80 Years Ago Today; The premiere of The Wizard of Oz at Grauman's Chinese Theatre

[Dennis Donovan]

https://tinyurl.com/jcn3suo (Wikipedia link)




The Wizard of Oz is a 1939 American musical fantasy film produced by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer. Widely considered to be one of the greatest films in cinema history, it is the best-known and most commercially successful adaptation of L. Frank Baum's 1900 children's book The Wonderful Wizard of Oz. Directed primarily by Victor Fleming (who left production to take over the troubled production of Gone with the Wind), the film stars Judy Garland as Dorothy Gale alongside Ray Bolger, Jack Haley and Bert Lahr.

Characterized by its legendary use of Technicolor (although not being the first to use it), fantasy storytelling, musical score, and memorable characters, the film has become an icon of American popular culture. It was nominated for six Academy Awards, including Best Picture, but lost to Gone with the Wind, also directed by Fleming. It did win in two other categories: Best Original Song for "Over the Rainbow" and Best Original Score by Herbert Stothart. While the film was considered a critical success upon release in August 1939, it failed to make a profit for MGM until the 1949 re-release, earning only $3,017,000 on a $2,777,000 budget, not including promotional costs, which made it MGM's most expensive production at that time.

The 1956 television broadcast premiere of the film on the CBS network reintroduced the film to the public; according to the Library of Congress, it is the most seen film in movie history. It was among the first 25 films that inaugurated the National Film Registry list in 1989. It is also one of the few films on UNESCO's Memory of the World Register. The film is among the top ten in the BFI (British Film Institute) list of 50 films to be seen by the age of 14.

The Wizard of Oz is the source of many quotes referenced in contemporary popular culture. Noel Langley, Florence Ryerson, and Edgar Allan Woolf received credit for the screenplay, but uncredited contributions were made by others. The songs were written by Edgar "Yip" Harburg (lyrics) and Harold Arlen (music). The musical score and the incidental music were composed by Stothart.

</snip>

Dorothy enters Technicolor:

[rzemanfl]

1. Not really-

https://www.jsonline.com/story/communities/lake-country/news/oconomowoc/2019/08/14/did-the-wizard-oz-really-premiere-oconomowocs-strand-theatre/2000740001/

[Dennis Donovan]

2. Well, it's disputed, but it did open at Grauman's 80 yrs ago today.

[ariadne0614]

5. Absent definitive proof, I'm going with Oconomowoc. n/t

[elocs]

3. When I was a young boy in the late 50s The Wizard of Oz

was shown on tv every spring and I always looked forward to seeing it. One year our tv was broke that Sunday and I was really bummed out.
Also, we had a b&w tv so I was really amazed the first time I saw it when the movie changed to color in Oz.

[rsdsharp]

6. Yes, I remember it from the 60s.

We, too, had a B&W TV, but even when we got color it wasn't that impressive, because it was apparently a washed out print that they were using. I bought the 50th anniversary laser disc (I know) and that was a real revelation. The color was amazing, as was the clarity. I saw things I'd never seen before, like pumpkins in the Scarecrow's corn field.

[Javaman]

4. back in my primordial days, I worked in film and got to see one of the sets of ruby shoes she wore..

they were encased in glass at Western Costume.

[Aristus]

7. I remember hearing stories about TV broadcasts of 'TWOZ'.

If local TV stations showing the film trimmed even a few seconds from the running time in order to shoehorn more commercials in, they would be overwhelmed with hundreds, or even thousands of phone calls from furious viewers. They soon learned not to tamper with the running time.