did they make such an iconic film all the way back in the 1930s? Well, they used a lot of new techniques and ideas that we now know to be dangerous. (I’ve been guilty of saying that they don’t make movies like they used to, and while that is true, yeah, it is also GOOD thing that they don’t.)

I always thought that The Wizard of Oz was the first feature film in color — lots of people think that — but it’s not true. There had been numerous color movies an even some technicolor movies before Oz. The first technicolor project was The Uninvited Guest way back in 1924. Throughout the 20s and 30s there were a number of short films with color.

It is fair to say, though, that none of those films had anything close to impact of Oz. If you are interested in technicolor and the more practical aspects of this movie, I suggest reading THIS article by the American Cinematographer where a qualified person discusses it.

What I can say is that Technicolor seemed SUCKY to work with. You needed so much lighting that the temperature on the set would constantly rise above 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Technicolor also was not cheap. It estimated that for Oz, just using Technicolor cost around $225,000 old timey money, or in today terms $4,928,469. NEARLY FIVE MILLION. So it wasn’t cheap and it was dangerous. I love how old technicolor films look but maybe its better we stick to new technology. . .

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Like any great movie there were numerous writing and directing issues. MGM was skeptical to do this movie since during this time fantasy movies were unpopular and usually just a waste of money (How fascinating that now we only have fantasy movies which make tons of money… I wonder what happened?) Fantasy movies were so unpopular than an earlier version of Oz came out with NO FANTASY ELEMENTS. That’s a weird premise, right? The Scarecrow and Tin Man were just men in costumes. Seriously. MGM originally wanted to follow suit to this earlier Oz and had the scarecrow just be a man too dumb to hold any other job besides scaring crows. Unfortunately this is a real fact, fortunately they got rid of this idea.

The movie went through three main directors, PLUS an original director before shooting actually started, PLUS a final director who did the Kansas scenes but isn’t credited.

Richard Thorpe was director for TWO WEEKS before being fired. Which is a little funny. They saw his work for two weeks and decided “Nope, that’s enough.” Thorpe had Judy Garland wear a blonde curly wig and heavy baby-doll makeup. The studio said this was an insane choice for a Kansas farm girl. As a Kansas girl myself, I find myself agreeing with the studio.

The next director was George Cukor, who moved away from Thorpe’s vision much to the relief of the studio. He was a temporary director though.

The final director, the one who is actually credited, is Victor Fleming. He did a bulk of the production. The reason he didn’t finish out the film was because he was busy directing this little indie picture called GONE WITH THE WIND.

So there were a lot of different ideas going into this movie and quite a few hands in the pot (is that how the saying goes? What does that even mean, why would hands be in a pot????)

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Let’s get into the casting of this movie because that was a whole ordeal.

They originally wanted beloved child star Shirley Temple to play Dorothy, but that just never ended up working out. There were real questions about Judy Garland; the casting director thought that she was too old (she was 16). But she was by far the strongest singer, and so they made her look younger with costuming tricks and she got the part.

Buddy Ebsen (later from Beverly Hillbillies) was cast as the Scarecrow and Ray Bolger was the Tin Man. However, Bolger really wanted to be the Scarecrow — he idolized the actor who played the Scarecrow on the vaudeville stage — so he asked to be recast. They obliged.

Now back to Buddy Ebsen. He was originally the Scarecrow and then he became the Tin Man. However, fans will know that he didn’t actually end up playing either part. This is because Buddy Ebsen had to drop the project after being hospitalized with a toxic reaction from inhaling aluminum dust from the aluminum powder makeup he wore. Production had to halt while they found his replacement, Jack Haley. And very sneakily, they changed the makeup from aluminum dust to an aluminum paste with a layer of white clown grease paint underneath.

By the way, because this production was already crazy expensive, Jack Haley only rerecorded "If I Only Had a Heart" and individual lines of "If I Only Had the Nerve". So, allegedly, Buddy Ebsen’s voice can still be heard in certain group vocals.

There were other makeup mishaps. To be fair, their makeup designer was one of the first to use foam latex makeup. To be unfair, though, it took over an hour to take off the Scarecrow makeup each time, and the makeup ended up leaving permanent lines around his mouth and chin. So, not great.

The Wicked Witch wore copper-based makeup that only allowed her to consume liquids while shooting.

Gale Sondergaard (who was married to one of the Hollywood Ten) was the original Wicked Witch of the West. But she withdrew when they changed the character to the “ugly witch” instead of the more sophisticated witch — Sondergaard thought the witch would be more like the one in Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. That’s when the role then went to former schoolteacher Margaret Hamilton.

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There were various major injuries on the set too. When the Wicked Witch leaves Munchkinland ,there was a hidden exit and smoke and fire to hide it. The second take went wrong and set her on fire. As if that’s not bad enough, because she was wearing COPPER makeup she received third-degree burns all over her hands and face. This led to her having to recuperate for three months.

There was another witch-related injury. Betty Danko, who was Hamilton’s stunt double, was on the broomstick when it ended up exploding. She was hospitalized for 11 days.

If you are keeping count that is now three major hospitalizations.

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Let us get into a lighter subject now. My absolute favorite fun fact about this movie: How they made a horse of a different color.

The American Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals wouldn’t allow for the horses to be dyed. It’s kind of funny that PEOPLE could have copper makeup on their faces, but horses were not allowed to be dyed. I’m not saying I am for dying horses, but why was THAT where they drew the line?

Anyway to work around this they put JELLO POWDER on the white horses to change their appearance.

Wait, it gets better.

They used lemon, cherry, and grape powder but they had to film the scenes quickly. Why? Because the horses discovered that the powder was delicious so they would lick it off.

Yes they put gelatin powder on the horses and then had to film fast so the horses didn’t lick off the color. And now you know why this is the best fact from the movie.

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There were plenty of other complications (like trying to get Toto to run alongside the actors, etc.) but somehow despite all of it they made a movie. And not just any movie, a movie for the ages.

The Wizard of Oz is one of the most timeless films of all time. And it might have been quite the production to make but it ended up being probably the only film from that time that holds up.

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Happy new year to everyone! I hope everyone had a good 2024. You can expect more from this blog in 2025, but please feel free to leave any suggestions about things you’d like to see this upcoming year.