Adapting The Wizard of Oz

Musical Versions from Baum to MGM and Beyond

Edited by Danielle Birkett and Dominic McHugh

Features new insights into the original film score
Advances a range of different perspectives on the film musical
Offers readers new understandings of even the most famous renditions of The Wizard of Oz

Adapting The Wizard of Oz

Musical Versions from Baum to MGM and Beyond

Edited by Danielle Birkett and Dominic McHugh

Description

One of the most beloved film musicals of all time, The Wizard of Oz represents an enduring family favorite and cultural classic. Yet there is much more to the story than meets the eye, and the MGM movie is just one of many ways in which it has been represented. In this lively and wide-ranging book, editors Danielle Birkett and Dominic McHugh bring together insights from eleven experts into the varied musical forms this great American myth has taken in the past century. Starting with the early adaptations of L. Frank Baum's story, the book also explores the writing, composition and reception of the MGM film, its importance in queer culture, stage adaptations of the movie, cult classic The Wiz, Stephen Schwartz's Broadway blockbuster Wicked, and the cultural afterlife of the iconic Arlen-Harburg songs. What emerges is a vivid overview of how music - on stage and screen - has been an essential part of the story's journey to become a centerpiece of American culture.

Adapting The Wizard of Oz

Musical Versions from Baum to MGM and Beyond

Edited by Danielle Birkett and Dominic McHugh

Introduction: "Rainbow Reflections": The Wizard of Oz as a Musical
Danielle Birkett and Dominic McHugh
Chapter 1: "Starring Montgomery and Stone!": The Wizard of Oz Musical Extravaganza (1902) and the Birth of a Brand
Jonas Westover
Chapter 2: The Road to Oz: From Book to Movie Musical
Benjamin Sears
Chapter 3: "Arlen and Harburg and More, Oh My!": The Cumulative Creation of the Oz Songs
Laura Lynn Broadhurst
Chapter 4: Sounds Must Stir the Fantasy: Underscore as Special Effect in The Wizard of Oz (1939)
Nathan Platte
Chapter 5: Dancing through Oz: Choreographic context in The Wizard of Oz
Claudia Funder
Chapter 6: "The Merry Old Land of Oz?": MGM's Concerns and the Shifting Reception History
Danielle Birkett
Chapter 7: "Friends of Dorothy": Queerness in and Beyond the Film
Hannah Robbins
Chapter 8: "We're Not in Kansas Any More": Three Stage Adaptations of the MGM Film
Dominic McHugh
Chapter 9: "Ease on Down the Road": Black Routes and the Soul of The Wiz
Ryan Bunch
Chapter 10: The Wizard of Oz and Wicked: Resonances, Legal Issues, and the Appropriation of a Classic
Paul Laird
Chapter 11: "Beyond the Rainbow": Afterlives of the Songs from The Wizard of Oz (1939)
Walter Frisch
Appendix 1: All Things Oz
Bibliography
Index

Adapting The Wizard of Oz

Musical Versions from Baum to MGM and Beyond

Edited by Danielle Birkett and Dominic McHugh

Author Information

Edited by Danielle Birkett, Associate Lecturer in Music and Creative Media, Northern Regional College, and Edited by Dominic McHugh, Senior Lecturer in Music, University of Sheffield

Danielle Birkett is Lecturer in Music at Northern Regional College. Her research presents the first full-length study of the 1947 Broadway musical Finian's Rainbow. Dominic McHugh is Senior Lecturer in Musicology and Director of Performance at the University of Sheffield. His publications include the books Loverly: The Life and Times of My Fair Lady (2012), Alan Jay Lerner: A Lyricist's Letters (2014) and The Complete Lyrics of Alan Jay Lerner (2018). He has appeared on BBC TV and radio numerous times, and has acted as a consultant to the Sydney Opera House's production of My Fair Lady, directed by Julie Andrews, as well as the Lincoln Center Theater production of the same musical.

Contributors:

Danielle Birkett, Lecturer in Music, Northern Regional College
Laura Lynn Broadhurst, PhD Candidate in Musicology, Rutgers University
Ryan Bunch, Artist Associate, Rutgers University-Camden
Walter Frisch, H. Harold Gumm/Harry and Albert von Tilzer Professor of Music, Columbia University
Claudia Funder, Director, Swing Patrol
Paul Laird, Professor of Musicology, The University of Kansas
Dominic McHugh, Senior Lecturer in Musicology and Director of Performance, University of Sheffield
Nathan Platte, Associate Professor of Musicology, The University of Iowa
Hannah Robbins, Frederick Loewe Research Associate, The University of Sheffield
Benjamin Sears, Professional Singer and Independent Scholar
Jonas Westover, University of Minnesota

Adapting The Wizard of Oz

Musical Versions from Baum to MGM and Beyond

Edited by Danielle Birkett and Dominic McHugh

Reviews and Awards

"The book as a whole is readable and useful to anyone interest in Oz, the discussed production, or theatre history more broadly." - Elizabeth Sallinger, Popular Music

"Editors Danielle Birkett and Dominic McHugh have selected some first rate scholars to write about the many aspects of the book and its various stage and screen versions so that the book is full of fresh and little-known information." - Thomas S. Hischak, Music, Sound, and the Moving Image

"With a variety of approaches represented throughout the volume, Birkett and McHugh's edited volume offers a valuable contribution to the study of musical adaptations. Additionally, the consistent accessibility of the collection and focus on a beloved film and related works makes this appealing for enthusiasts of the genre and The Wizard of Oz." - Megan Woller, Journal of Film Music

"Birkett and McHugh have put together a package tour of the capacious land of Oz that leaves nothing to be desired. It has heart, brain, and nerve." - Stephen Banfield, Professor Emeritus of Music, University of Bristol

"Through the wizardry of Birkett and McHugh and their team of scholars, readers of this wide-ranging collection can follow the yellow brick road with both relevant historical commentary and trenchant criticism." - Geoffrey Block, author of Enchanted Evenings: The Broadway Musical from Show Boat to Sondheim and Lloyd Webber and Series Editor of Oxford's Broadway Legacies

"The famed 'Yellow Brick Road' has wound a devious path through U.S. political, social, and economic history from the first musical adaptation of L. Frank Baum's initial novel through Stephen Schwartz and Winnie Holzman's Wicked and beyond. It became a cultural icon and a counter-cultural one by way of the 1939 movie, and this splendid set of essays maps its various twists and turns in search of what might still lie somewhere 'Over the Rainbow'." - Tim Carter, author of Oklahoma!: The Making of an American Musical and Rodgers and Hammerstein's Carousel