The Wizard of Oz

The Wizard of Oz was a 1902 stage play based on The Wonderful Wizard of Oz by L. Frank Baum, which was originally published in 1900. It premiered in Chicago and later moved to Broadway in 1903, where it ran for nearly 300 performances from January 21, 1903 to December 31, 1904, followed by travelling tours of the original cast. It starred Anna Laughlin as Dorothy Gale, Fred Stone as The Scarecrow and David C. Montgomery as the Tin Woodman. Arthur Hill (no relation to the Canadian film, theatre and TV actor) played the Cowardly Lion, but in this version, his role was reduced to a bit part. An element from the show - the snowfall caused by the Good Witch which finally kills the smell of the poppies that had put Dorothy and the Cowardly Lion to sleep - was later used in the famous 1939 movie.

The play was written by L. Frank Baum himself, though after producer Fred R. Hamlin and director Julian Mitchell rejected his 1901 spec script, The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, which held close to the novel, he wrote a completely new script based on their desires. He hired a New York joke writer, Glen MacDonough to add topical humor he felt himself incapable of writing. Most of the original songs were written by Paul Tietjens on Baum's lyrics, but two, "The Guardian of the Gate" which was cut ofter only a few performances, and "The Different Ways of Making Love" (which sounded less risqué at the time) were composed by Nathaniel D. Mann, who later wrote the score for Baum's 1908 film/theatrical presentation, The Fairylogue and Radio-Plays. Most of Baum's songs related to the story in some way, as in operetta, but as performed, the play was more like Vaudeville, and new songs by other songwriters were frequently substituted. In fact, the first song interpolated into the musical was "The Traveler and the Pie", a major number for the Scarecrow, a song Baum and Tietjens had intended for a play called The Octopus; or the Title Trust, which was never produced and possibly never completed. This was to be an exception in that it was written by Baum and Tietjens, but it was a classic of the time and stayed in the show. James O'Dea and Edward Hutchinson wrote one of the show's most celebrated songs, "Sammy", which was sung by Trixie Tryfle about a lost love before Pastoria, though the only contemporary recording of the piece was sung by a man!

The witches are largely absent in this version; The Good Witch of the North appears, named Locasta, and The Wicked Witch of the East is a special effect. The Wicked Witch of the West does not appear, and Glinda appears to have been written out, as she does not appear in the Broadway cast list, although she does appear on another one. Toto, Dorothy's dog, has also been replaced, by a cow named Imogene.

New characters in the script include King Pastoria II, Oz's true king working as a Kansas motorman and his girlfriend, Tixie Tryfle, a waitress. His return takes up a bit more of the story than Dorothy's desire to return home. Another subplot includes Cynthia Cynch, the Lady Lunatic, a prototype for Nimmie Amee, in that she is the Tin Woodman's girlfriend. Niccolo Chopper was renowned for his ability to play the piccolo, which was the subject of one of her songs, and he is shown playing a piccolo in The Wonderful Wizard of Oz, which, the first Oz film made without Baum, was highly influenced by the popular play. The Wizard was presented as various ethnic stock character stereotypes, depending upon who played him. He was assisted by Sir Wiley Gyle and General Riskitt. David L. Greene and Dick Martin erroneously captioned a picture of General Riskitt as "Sir Wiley Gyle" in The Oz Scrapbook, and Donald Abbott carried this mistake over into his illustrations for How the Wizard Saved Oz.

The animals in the play, including the Cowardly Lion, did not speak, based on pantomime tradition. Although the lion costume was realistic, far more so than Bert Lahr's in the MGM film, his main purpose was a bit of comic relief and scaring off the villains on occasion. His quest for courage is completely omitted, much as the other characters' quests are deemphasized in favor of various comic routines. Ultimately, though, their desire to seek the Wizard's aid gets them caught on the wrong side of the revolution, jailed and ultimately scheduled for execution. In a deus ex machina, another tornado arrives to sweep Dorothy home from the chopping block.

Many new plot twists are virtually pointless. In addition to a kiss of protection, Dorothy gets three wishes, one of which is wasted on a triviality. The second is used to bring the Scarecrow to life, and the third is used so she can learn the song Sir Dashemoff Daily (a trouser role) has written to his girlfriend, Carrie Barry. This song was written by Baum and Tietjens, but some programs credited the song to Glen MacDonough and A. Baldwin Sloane to make their connection to the play look greater.

Probably the biggest influence on the 1939 MGM film, aside from making the story into a musical (for which many at MGM thought this show's classic songs should be utilized, though they were outvoted), is the Poppy Sequence that ended Act I. In the novel, Baum imaginatively has a legion of field mice pull a cart with the Cowardly Lion out of the poppy field. This was deemed unfeasible (though the stage version of The Wiz created a variation, with the mice as anthropomorphic vice cops), and Baum, though he included it in the 1901 script, replaced the scene with that of the Snow Queen creating a storm that destroys the poppies, much as Glinda does in the 1939 movie. This concluded Act I with an elaborate dance known as "Winter Reveries", which James Patrick Doyle plays on synthesizers on the album, Before the Rainbow: The Original Music of Oz.

Because there were no cast albums in those days, productions of the musical often exceeded four hours in length because of multiple demands for encores, since many of the attendees knew they would never get to attend again, and these encores were responded to. Popular songs were often sung multiple times and this was often used to gauge whether a song should be retained or dropped. Two popular routines that were worked in include a sailing routine and a football routine, the latter parodying the level of violence in the sport, which had recently been lessened due to new regulations.

The play has been revived in Tarpon Springs, Florida by the New Century Opera Company in 1998 and, most recently, July 2006. Hungry Tiger Press announced several years ago that it would be publishing the complete libretto for the first time, but has been delayed years beyond the original announcement on claims of finding new material, though many suspect the sudden death of James Patrick Doyle was the major factor, which the company denies. There have been several new recordings of the songs, though none have had major distribution.

See also

• The Wizard of Oz (adaptations) — other adaptations of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz

External links

• cast and crew information
• Internet Broadway Database

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