Arts & Entertainment

Off To See The Wizard

Photo by Peter Coom bs

Stage version of a beloved family film comes to the Fisher Theatre.

Suzanne Chessler
Special to the Jewish News

M

embers of three different gen-
erations — all enduring fans
of The Wizard of Oz — have
important commitments to the touring
musical of the same name to be staged
Jan. 29-Feb. 14 at the Fisher Theatre.
New York-based Ernie Harburg, 83, son
of show lyricist E.Y. (Yip) Harburg, has
seen the production twice and has many
recollections of his dad's work on the film
that marked its 70th anniversary last year.
Beth Cheryl Tarnow, 22, a member of
the ensemble, grew up watching the film
and is excited that the stage version opens
up her career dreams.
Josee York, 10, of Rochester Hills, another
fan of the movie and an aspiring stage
performer, welcomes the opportunity to be
among the youngest cast members culled
from local performers at each tour stop.
The play, filled with technical innova-
tions to enhance the colorful scenes,
recaptures the world of Dorothy, who
longs for a better place with her dog Toto,
suffers a head injury during a tornado and
is transported beyond the rainbow to find
magical characters in the Land of Oz.
"I think when you have a work of art
moving from one medium to another,
you get different effects:' says Harburg, a
former University of Michigan social sci-
entist. "The community feeling you get in
a live theater is deeper than from a film:'
Harburg, recently at the Jewish
Community Center of Washtenaw County
to introduce his new book, Liberty,
Equality, Consensus and All That Jazz at
the Del Rio Bar, believes the universal
yearning for personal independence has a
lot to do with the success of the Oz book,
film and stage production.
Recalling the evolution of the film, he
says, "Yip, as a poet, rose to a high artis-
tic effort that he and composer Harold
Arlen put together, but the song 'Over the
Rainbow' had been thrown out by the
director.
"Yip and Harold went ballistic and
complained to [MGM studio head] Louis
B. Mayer, who sat behind his desk as five
or six people argued about whether the
number should be included. Finally, Mayer
said, let the boys have their song: and
that's the way the decision was made
Harburg also recalls how his dad got the
idea for "Over the Rainbow."

The cast of the national tour of the Wizard of Oz. The production is based on the Royal Shakespeare Company's celebration of

the 1939 MGM movie.

"Yip and Harold had agreed that they
needed a song to capture where the girl
was yearning to go:' Harburg explains.
"Yip said he would get back to Harold with
a dummy title so Harold could write the
music based on that.
"Then one day, Yip was walking on a
Beverly Hills lawn when the gardener
turned on the sprinkler system. As Yip
was starting to run to get away, rainbows
appeared in the sprinkles. When he got
to a dry place, he thought about it and
realized the little girl in Kansas knew
only gray so the other side of the rainbow
[would be her destination].
"It took several weeks to come to the
idea of 'somewhere over the rainbow, and
that starts all the action in the film."
As Tarnow tours for the first time, most
visibly as the mayoress of Munchkinland,
she remains a fan of the music in the clas-
sic, family-friendly staple of American
culture.
"It's rare that a show can please so many
audiences:' says Tarnow, a May graduate of
the Shenandoah Conservatory in Virginia.
"The stage show is a celebration of the
film with vibrant dance and costumes that
bring the story to life.
"With all the special effects, I watch the
witch melting on stage every night and
still can't figure out how they do it. The
tornado is experienced with the help of
projection screens."

Tarnow, who was raised in New Jersey
where she had her bat mitzvah, has
worked in summer stock and loves get-
ting to see the country as she tours.
"At each venue we work with the local
children playing the Munchkins," she
says. "Their dance schools get training
kits, and we meet with them to put it all
together."
Josee, who studies at Deborah's Stage
Door in Rochester Hills, where she lives,
thinks of the Munchkin costumes and
wigs as cool.

Ensemble member Beth

Tarnow plays the mayoress
of Munchkinland.

"I'm happy when I'm on stage says the
fifth-grader at Long Meadow Elementary
School who also enjoys taking part in
ceremonies lighting Chanukah candles. "I
even love the dance-school practicing."
Harburg says that the Munchkins rep-
resent the idea of community that was
important to his socialist dad.
"Community had to do with his Jewish
heritage Harburg says. "It's implicit in the
Jewish outlook that community is basic to
survival. It makes life worth living to be
giving to the community" 0

Josee York, second from left in the first row, is one
of 12 "local Munchkins" from Deborah's Stage Door

in Rochester Hills.

The Wizard of Oz will be performed Jan. 29-Feb.14 at the Fisher Theatre.
Performances are 7:30 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays, 2 p.m. Saturdays, and
1 and 6:30 p.m. Sundays. There is a matinee at 1 p.m. Thursday, Feb.11,
and no evening performance on Feb.14. $24-$79. Info: (313) 872-1000 or
BroadwayinDetroit.com ; tickets: (800) 982-2787 or ticketmaster.com .

January 21 • 2010

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