The Latest Wizard of Oz News

(I will update this page when there is news to tell. Any news older than a year is dropped at the next update. If you have news to report, please e-mail me.)

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(For more Oz news, check out The Daily Ozmopolitan. For the latest Oz not-quite-news, see the Rumor Control section of this page.)

June 25, 2009

Michael Jackson as the Scarecrow in 'The Wiz'

Michael Jackson, the self-proclaimed King of Pop, died today in Los Angeles from an apparent coronary attack. He was fifty years old. An entertainer his entire career, the superstar was best known for his music, both in the Jackson 5 with his brothers and his solo career. He also dabbled in acting, however, and his first role was as the Scarecrow in the 1978 movie adaptation of The Wiz. He is succeeded by his parents, brothers and sisters, two sons, and a daughter.

June 1, 2009

The Baum Bugle, Winter 2008If you are a member of the International Wizard of Oz Club, it should be on its way! The latest edition of The Baum Bugle, cover dated Winter 2008, is in the mail and making its way to members.

In this issue:

May 7, 2009

Mickey Carroll, who played several Munchkins in the famous 1939 movie version of The Wizard of Oz, died today in his home town of St. Louis. He was 89. Born Michael Finocchiaro in 1919, he entered vaudeville, appearing in Phillip Morris promotions at the age of 17, and opposite Mae West at 18. He was then invited by MGM to appear in his only movie, playing the Town Crier, a fiddler, and a soldier. By the end of World War II, however, he was back in St. Louis working in the family business. Over the last few years, once his Wizard of Oz role was discovered, he was a mainstay of the Oz circuit, appearing at conventions and events all over the world. He also raised money for local charities, raising over $1 million for causes in St. Louis. (News courtesy of Jane Albright and the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.)

March 12, 2009

Slowly but surely, the Oz Club is catching up with its own publication schedule for their journal, The Baum Bugle. Thanks to the efforts of guest editor Marcus Mébès, the Autumn 2008 issue has now been published and is making its way to members.

This issue includes:

February 25, 2009

Philip José Farmer, one of the most widely read and honored writers of modern science fiction and fantasy, died peacefully this morning in his sleep. He was ninety-one, and is survived by his wife, Bette, and children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren. Although probably best known to the general public for the science fiction series Riverworld, Farmer is best known in Oz circles for the 1982 novel A Barnstormer in Oz, in which he imagined an Oz that Dorothy had actually traveled to. A generation later, her son, a barnstorming pilot, flew his plane into a green cloud and ended up in the real Oz, not the sanitized version written about by L. Frank Baum. He helps Glinda stop a new wicked witch from taking over Oz, as well as stopping the United States Army from invading. Although controversial among many Oz fans, Barnstormer does have its devotees. Its publication at the time also raised the profile of Oz at a time when there was little else new.

(News courtesy of cnn.com and The Official Philip José Farmer Web Page.)

Also passing away today was August Clarence Swensen, who had a brief career in Hollywood in the 1930s. After being discovered in an all-midget circus in Texas, he went west and played the town preacher in the 1938 all-midget Western The Terror of Tiny Town and an ape in Tarzan Finds a Son (1939), but he is best known for playing a Munchkin soldier in The Wizard of Oz. He left show business after the United States entered World War II, however, and moved back to his native Texas to become a radio technician. After the war, he married his sweetheart, Myrna Clifton, and went on to a career as an electronic technician at the University of Texas. He retired in 1980, and then found a new career reminiscing about The Wizard of Oz at Oz festivals around the country. Clarence and Myrna (who did not appear in the movie) were popular guests, where Clarence would wear a reproduction of his soldier's costume. He had been in ill health since a stroke in 2005. He is survived by his wife, Myrna, and three daughters and their familes.

(News courtesy of Jane Albright and The Austin American-Statesman. Further background information courtesy of The Munchkins of Oz by Stephen Cox.)

December 10, 2008

Members of the International Wizard of Oz Club should expect to see the latest edition of the Club's journal, The Baum Bugle, in their mailboxes soon, if it hasn't shown up already. As usual, the Bugle production schedule is a little behind, as this is the Spring 2008 issue, which focuses on Ozian geography, in honor of the Club's latest, updated edition of its Oz maps.
In this issue:

August 18, 2008

The Winter 2007 issue of The Baum Bugle, the journal of the International Wizard of Oz Club, has been published and sent off to Club members. Celebrating the centennial of the book Ozma of Oz, it's another in a long line of comprehensive (if somewhat chronically challenged) issues.

