Wicked/L. Frank Baum Question

Actually, THE WIZARD OF OZ is in the public domain.

I'm actually pretty familiar with the books, and its clear that Maguire was careful not to include characters outside of first couple of the Oz books (published 1900-1904) which probably keeps them out of any copyright infringement/royalty issues.

Aren't the characters owned by MGM?

Well MGM doesn't own the film rights to OZ anymore -- I think it's owned by WB. That said, they only would have purchased motion picture rights, and once the copyright on the original property expired, so would any studio's exclusivity to the characters of the original book.

But Plum is right -- hence Maguire's treatement of the "magic shoes" in WICKED which aren't exactly ruby...

Updated On: 6/21/05 at 11:14 PM

ted turner owns prodominantly the visual aspects of the movie version, its why glinda's "main" dress is blue/white instead of pink etc.

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Though the green skin was actually an invention of the movie, correct?

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the original books had colored plates for the pictures which had been illustrated by W. W. Denslow. Baum and Denslow both paid to have the colored plates put in wich changed with the colors of the different countries. *I believe* all the witches, including Glinda, in the original color illustartions had green skin...

this is a small picture, but it's all I could find. in it, Glinda has green skin...

Updated On: 6/21/05 at 11:52 PM

And that the two good witches of the original book were combined into one witch.

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No, but it's interesting that Maguire chose to follow the movie in that respect.

And Baum's Glinda was the witch of the South, I think.

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<<<"Are you a Munchkin?" asked Dorothy.

"No, but I am their friend, although I live in the land of the North. When they saw the Witch of the East was dead the Munchkins sent a swift messenger to me, and I came at once. I am the Witch of the North.">>

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That's just weird.

I haven't owned a copy of the book since I was in 5th grade.