First picture of the set for Webber's Wizard of Oz!

[broadwayguy2]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 3:50am

Spending a sleepless night can show you some wonderful things.
Here is what (I believe to be) the first picture we have seen of the set for Webber's Wizard of Oz. if the rest of the sets and costumes are up to this, I am EXCITED.
The Emerald City looks fantastic and I believe that to be a bit of Dorothy's farm / farmhouse...

The Wizard of Oz at the Palladium casts a spell over Andrew Lloyd Webber

[bwayphreak234]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 4:08am

I like it! This show will probably be visually stunning. I can't wait to see more pictures.

[BwayTday]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 4:15am

I'm sure the city layout design has been used before, but it reminds me of the spiderman buildings. I hope it looks amazing though.

Updated On: 12/30/10 at 04:15 AM

[bwayphreak234]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 4:30am

^ I was thinking the same thing. They do look like the Spiderman buildings.

[SeanMartin]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 7:27am

Sorry, but... ick.

Yeah, it's a SPIDEY rehash, with a little bit of TMM mixed in for laughs. One could almost say, based on this, that the designer looked to WICKED, not Baum, for inspiration.

[ClapYo'Hands]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 7:46am

It looks like my high school production's set...

[AvenueQResident]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 7:59am

It's rather amusing to see ALW wearing a builder's hat.

[aasjb4ever]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 8:58am

I'm surprised the hat could fit on his freakishly large, one-could-say caricature-ish head

[Jordan Catalano]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 9:04am

God, he looks hot dressed like Bob the Builder.

[HistoryBoy2]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 9:10am

He looks like a melancholy scrotum.

Sets seem alright though.

[broadwayguy2]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 9:28am

"I've ruined my face, now I am going to ruin Oz."

LOL @ HistoryBoy.

As I said previously, I like it.. I DO think it worth pointing out the obvious that such a forced perspective is very common and I think it's a shame that people instantly look to "Spiderman" as a reference point now... Oh Taymor, what hast thou done? These are also only 4 individual scenic units and in no way represents an entire set. One can't lambast the entire production design for Dreamgirls just based on a solitary light tower and Effie's dressing table. Criticism of these pieces or not, my mind dances with visuals of what the rest looks like.

SeanMartin, where do you see the influence of Wicked? I see none..

[aasjb4ever]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 9:32am

^ Are you Andrew Lloyd Webber?

[Huss417]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 9:34am

Looking forward to seeing a second picture as the first one is so-so.

[Adam Chris]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 10:10am

He looks bored with his own show. He's like, "whatev".

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 11:19am

Honestly, I'm not much on forced perspective. Everyone has overused it these days.

That said, I like that it has a more Book approach than a film approach. And the idea that Oz will be real again (and not a dream) makes me very happy.

[ucjrdude902]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 11:28am

Jordan whose the gentlemen in your picture?

[Phyllis Rogers Stone]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 11:34am

His last name is Lloyd Webber.

[FindingNamo]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 11:37am

People can say what they want but he sure is attractive.

[SeanMartin]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 12:23pm

>> SeanMartin, where do you see the influence of Wicked? I see none.

WICKED has a very steampunk sensibility to it, with lots of Victoria detailing. Same can be said about the architecture in this design.

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 12:47pm

^ I don't necessarily see steampunk in the design yet, but Victorian, yes.

The thing is, if they are going back towards the book, then comparisons in design are going to be natural. The book was written through the 1890s, finalized in 1899 and came out in 1900. If they want to set it in that time frame, then it's inevitable that there will be Victorian and Edwardian influences across the board.

[Reginald Tresilian]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 1:30pm

Right. And the only reason that seems surprising is because of the influence of the MGM film, which had a decided Art Deco look.

Forced perspective aside, this looks like the Emerald City I've seen depicted in dozens of illustrations of the original text.

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 2:11pm

"He looks like a melancholy scrotum."

ROFL!



More forced persective scenery... yawn.

""And here's Dorothy's house," he adds, as he clambers over a tangle of electrical cables in the wings. "It's going to be very convincing in the tornado scene because it all collapses."

Uhm, what does Dorthy fly to Muchkinland in? Not to mention the house is how they kill the WWOTE...

"The most exciting thing about this production is to see if we can make it work for the first time in the theatre properly because it's never really translated on stage before," he says.

REALLY?! NEVER?!

Updated On: 12/30/10 at 02:11 PM

[jimmycurry01]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 4:41pm

It has never translated very well to the stage before. Remember the crap production that played on Broadway and then went on tour about ten years ago? That didn't translate well at all. Then we recently saw a tour last year or so as well, which was loathed by audiences and critics for its amateurish qualities. I haven't seen RSC's original stage production from the 80s, so I can't comment on that. The MUNY production makes many interesting deviations from the MGM movie.
I think it may be safe to say the material has yet to translate well to the stage. I don't know that Webber is really the one to do it. He isn't much of a producer, and I think adding new material to a classic is a dangerous move. It may have been a better idea to create a brand new Wizard of Oz, but then others have tweaked with classics and they became hits on stage. We will just have to wait and see what happens.

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 5:02pm

I still don't understand why people say The Wizard of Oz has never worked well on stage. I can understand not liking a specific production, but are we actually blaming the material? In my opinion the movie itself is already fairly theatrical and it doesn't really require a major overhaul to adapt nicely to the stage. There's a lot of material that was written for the film like The Jitterbug, and song for the crows and the apple trees that seems to suggest that Arlen and Harburg may have actually been writing with the stage in mind and not for film as I don't see how that material could have ever worked on film -- yet it translates very nicely to the stage. Updated On: 12/30/10 at 05:02 PM

[Midnight Radio]

Posted: 12/30/10 at 5:03pm

The Wonderful Webber of Oz