In this issue:

July 17, 2008

The nominations came out to day for the 60th Annual Prime Time Emmy Awards, for excellence in television, and the Sci-Fi Channel miniseries Tin Man received nine nominations. They are for:

This makes Tin Man the most nominated Sci-Fi Channel production in a single year. The Emmy awards will be given in a ceremony broadcast on ABC September 21. For full details, see the report at http://www.scifi.com/scifiwire/index.php?category=0&id=57790. The complete list of Emmy Award nominations is available at http://cdn.emmys.tv/awards/2008pte/60thpte_nomswin.php.

July 12, 2008

The International Wizard of Oz Club presented the Winkie Award, for those who have contributed to the west coast Winkie Convention, tonight to David Maxine. As the force behind Hungry Tiger Press and an expert in Oz dramatizations, he has made many presentations to the convention, and also worked behind the scenes in many ways as well. At the same time, the Club announced that earlier, the L. Frank Baum Memorial Award, the Club's highest honor given for outstanding contributions to Oz, was awarded to Meinhardt Raabe, the actor who played the Munchkin Coroner in the famous 1939 film version of The Wizard of Oz. Club President Angelica Carpenter was given the award to present to Meinhardt at a later date.

Rumor Control
(Because of the many questions I am asked about possible forthcoming Oz projects or other bits of pseudo-news, I have added this section to answer some of these inquiries.)
Could there be more Tin Man? This item from SciFiWire at least raises the possibility.
There seems to be a spate of new animated features in the works based on the works of L. Frank Baum. Legendary director John Boorman is taking charge of his first animated movie, a $25 million dollar computer animated version of The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. It will be based on the book, and it's not a musical. The producers are Laurent Rodon and Claude Gorvsky at Films Action in France, and Boorman's associate Kieran Corrigan. Currently in preproduction, it's currently slated for a summer 2010 release. You can see more about it at http://www.actionsynthese.com/galerie.php?language=en, then click on "Projects in Production" (yes, that's Dorothy in the picture next to it), then on "The Wizard of Oz." Meanwhile, another computer animated production, this one of Baum's 1902 book The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus, is currently scheduled to come out a few months later, for the holiday season of 2010. The producers are Hyde Park Entertainment, Toonz Entertainment, and Gang of 7 Animation. As with all movie projects, a lot can happen before release, which could cause them not to happen. Keep an eye on this website's news and events pages for details if they get closer to actually coming out.
Yes, it looks like a film version of Wicked is currently in pre-planning at Universal. But this is a long way off—sometime in the next decade—and a lot can happen. However, the success of the play most likely means that there will be a film version some day.
I've seen the news stories as well (such as this one): Todd McFarlane, the creator of Spawn, and writer Josh Olson are collaborating on a "sequel" to The Wizard of Oz. Already, Oz fans are divided on this, as the early press releases seem to have not quite got the whole story straight. Some reactions also seem to be based on McFarlane's controversial Oz "toys" from a few years ago (which were so heinous, they are the one Oz product that I will not carry in this website's bookshop). But don't panic! This is still a long way from happening, and may be abandoned anywhere along the way, like so many other projects in Hollywood. Even if it does happen, it won't be for some time, and a lot still has to be decided.
Working its way through Hollywood preproduction: A film version of L. Frank Baum's The Life and Adventures of Santa Claus at Circa Pictures. It's at least listed on their website, at http://www.circapictures.com/ (click on "Backstage," then look at the list of movies).
It's still in the early stages of development, but it looks like there's a new film version of The Wizard of Oz in the works — in India. It will be done as a Bollywood musical in Hindi. More on this as (if?) it develops.
Alpine Pictures (http://www.alpinepix.com) has signed a deal to make several movies based on the books of Roger S. Baum. The first is scheduled to be Dorothy of Oz, which now has a website at http://www.dorothyofozthemovie.com/.
No, there is no truth whatsoever to the rumor that Warner Bros. is going to invest one billion dollars on an all-computer generated remake of The Wizard of Oz, directed by Peter Jackson. (My goodness, how do these sorts of stories get started? Oh, yeah, in places like this...)
Another author trying to turn his Oz story into a movie? Geoff Ryman appears to be shopping Was around...
I've also heard about American McGee turning his Oz video game (which I now hear has been cancelled — finally) into a movie.
In recent years, there have been proposals for other Oz projects, none of which now appear that they will get off the ground. Among them:

If progress is made on any of these projects, such as actually going into production or a release date announced, the news will be posted as quickly as possible on this page. But at this stage, any of these going into production is very unlikely.

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