2. The Movie - Cast
2.1. How many actors, overall, appeared in The Movie?
2.2. Who played who in The Movie?
2.3. Which characters in Kansas became which characters in Oz?
2.4. Did any of the actors use stage names, and what are their real names?
2.5. Who were the stand-ins and stunt doubles?
2.6. Are any cast members still alive?
2.7. Wasn't Shirley Temple originally cast to play Dorothy?
2.8. Is it true Buddy Ebsen was originally cast to play the Tin Woodman?
2.9. What other actors were considered for parts in the film that later went to others?
2.10. How much did everyone earn on The Movie? Is it true Judy Garland received the lowest salary of all the cast members?
2.11. How old was Judy Garland when she made The Movie?
2.12. How many parts did Frank Morgan play?
2.13. Who was Ray Bolger's childhood hero?
2.14. How old was Billie Burke when she made The Movie?
2.15. Who is Nikko?
2.16. Is it true that Aunt Em committed suicide?
2.17. Whatever became of Toto?
2.18. How many "Munchkins" were there?
2.19. Who played the Munchkin mayor and coroner?
2.20. Did Billy Barty, Patty Maloney, or Zelda Rubinstein play a Munchkin in The Movie?
2.21. Is it true that the Munchkins were all drunkards?
There's no exact number available, but this is a reasonable breakdown based on what's currently known:
This makes for a grand total of 497, so it's probably safe to say "around 500."
Here's the official cast list, as shown in The Movie's closing credits:(The Cast page will give you more information on the cast).
Other cast notes: Some of the Munchkin voices, and the voices of the two apple trees, were provided by Pinto Colvig, better known as the original voice of Goofy (and also Sleepy and Grumpy in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs), and the "Voice of Snow White" (as it's called in the script) in the Tin Woodman's song "If I Only Had a Heart" ("Wherefore art thou, Romeo?") really was the voice of Snow White from the Disney movie, Adriana Caselotti. The Winged Monkeys were little people who did stuntwork. MGM contract player Mitchell Lewis played the captain of the Winkie Guards (probably best known for the line, "She -- she's dead! You KILLED her!").
To make the dream motif more believable, characters from Dorothy's real life in Kansas became fantasy characters in Oz. For some reason, they were listed in the credits by their Kansas names, even though their Oz parts were much larger and more memorable. So, to help those who may be a bit confused:
As it turns out, most of the major actors in The Wizard of Oz did not use the same names with which they were born. Judy Garland's real name was Francis Gumm, Frank Morgan was born Francis Wupperman, Ray Bolger's real name was Raymond Wallace Bulcao, and Bert Lahr's was Irving Lahreim. Jack Haley's real first name was John (Jack being a nickname, of course), and Billie Burke was her real name -- sort of. Her full name was Mary William Ethelbert Appleton Burke, and the Billie would have been a variant of Billy, the diminutive of her second name. (She was probably also named for her father, Billy Burke, a well-known clown for Barnum and Bailey.) And Toto's real name was Terry, but she often appeared under the name Toto after making The Wizard of Oz.
The names of the stand-ins for only three actors are known. Bobbie Koshay was Judy Garland's stand-in, and Betty Danko stood in for Margaret Hamilton and performed many of the stunts (Eileen Goodwin finished the broom flying when an accident put Danko in the hospital). Ray Bolger's stand-in was Stafford Campbell. There were also stand-ins for Jack Haley and Bert Lahr, but their names have been lost.
Sadly, time has taken its toll on The Movie's cast, and none of the principal players are with us any more. Frank Morgan died in 1949, Bert Lahr in 1968, Judy Garland in 1969, Billie Burke in 1970, Jack Haley in 1979, Margaret Hamilton in 1985, and Ray Bolger in 1987. The only cast members known to still be alive are about sixteen of the little people who played Munchkins, many of whom still make public appearances. Among the most visible are Jerry Maren (middle Lollipop Guild kid), Margaret Pellegrini (various Munchkin women), and Meinhardt Raabe (the Coroner). Some of the extras from the Emerald City scenes are also reported to still be alive, but they're not as well known or visible.
