Wizard of Oz musical (not movie) questions

[Emcee4ever]

Posted: 1/19/07 at 10:09pm

How do you do the Wicked Witch of the East's feet disappearing and the slippers appearing on Dorothy's feet? Just curious.
Updated On: 1/19/07 at 10:09 PM

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 1/19/07 at 10:16pm

I believe they were inflatable, and they just let the air out of them and pulled them under the house set piece.


Sort of like a party whistle.

[Emcee4ever]

Posted: 1/19/07 at 10:23pm

I never thought of that! Cool!

[husk_charmer]

Posted: 1/19/07 at 11:02pm

TheatreDiva is correct in terms of the film. There are several traditional methods for the stage:
1) The MUNY rental unit (And many others), feature an "Oz" porch, which has the feet under the porch, and, at a cue, they pull back under and a piece of fabric decorated like foundation covers the spot.
2) The most common way is to have the Munchkins swarm Dorothy, and they switch shoes on her. Typically these are the shoes on the prop legs.

Does this help?

[defyingravity11]

Posted: 1/20/07 at 12:38am

When I did a stage production we had the legs of the witch pulled back into the house foundation. Dorothy had been standing behind Glinda's large dress (as if afraid of the Wicked Witch of the West) and a Munchin took a second pair of ruby slipperd from her basket and made the switch.

[CATSNYrevival]

Posted: 1/20/07 at 2:39am

I saw a production that had Dorothy in the Ruby Slippers for the entire show and had some kind of fabric covering over them for the Kansas scene. the change was done by a munchkin behind Glinda's dress the second a pyrotechnic went off for the disappearing shoes.

[DayDreamer]

Posted: 1/20/07 at 4:22am

The production I was involved with (choreographed) we did it the way husk described, but we had two sets of shoes.

[kyle.]

Posted: 1/20/07 at 1:15pm

http://www.beyondtherainbow2oz.com/stagethewizard.html

[TheatreDiva90016]

Posted: 1/20/07 at 2:28pm

Actually, I think the film version was shot in reverse. The legs started out delflated and rolled up and were filled with air. Then they just played it backwards, making it look like the legs delflated and curled up.