Who would you cast if "The Wiz" was re-done on film?

[mygfdontliveincanada]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 2:49pm

Here are a few of my picks...

Dorothy: Beyonce
Tinman: Usher (it's a dance role)
Wizard: Little Richard
Evilene: Aritha Franklin
Glinda: Donna Summer
Adapearle: Mariah Carey

[Michael Bennett]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 2:52pm

I would cast Dorothy with a child. Using a grown up Diana Ross was one of the major mistakes made by the film version of THE WIZ.

[BSoBW2]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 2:57pm

Dorothy: Dakota Fanning
Tinman: Dakota Fanning
Wizard: Dakota Fanning
Evilene: Dakota Fanning
Glinda: Dakota Fanning
Adapearle: Dakota Fanning


Really?

Dorothy: Marcy Harriell
Tinman: ??
Lion: Chuck Cooper
Scarecrow: ??
Wizard: Andre de Shields
Evilene: Mary Bond Davis
Glinda: Darlene Love
Adapearle: Adriane Lenox

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 2:57pm

Exactly. Ross was a disaster in the film and looked ridiculous running around crying with her little dog. They should have cast Stephanie Mills who, at 4' 9" or whatever she was, still looked like a teenager.

[uncageg]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 4:01pm

I agree. Ms. Mills should have been cast. But when you are sleeping with the head of Motown, you get what you want. Motown destroyed what could have been a spectacular screen musical. And especially one with a black cast. That afro she was sporting just made me cringe. The only good things about that movie to me were Mabel King and Quincy Jones' music and arrangements. If it were to be re-done, I would not like to see any of the current female pop stars play Dorothy. I would much rather see a new breakout performer do the role. I agree with Chuck Cooper as the Lion. De Shields or Vereen as the Wiz. Trey Lorenz might make a good Scarecrow. And I agree with Aretha as Evilene.

[theatrebabe]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 4:16pm

I agree. I hated Diana Ross in that roll. Stwphanie Mills is amazing and looks like a child.

I just repeated everything you all said, but whatever.

[uncageg]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 4:58pm

I remember reading somewhere that one excuse for not casting Stephanie was that she did not look good on film. I think she would have looked fine and sounded 100 times better!

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 5:09pm

Berry Gordy wanted Diana from the beginning. His production company bought the rights and he always planned on the movie being a Ross vehicle. He wanted a musical follow up to "Lady Sings The Blues" and "Mahogany" and for some stupid reason he thought casting the 34 year old Ross as Dorothy made sense. The film was such a huge flop that it ended her career in Hollywood (and soon after ended their relationship).

[bjivie2]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 5:20pm

In myh opinion, canada, your picks for the movie are ridiculous. Beyonce? Usher? Mariah Carey? No, no and no.

Here are my picks...

Dorothy: an unkown 17 year old with a powerhouse voice
Tinman: Ben Vereen
Wizard: Eddie Murphy (he can go from one black movie musical to the next one)
Evilene: Patti Labelle
Glinda: Vanessa Williams

And here (for the umpteenth time) is my revival cast:

Dorothy: Anika Noni Rose
Tin Man: Ben Vereen
Scarecrow: Darius DeHaas (don't know if he can dance it or not)
Wizard: Billy Porter
Auntie Em: Lillias White
Evilene: Jennifer Holliday
Adaperle: Carol Channing (she's 1/16th black)
Glinda: LaChanze

[BroomstickBoy]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 5:21pm

Wasn't there a remake in the works with :
Dorothy : Monica
Glinda : Queen Latifah
Evilene : Patti Labelle
The Wizard : Little Richard

etc etc etc???

[bjivie2]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 5:23pm

I think there was talks of a TV movie recently, hasn't there?

[TennesseeTwang]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 5:37pm

I like the idea of a real, live, child playing Dorothy.

Btw, Michael Jackson in the Diana Ross version, was creepy even then.
Updated On: 9/18/05 at 05:37 PM

[Demitri2]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 6:22pm

Besides Ross ruining the film, the thing I remember hating the most about the movie was how drab it looked. I saw it at the Cinerama Dome in L.A. opening day and the color was so washed out I couldn't believe it. As I sat there the movie just got worse and worse as did Ross' performance. On the other hand though, the Broadway show was totally enjoyable and Mills brought the old goose bumps out when she sang.