Not really. From the beginning, The Movie was meant by LeRoy and Freed to be a vehicle for Judy Garland. Garland had been on contract at MGM for about four years, and the movie-going public was beginning to notice her. She'd already been a success in some second-string MGM pictures, and Oz seemed an ideal vehicle to show off her talent and really launch her into stardom. However, the New York-based executives of MGM's parent company, Loews, realizing the scope and expense Oz would require, wanted a big name star to ensure box office success. So 20th Century Fox was approached -- after Oz and Garland's casting had already been announced to the press -- about loaning Temple to MGM for The Movie. (One story claims that MGM offered to loan Jean Harlow and Clark Gable to Fox for the filming of In Old Chicago as compensation, but this is probably not true, as Harlow died in 1937, before work ever began on Oz.) Fox didn't want to loan the biggest box-office attraction in America out to anyone, however, and LeRoy and Freed weren't too impressed with her abilities. There are some stories that MGM also tried to borrow child stars Deanna Durbin from Universal and Bonita Granville from Warner Bros., but if true, the studios turned MGM down, and so the executives settled on Garland. But the earliest press releases, when the project was first announced, all list Garland in the cast, so there is no truth to the notion that she was the studio's second choice, winning the part by default. (Fox would later feature Temple in their own big-budget Technicolor fantasy, The Blue Bird, in answer to similar projects from the other studios, but it didn't do nearly as well as Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs or The Wizard of Oz.)
Not exactly. While Ebsen, later known for his television roles as Jed Clampett in The Beverly Hillbillies and the title role in Barnaby Jones, was originally cast in The Movie, it was as the Scarecrow. Ray Bolger was cast as the Tin Woodman, as the Scarecrow was the bigger part and Ebsen the bigger star. But Bolger protested, as he felt his fluid style of dancing was better suited to the Scarecrow. LeRoy agreed, and switched Ebsen and Bolger's roles. After two weeks filming, however, Ebsen found that he suddenly couldn't breathe one night, and was rushed to a hospital and put in an iron lung. He had developed a reaction to the aluminum dust used to tint his face silver. (At the time, aluminum dust was erroneously thought to be safe to breathe.) As all of the footage shot to that point was later abandoned anyway, it meant the part of the Tin Woodman could be recast. Ebsen doesn't appear in the finished film, but his voice can still be heard in some of the ensemble songs. MGM borrowed Jack Haley from 20th Century Fox to play the Tin Woodman, and the make-up was reformulated into a paste. (Haley didn't get away unscathed, however; he developed an eye infection from the make-up, and he was off the set for a few days while he recuperated.)
Some other actors slated to be in Oz at one point or another were Gale Sondergaard as the Wicked Witch, when the character was first envisioned as smooth and glamorous, like the Queen in Snow White (when it was decided to remake the Witch in a more traditional mode, tests were done to make Sondergaard look ugly, but she was just too beautiful to pull it off, and didn't want to play "ugly" anyway); and Ed Wynn and W. C. Fields were both approached to play the Wizard. Fields wanted more money than MGM was willing to pay, and he was soon busy making My Little Chickadee anyway, so he didn't take the part. There was even some early thought about Leo, MGM's trademark lion who roared at the start of every picture, playing the Cowardly Lion, with dubbed-in dialogue.
To answer that second part first, sort of. Back in the old days of the Hollywood studio system, actors were usually paid weekly during the production of a picture, rather than a set amount per film and/or a portion of the box office as happens today. Judy Garland's contract at the time stipulated that she would receive $500 per week, which was therefore her salary for The Wizard of Oz. In comparison, Charley Grapewin and Clara Blandick were paid $750 per week, Billie Burke $766.67, Margaret Hamilton $1000, Buddy Ebsen (while he was working on the film ) $1500, Bert Lahr and Frank Morgan $2500, and Ray Bolger and Jack Haley $3000. However, Terry and her trainer, Carl Spitz, were paid $125 per week, and the little people playing the Munchkins $100 each (half of which they had to give to their manager, Leo Singer). So while Garland's weekly salary was the lowest of the principal human cast, it wasn't the lowest of the entire film.
