The Wiz

An adaption of “The Wizard of Oz” that tries to capture the essence of the African American experience.

• Director: Sidney Lumet
• Genre:Adventure / Family / Fantasy / Musical
• Runtime:132 minutes

Cast

Diana Ross : Dorothy
Michael Jackson : Scarecrow
Nipsey Russell : Tinman
Ted Ross : Lion / Fleetwood Coupe de Ville
Mabel King : Evillene

A Thanksgiving dinner brings a host of friends and family together in a Harlem home, where a 24-year old schoolteacher named Dorothy Gale (Diana Ross) lives with her Aunt Em (Theresa Merritt) and her Uncle Henry (Stanley Greene). Extremely introverted, Dorothy has, as her aunt teases her, “never been south of 125th Street”, and refuses to move out and move on with her life.

While cleaning up after the dinner party, Dorothy’s dog Toto runs out the open kitchen door into a violent snowstorm. Dorothy succeeds in retrieving him, but finds herself trapped in the snowstorm. A magical whirlwind – the work of Glinda the Good Witch (Lena Horne) – materializes and transports the woman and her dog to Oz. Upon her entrance into Oz, Dorothy smashes through an electric “Oz” sign, which falls upon and kills Evermean, the Wicked Witch of the East. As a result, Dorothy frees the Munchkins who populate the park into which Dorothy lands; the Munchkins had been transformed by Evermean into graffiti for “tagging” the park walls.

Dorothy soon meets The Munchkins’ main benefactress, Miss One, the Good Witch of the North (Thelma Carpenter), a magical “numbers runner” who gives Evermean’s powerful silver slippers to Dorothy. However, the frightened Dorothy desperately wants to get home. Miss One urges her to follow the yellow brick road to the Emerald City and find the mysterious “Wiz” who Miss One believes holds the power to send Dorothy back to Harlem. The good witch and the Munchkins then disappear and Dorothy is left to search for the yellow brick road on her own. Read more