More Tidbits About The Wizard Of Oz That You Might Not Have Known

Ed Wynn

Frank Morgan was not the first choice to play the Wizard, Ed Wynn was but he turned down the part because the role only had him at the end as the Wizard and the Kansas doctor.

Munchkin land's Coroner

Meinhardt Raabe the actor that played the Coroner was just 2 inches short of joining the Air Force so he decided to join CAP Civil Air Patrol. During World War II he was CAP's worlds smallest pilot. His only lines were...

"As coroner, I must aver

I thoroughly examined her

And she's not only merely dead

She's really, most sincerely dead!"

Which only took 15 seconds.

Silent film

In 1910 a 13 minute silent film was made. I guess 106 years ago it was pretty normal, but watching it today it seems a little creepy. I thought so anyway. At the end of this movie, Dorothy decides to stay in Oz and not go back to Kansas. I couldn't even watch it and its' only 13 minutes long! See for yourself.

Margaret Hamilton's on set accident

During her escape through the elevator in the stag floor, she was trapped below the set (while filming continued) and suffered severe burns on her face and hands when the fireball that was to hide her escape misfired. The Scene was only shot twice. She was burned in the second take. However they used the rehearsal take as the one they used in the movie. Her make-up had to be removed with alcohol which was a very painful process. Margaret refused to do any more scenes that involved with smoke or fire. They had a stand in Betty Danko suffered permanently scaring burns which put her in the hospital for 11 days. Danko's legs were burned when during the "Surrender Dorothy" scene. She sat on a pipe made to look like a smoking broomstick when the pipe exploded during the 3rd take. Another stunt double Aline Goodwin had to finish that scene.

Biggest inside joke of the film

When the Scarecrow recites the Pythagorean theorem he mixes it all up, which has become an inside joke of the film. What he should have said was....

"The sum of the squares of the two shortest sides of a right triangle is equal to the square of the remaining side, or hypotenuse."

Made of real lion skin

The Cowardly Lion's costume was made of real lions skin and fur. Weighing about 60 pounds. A crew of people were hired for one specific job and that was to dry out the costume and make it fresh smelling for the next days filming. Because Bert Lahr would sweat so much under the hot set lights. At auction the costume brought in over 3 million dollars which was 3 times more than what they expected.

The book is always a bit different

We all know the book is always different and usually better than the movie, in the book instead of Dorothy saying "There's no place like home", she says to her magic shoes which are silver, "Take me home to Aunt Em!.

Singer Midgets

Named for their manager Leo Singer, the Singer Midgets troupe comes from Europe. At first the studio wanted 300 little people but ended up going with 124 little people to be cast as Munchkins. Many of them took advantage of this opportunity to escape the Nazis according to the Internet Movie Database. All but two of their voices were dubbed because they didn't speak English.

Glinda's Bubble

Glinda's bubble was actually made of glass and because Technicolor compositing was so new that it took 2 weeks to get just the right lighting to make it look right. It was also filmed separately from Glinda. Although many believed Billie Burke (Glinda the Good Witch)voice was dubbed...it actually was not, she did her own singing for the film.

Judy fell in love with Terry

Terry is the dogs real name. Judy fell in love with her and wanted to adopt her but her owner and trainer refused to let her go. Over her life time she appeared in 17 feature films. She was a very skittish dog and would wet the carpet a lot. On set if she got nervous or frightened like when the wind machine was in use and when the Tin-Man would pump steam out of his funnel hat, "Toto" would hide behind her fellow actors. "Toto" also earned more money than the Munchkins did...Toto at $125 per week and the Munchkins making just $50 per week.

Flying Monkey Mishaps

Suspended above the sound stage several of the Flying Monkeys fell several feet and were injured when cables snapped.

Director Victor Fleming

It's been told that director Victor Fleming slapped Judy Garland when she couldn't get her giggles under control during the scene where she had to slap the Cowardly Lion. She gave the director a kiss after he slapped her. That would never happen on a movie set today, there would surely be law-suits!