There are two factors to consider, however, when calculating the actors' salaries. One is that many of the cast did not work every week, and thus did not get paid for the entire time of production. (Because the Kansas scenes were filmed last, Uncle Henry and Aunt Em weren't even cast until well into the film's production; once cast, Grapewin and Blandick only worked one week.) Garland, however, was there every week, as she was in nearly every scene. (Terry, too.) And as a result of her success in The Wizard of Oz, Garland's original and fairly standard MGM contract was torn up, and a new contract with a much more lucrative salary structure was drawn up, so it had far-reaching benefits for her earning power.
There's an amusing story about the salaries and guarantees of work on the film. Initially, MGM offered Bert Lahr a five week contract, but Lahr held out for six weeks. MGM countered with five, Lahr said six. This went back and forth for some time. Finally, MGM caved in and gave him six weeks. (An internal MGM memo still exists that gives credence to this story -- "five" is crossed out and "six" typed in next to it.) Lahr ended up working on the film for nearly six months.
Judy was sixteen during the production of The Movie. By the time it premiered, however, she had turned seventeen.
In addition to Professor Marvel and the Wizard, Morgan also played the Guardian of the Gate ("Who rang that bell?"), the cabbie driving the Horse of a Different Color, the palace guard ("I had an Aunt Em myself once!"), and the Wizard's fiery head, for a total of six parts.
As a boy, Bolger caught a performance of Fred Stone in the play Jack O' Lantern in Boston, and from that time on he wanted to become a dancer like Stone -- and he did. Perhaps Stone's most famous role -- which Bolger probably never got to see -- was the Scarecrow in the original 1902 stage version of The Wizard of Oz.
Older than you might think! She was fifty-five during production (she'd just turned fifty-six only days earlier when The Movie premiered.)
For some reason, the character of Nikko is listed in the end credits, even though his character is never named in The Movie. Nikko is the chief of the Witch's winged monkeys, who is always hanging around while the Witch is checking things out in her crystal ball. He was played by Pat Walshe.
Sadly, yes. Actress Clara Blandick killed herself in 1962 by a combination of a sleeping pill overdose and putting a plastic bag over her head. She was 80 at the time.
There are two conflicting reports. The more likely one, in my opinion, is that when Terry, a show business veteran who appeared in a number of films, died, she was buried in the backyard of her trainer, Carl Spitz. Later, Spitz's property was sold to the city of Los Angeles, and the Ventura Freeway was built over it, so Terry is now under either the roadway or an apartment complex. I have also been alerted, however, to a report in The Guinness Book of World Records that Toto's stuffed remains were auctioned off in 1996 for $3,680. I have not been able to confirm this story, however. (It is possible that both accounts are correct, as Terry was off the set for a while after one of the Winkie guards accidentally stepped on her. Another dog filled in for her during that time, so it may be Terry's understudy who was stuffed and auctioned off.)
In the book, Dorothy was greeted by only three Munchkins, but MGM decided to put in a few more than that! In total, 124 little people were hired to portray the Munchkins (although a small number of them didn't quite make it all the way through shooting, for many reasons). Since there was a much higher proportion of men to women in that group, a few young girls (around eight of them) were also hired to fill out the ranks of the Munchkins townswomen (they mostly stayed in the background).
For some reason, these are the only two Munchkin parts that people ask about. The Mayor was played by Charley Becker, and the Coroner by Meinhardt Raabe.
No, none of these now well-known little people actors appeared in The Movie, as they were all too young. Barty came close, but was turned down when it was discovered that he was only thirteen. Maloney and Rubinstein didn't even begin their acting careers until much later. All three appear in Under the Rainbow, however, a 1981 Chevy Chase comedy that was, in part, a highly fictionalized account of the Munchkins' arrival at MGM and the making of The Movie. Barty, in fact, had one of the lead roles, and it was Rubinstein's first film.
No, of course not. True, Judy Garland joked about this with Jack Paar once on The Tonight Show, but that was Judy's sense of humor. There were 124 little people who played the Munchkins, and while many of them were show business veterans, others had never acted before; many were still teenagers, away from home for the first time. They were so busy making The Movie that they really didn't have much time or energy for partying, although apparently a few of the older men did try at one point or another. (One even hit on Judy Garland.) The movie Under the Rainbow is based on this legend, but it is not a docudrama, and certainly not a documentary!
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