Saw an interesting show the other day called "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" It was a documentary about the movie made back in the late 80s or early 90s. It had the usual factoid stuff, like Buddy Ebsen was the original Tin-Man, etc., but it went into stuff I didn't know.
Like how they did the special effects (i.e., how the house floated up in the tornado...they actually filmed it tumbling from the top of the studio to a painted floor, then reversed the shot for the movie, so it looked like it was floating!).
Others were, the original Wicked Witch was some bombshell, but it didn't jive, so they got a haggard looking actress. That actress was also badly burned during the Munchkin scene when she fell through the trap door when the fire ball went off. She received second and third degree burns to her face and arms because her makeup caught on fire.
I also didn't know there were like 4 or 5 directors for the movie!
And the last one was that Dorothy was originally a trollop kind of girl. Judy Garland was wearing a blonde wig with lots of makeup until one the directors told Garland she was sixteen and playing a country girl, so she went with brunette pigtails.
Yeah, I have that special on DVD and love to watch it. I also have some delightful short silent movies; the first "Oz" movies, if you will.
Like The Titanic, I've always been fascinated both by the famous Oz movie and the Baum books. I have a lot of different books on both (with a ton of trivia) if anyone is interested in taking a look at them.
Baum sure had an imagination! He came with up the most wonderful characters; the ones in the movie are really just the begining of what he thought up.
And, yeah, although Victor Flemming got billed as the director for the movie, there were many others. BTW, Flemming got called of the Oz set to go finish directing another movie that had run through a bunch of directors, Gone with the Wind. It's said that Clark Gable requested him because Flemming was a "man's man" like him.
Anyway, 1939 put out some great flicks!
And, the original wicked witch was a hottie. She went on to film a semi famous movie with Shirley Temple (who, BTW, was seriously considered for the role of Dorothy) called "The Bluebird". She got to play a good pretty witch in that movie.
Source: "All Things Oz"
2 comments:
Saw an interesting show the other day called "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" It was a documentary about the movie made back in the late 80s or early 90s. It had the usual factoid stuff, like Buddy Ebsen was the original Tin-Man, etc., but it went into stuff I didn't know.
Like how they did the special effects (i.e., how the house floated up in the tornado...they actually filmed it tumbling from the top of the studio to a painted floor, then reversed the shot for the movie, so it looked like it was floating!).
Others were, the original Wicked Witch was some bombshell, but it didn't jive, so they got a haggard looking actress. That actress was also badly burned during the Munchkin scene when she fell through the trap door when the fire ball went off. She received second and third degree burns to her face and arms because her makeup caught on fire.
I also didn't know there were like 4 or 5 directors for the movie!
And the last one was that Dorothy was originally a trollop kind of girl. Judy Garland was wearing a blonde wig with lots of makeup until one the directors told Garland she was sixteen and playing a country girl, so she went with brunette pigtails.
Cool show.
Yeah, I have that special on DVD and love to watch it. I also have some delightful short silent movies; the first "Oz" movies, if you will.
Like The Titanic, I've always been fascinated both by the famous Oz movie and the Baum books. I have a lot of different books on both (with a ton of trivia) if anyone is interested in taking a look at them.
Baum sure had an imagination! He came with up the most wonderful characters; the ones in the movie are really just the begining of what he thought up.
And, yeah, although Victor Flemming got billed as the director for the movie, there were many others. BTW, Flemming got called of the Oz set to go finish directing another movie that had run through a bunch of directors, Gone with the Wind. It's said that Clark Gable requested him because Flemming was a "man's man" like him.
Anyway, 1939 put out some great flicks!
And, the original wicked witch was a hottie. She went on to film a semi famous movie with Shirley Temple (who, BTW, was seriously considered for the role of Dorothy) called "The Bluebird". She got to play a good pretty witch in that movie.
Post a Comment