Dancing through Time: “Wicked”

Time marches on? Time dances on? I only know that I seem to have become too grown-up to thoroughly enjoy Wicked. Yes, of course I still love watching what happens to Dorothy and her pals when they journey from Munchkinland to the Emerald City in the classic 1939 film. It’s a movie I’ve adored since childhood when, months before I actually got taken to see it, I pasted a newspaper photo of Glinda and Dorothy in my scrapbook. The screening I was so excited about was, of course, an encore presentation. The film’s debut occurred long before I was born—and long before the movie industry had adopted basic safety practices to protect actors from harm. I strongly recommend Aljean Harmetz’s The Making of the Wizard of Oz, first published in 1977 and now available in an illustrated anniversary edition, to anyone who wants to read hair-raising stories of the dangerous conditions on that set. 

The 1939 production was hardly the first attempt to film L. Frank Baum’s classic children’s tale. I’m told there’s a silent version dating back to 1925. But after the success of the Judy Garland vehicle, Hollywood tried several times to film other of Baum’s Oz books, with mixed results. (Does anyone remember Fairuza Balk in 1985’s Return to Oz?) More inspiring was the screen version of the Broadway hit, The Wiz, in which the familiar story of Dorothy and her friends is re-imagined in an African-American context, with such stars as Diana Ross (Dorothy), Michael Jackson (as the Scarecrow), Lena Horne (Glinda), and Richard Pryor (The Wizard of Oz) giving an urban twist to the saga, which starts on the mean streets of Harlem instead of on the Kansas prairies.  

I’ll say this for Wicked: it’s a thorough rethinking of Baum’s original story. Wicked began as a 1995 novel by Gregory Maguire, subtitled The Life and Times of the Wicked Witch of the West. I found its prose rather ponderous, but it cleverly explores the nature of evil by looking at the evolution of a young woman named Elphaba from pathetic misfit to incarnation of all things witchy. The novel became a 2003 hit musical, thanks at least in part to Stephen Schwartz’s songs, with a big assist from the performances of Adina Menzel and Kristin Chenoweth. (Both get nice little cameos in the film version.)

The new movie, which is certainly doing its share of saving the financially precarious film industry, is actually Wicked, Part I. It’s also, I trust, introducing a new generation to the joys of movie musicals. Under the direction of Jon M. Chu, who had previously scored with Crazy Rich Asians and the Lin Manuel Miranda musical, In the Heights, it is visually impressive, with the palace of Oz, the complicated hair-do of Madam Morrible, and the frilly all-pink wardrobe of Galinda all given loving attention. The singers really sing; the dancers really dance. And Chu’s openness to casting actors of many backgrounds—especially Cynthia Erivo as the green-skinned Elphaba—adds a nice subliminal message about society’s scorn for those whose skin is a different shade. 

So what’s not to like? I guess for me (but not for the younger folks with me, including a starry-eyed ten-year-old) the movie felt overly long and overly effortful. The very earnestness of the film’s social issues (which get tangled up with a subplot about the mistreatment of animals) seemed overwrought to the point of dullness. Yes, I loved Ariana Grande’s rendition of the show’s best song, “Popular,” But I’m not counting the days until we get to see Wicked, Part II. 

 

From Motown to Hollywood: I Heard It on the Grapevine . . .

 Detroit doesn’t seem like a go-to place for movie connections. But I’m just back from the Motor City, where I spent a joyful hour touring the Motown Museum, also known as Hitsville, U.S.A. “Hitsville” was the nickname given by Berry Gordy to the first headquarters of his recording empire. The two-story house, a former photography studio, was purchased by Berry in 1959. He and his young family lived in a modest apartment on the second floor, and on the tour you can still see their mid-century modern furnishings, featuring pointy area lamps and bright orange trim. Downstairs is the recording studio is where early Motown hits were born: indelible songs like “Please, Mr. Postman” and “My Girl.” The studio’s most prominent feature is a large piano , an 1877 Steinway Model D grand, that has been beautifully restored thanks to the generosity of a museum visitor, Sir Paul McCartney.

The museum is on West Grand Boulevard, in an area that features a busy funeral home, a large hospital complex, and some residences that are on the shabby side. (Not far away is the once- glorious Fisher Theater, a landmark art deco skyscraper from 1928: this is where Fiddler on the Roof had its first out-of-town tryouts almost 40 years later. But I digress.)  Once Motown Records was up and running, Gordy controlled the entire block, with various of the neighboring houses dedicated to different aspects of the company’s needs. One house, for instance, served as the financial hub of Motown, with another providing rehearsal space for the stable of singers under contract. Most of them, in the early days, had been Gordy’s childhood neighbors and pals. And he was indebted to Detroit, as well, for a job that started him on his path to fame and fortune.