[Marquise]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 6:22pm

I don't think Berry Gordy had Diana in mind for THE WIZ. The movie was a a co-production between Universal Pictures and Motown Productions. I've read that their intentions were to cast someone who was age appropriate and stick more or less to the original stage book.

Diana Ross has just moved to New York after living in LA. Her marriage to Rob Silberstein had just ended. Story goes she watched the original 1939 film with her daughters and somehow convinced herself she could play the role of Dorothy.

Initially Berry Gordy nixed the idea. Diana however was very persistent and argued that the moral of THE WIZ was about someone, anyone trying to find their way in the world and that it wasn't necessarily about a "little girl". To her, Dorothy could be anyone of us. And with that argument more or less she got the role.

Once she was on board THE WIZ which originally had a very modest budget became a multi-million dollar film effort. Quincy Jones was hired to produce it's soundtrack. Michael Jackson was hired to play "Scarecrow". Sidney Lumet was set to direct and he cast his (then) mother in law, the legendary Lena Horne as "Glinda".

The result: One of the worst Movie Musicals EVER to come out of Hollywood.
Updated On: 9/18/05 at 06:22 PM

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 6:29pm

LOL. Thank you Marquise.

They frankly should burn every print of that monstrosity so nobody ever has to sit through it again -- except, of course for the Lena Horne section. The Great Lena somehow emerges not only with her dignity in tact, but she blew away everything else in the film. I'll never forget the ovation her number received in the movie theatre when I saw it as a child -- one of the few times I've seen such spontaneous applause of a film.

[Marquise]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 6:36pm

Yes Margo. I remember seeing this (more or less) at the Loew's Orpheum on East 86th in NYC when it opened. I also remember people clapping. I (of course) didn't know who Lena Horne was at the time but I have to agree that if there is a bright spot in the film it would have to be Lena along with Mabel King and Ted Ross.

WTF was up with that Emerald City sequence anyway?

[jasonf]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 6:37pm

I couldn't get past the idea of Chuck Cooper as the Lion -that would be great. If we're casting the top African Americans in theater, how has no one mentioned Brian Stokes Mitchell (Tinman maybe?) or Norm Lewis (Scarecrow)? I think Anika Noni Rose would be great as Dorothy, LaChanze perhaps as Glinda, and Lilias White as Eveline...

[MargoChanning]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 6:38pm

Weirdness. Just plain weirdness. That color thing made no damn sense. And what a waste of Richard Pryor.

[theatrebabe]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 6:40pm

Yea, and what was with the munchkins coming out of the walls. I saw it when I was like 9 and it freaked the hell outta me.

[Marquise]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 6:51pm

I dunno. Joel Schumacher (YES, the very same Joel Schumacher who directed PHANTOM OF THE OPERA) is responsible for the screenplay. It must have something to do with all the drugs he took in the '70s.

[best12bars]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 7:55pm

The really sad thing to me is that most people think that the movie was a failed representation of the stage show, when (in fact) the film was NOTHING like the Broadway musical. The show was about a little girl from Kansas going to Oz, and was actually more faithful to the original children's book by L. Frank Baum than the 1939 MGM movie was (as far as storyline and characters). The Wiz as a movie had a 28 year old school teacher from Harlem, going to an urban Oz (that looked like a New York City disco drug trip) complete with garbage piled up on the sidewalks and scary characters in the subway.

I thought the original production was incredibly inventive and charming. And I hope that if it's revived on stage or as a movie (either for TV or on the big screen) that someone has the sense to restore what was right about it to begin with.

If they made a new movie and stuck to the original script, I don't even think it would count as a remake. More like a "here's what should have been done the first time."

[alterego]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 9:09pm

I don't know who to cast for a remake, but please, please cast someone with youth on their side for Dorothy!

I was a huge fan of the stage show when it was done in Australia in 1976, a reproduction of the Broadway version with the exception that we had black principals and a white chorus(Dorothy was 19 year old Andrea Frierson from Once On This Island and the Tinman, Victor Willis who a year later was lead singer for the Village People). I remember seeing the movie when it first came out and being terribly disapointed. I also recall how ugly the movie looked, just a bad bad movie. Please bury it!

[ShuQ]

Posted: 9/18/05 at 9:14pm

I'd cast Anika Noni Rose or Tamyra Gray as Dorothy.