At a young age, Gordy accepted a blue-collar job at a Ford assembly plant. While helping to put together automobiles, one piece at a time, he kept his mind busy by making up songs to the steady throb of the assembly line. Nor was it only a sense of rhythm that he took away from Ford. The job gave him the idea that he could manufacture, piece by piece, a cadre of recording artists. So when the Temptations, the Supremes, the Jackson Five, and Martha and the Vandellas came under his purview, he took it upon himself to mold them into superstars. Vocal coaching and choreography were part of their bootcamp. There was also a deportment coach who schooled them in manners, giving them a social polish that—as inner city kids—they hadn’t previously enjoyed. 

As always, fame presented new temptations—and new opportunities. In 1972 Gordy moved Motown’s headquarters to Los Angeles, perhaps losing the company’s soul in the process. But for him it was a logical move, one that allowed him to experiment with motion picture production. He became the executive producer of several much ballyhooed films, notably including Lady Sings the Blues. This tribute to the life of jazz legend Billie Holliday marked the Oscar-nominated film debut of Diana Ross, with whom Gordy had long had both a professional and a personal relationship. Ross was his star when he tried his hand at directing with 1975’s Mahogany, and she also played an unlikely Dorothy in The Wiz, for which he played a behind-the-scenes role.

Though Gordy left Detroit in his rearview mirror, his sister Esther Gordy Edwards insisted on staying put. I heard it on the grapevine: she’s the one who made the museum happen. I for one am very grateful.

The Motown Museum Today

Easing On Down the Road with The Wiz

In early 1975, while blaxploitation flicks like Shaft and Superfly were still scoring on multiplex screens, Broadway welcomed a musical version of the classic Wizard of Oz that introduced black vernacular, pop music, and an entirely black cast. The show, which was called The Wiz, played to packed houses until 1979. At the annual Tony Awards festivities, it collected seven statuettes, including Best Musical Score and Best Musical. For the late Geoffrey Holder, husband of my first dance teacher, Carmen de Lavallade, it was definitely a career highpoint. The multitalented Holder won a Tony for directing the show, and a second for designing its flamboyant costumes. When his name was called, he literally danced up to the stage in a wonderful display of showmanship.

A hit of this magnitude of course captured the imagination of Hollywood. Transferring a fantasy from stage to screen is always a challenge, but the filmmakers behind The Wiz made some choices that definitely added to their difficulties. The Dorothy on stage in The Wiz, like that in the classic Judy Garland film adapted from the L. Frank Baum novel in 1939, is played as an innocent young girl. But the Hollywood team doubtless felt it needed a star performer, which is why it gave the role to Diana Ross, age thirty-four. A very game Ross could indeed look super-skinny and helpless, but she couldn’t convince as an adolescent. That’s why her part was transformed into that of a rather agoraphobic spinster kindergarten teacher who works hard on behalf of her extensive Harlem family but is cut off by her own fears from enjoying the world outside her door. The team behind Ross and company today seems unlikely. The screenwriter was Joel Schumacher, not yet a director of tough dramas. The director was the great Sidney Lumet, best known for films (like The Pawnbroker, Serpico, and Dog Day Afternoon) that captured a sense of urban squalor.

Perhaps because of Lumet’s experience on the streets of New York City, this cinematic version of The Wiz dropped the traditional Kansas setting of the opening scene in favor of a gritty urban Harlem streetscape. Characters descend into a spooky but fantastically appointed subway, and the Cowardly Lion (Ted Ross, who’d also won a Tony for this role) starts off as one of the lions in front of the New York Public Library. Other characters are played by Hollywood royalty, including Richard Pryor as the Wizard himself, Lena Horne (Lumet’s mother-in-law)  who gets to sing a corny ballad as Good Witch Glinda, and none other than Michael Jackson, playing his first movie role as the Scarecrow. Watching this film for the first time recently, I admired the lively sets and costumes (the film earned four Oscar nominations in technical categories), but disliked the way the lugubrious story advanced at a crawl, milking every opportunity to be sentimental.

But the recent trend for “live” musicals on TV gave me a chance to relive the spunk and spirit of the stage show. The 2015 broadcast was chockful of stars (Common, David Alan Grier, Mary J. Blige as an appropriate hateful Wicked Witch of the West, aka Evillene), but an actual teenager, Shanice Williams, was the glue that held it all together. Perhaps some of the excitement came from the adrenaline rush as cast and crew all joined hands to work at achieving theatrical perfection. I also sensed freshened dialogue, a sharpened storyline, and less easy sentimentality. Sorry, Diana Ross – you’re a singer like no other, but I’d rather not ease on down the road again with you anytime soon.