Over The Rainbow – The Wizard Of Oz – London Musical
Posts tagged musical
Wizard of Oz Sequel – Surrender Dorothy
Jun 15th
Drew Barrymore is set to direct the film “Surrender Dorothy,” which will be a “loose sequel” to the classic 1939 movie musical “The Wizard of Oz“.
Drew Barrymore
Barrymore has been developing the project for years, and at one point appeared set to play Dorothy’s great-great-granddaughter, who learns to use the ruby slippers’ power when the Wicked Witch unexpectedly returns to take over Oz and the earth. It’s unclear if Barrymore will still take the role or just direct.
Now “Surrender Dorothy” is just one out of five “Oz” films that have been reported as being in development recently, following the big box-office success of Tim Burton’s “Alice in Wonderland.”
Possible films include “Oz the Great and Powerful,” a Disney project that would show how the Wizard came to Oz. There may also be a film version of “Wicked“, the musical prequel to Wizard of Oz. Wicked the musical has been fabulously successful on Broadway and in the London West End.
Sierra Boggess From Love Never Dies
May 18th
Sierra Boggess From Love Never Dies spent some time with the Dorothys last week giving advice and answering questions, specifically related to maintaining the stamina needed to fulfil the requirements of performing up to 8 times a week on the West End stage in London. She explained that the winning Dorothy who gets to perform in The Wizard Of Oz can expect not just a wonderful job but also a complete lifestyle as a leading lady. Sierra was impressed that the amount of working being put in by all at the Dorothy house was already a good preparation for the real thing.
On Sunday night’s Over The Rainbow, Sierra Boggess performed the title song from the new Andrew Lloyd Webber musical, Love Never Dies
Sierra Boggess
Four Superstars, One Dorothy
May 16th
Four Dorothy contenders remain for just a few hours more, and then they will be reduced to three. All four girls who remain in the competition have star quality in many ways, each different, but only three can go through to the Over The Rainbow final next week with a chance to star in The Wizard of Oz in London’s West End starting in April 2011.
Danielle Hope
Danielle’s Performance on Saturday
Steph Fearon
Steph’s performance of Rule The World
Sophie Evans
Sophie’s Performance of Reflection
Lauren Samuels
Lauren’s performance of Heaven.
Dorothy Duets
Ins the first duet duel of the night, Sophie and Steph sang I’m Gonna Was That Man Right Out of My Hair, and then
Lauren and Danielle performed a duet version of Popular from the hit Oz musical, Wicked.
The Wizard Of Oz has been done before
May 14th
I thought it would be interesting to go back over something Andrew Lloyd Webber said about The Wizard of Oz and Over The Rainbow way back during one of the early audition sessions, in fact in Scotland. Andrew Lloyd Webber talked about Over The Rainbow and the Wizard Of Oz production as one of his most ambitious projects yet but said he wanted to steer clear of the classic 1939 movie.
He said:
This is the most difficult show I’ve had to cast. Joseph, Oliver and Maria all came from established theatre productions which are huge hits.
The Wizard Of Oz has been done before, but it’s never worked properly because they’ve tried to recreate the movie too closely.
I’m essentially writing a whole new musical with some of the greatest songs ever written and composing completely new music for it.
There’s at least half a dozen new songs.
So that’s a tantalising insight into what the forthcoming London production at The Palladium promisies. A new musical with half a dozen new songs, a fantastic Dorothy (no matter who wins) all based on but not recreating the original American story.
Jessica Robinson Not Dorothy
May 10th
Oh noes! Not Jessica??!
Jessica Robinson became the surprise second victim of the double knock out weekend yesterday on Over The Rainbow simply because the public voted her into the bottom two alongside of Danielle, who ought really to be the outright favourite to win.
Given that dreadful choice, it was probably no choice at all that Danielle had to be saved but it still doesn’t seem right that Jessica should be out of the competition at this stage. When asked why she thought she had managed to avoid the bottom two so far, Jess put it down to her amazing fan base, but I’m afraid they let her down, just the once.
Ah well, what else happened…?
The mashup was a medley of songs, two from Fiddler on the roof and some pop songs.
Who catches your eye for most of the time when watching the group performances?
If They Could See Me Now
Tamsin Outhwaite returned to Over The Rainbow, this time to perform herself and show the girls exactly how it’s done.
Tamsin Outhwaite performs “If They Could See Me Now” from current West End smash hit musical Sweet Charity
The Sing Off
Danielle and Jessica were given an Andrew Lloyd Webber composition for the inevitable sing off, Take That Look Off Your Face from “Tell Me On A Sunday”
Goodbye Jessica
Jessica seemed to be genuinely grateful for having the good fortune to last through the show as long as she had done, and I’m sure leaves us with the confidence that she has a bright career in musical theatre ahead of her, (if not in Wizard Of Oz) as she sings Somewhere over The Rainbow and heads for flying moon.
Jenny leaves #Dorothy
May 9th
Jenny Douglas Is Not Dorothy
Jenny Douglas from Scotland was the first casualty of the weekend’s double eviction special of Over The Rainbow. Jenny showed increased competence in her singing but failed the test of working with Toto the dog! Understandably perhaps, For Andrew Lloyd Webber, that was enough to rule out Jenny from being in The Wizard of OZ when it opens in London’s West End in March 2011.
Over The Rainbow started this week with a group rendition of the powerful musical theatre song “Defying Gravity” from Wicked. Normally a big solo number, it was slightly odd to hear this a little under performed by the six Dorothys but then it hadn’t really been explained that this was Musical Theatre week.
So firstly, Danielle sang “On My Own” from the musical, Les Miserables impeccably as always.
Then it was the turn of Jenny with her version of Send In The Clowns from the musical, A Little Night Music. By the way, has anybody else noticed that the musical phrase for Send in The Clowns is just like Love Never Dies? Jenny received a mixed response from the judges.
Jessica this week took on the Mary Poppins classic, Supercalifragilistic or rather in full, Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious, as song which potentially leaves little for an individualist performer to build on but to my surprise, Jessica managed to to turn it into an entertaining music hall number. Who’d have thought it. Jessica deserves a place in the semi finals.
Lauren performed Being Alive from the Sondheim musical, “Company” and once again I felt, justfied staying in the show right up to the line.
Steph was given the well known song “Somewhere” from the musical West Side Story and rose to the occasion yet again by showing just how far she has improved in confidence with her new found variation in singing styles.
Sophie has managed to evade the sing offs recently, and once again she avoided the bottom two with a splendidly up tempo version of “I Enjoy Being A Girl” from Flower Drum Song by Rodgers and Hammerstein, a less well known musical based on the 1957 novel of the same name by Chinese American author C. Y. Lee.
In the end, Jenny found herself in the bottom two alongside Lauren Samuels. I don’t know what Lauren was doing there, but it’s a public vote so anything can happen. They had to sing a duet rendition of Simon & Garfunkel’s ‘Bridge Over Troubled Water’, a song which I have never cared for, but whichthey managed to turn almost into a musical theatre piece.
Andrew Lloyd Webber then wasted no time in saving Lauren, citing Jenny’s failure to control Toto as the reason why she would have been too much of a risk on the Wizard Of Oz Stage.
Five Remaining Dorothy Contenders
So the five girls remaining are Lauren Samuels, Jessica Robinson, Danielle Hope, Sophie Evans and Steph Fearon, with one more due to be eliminated on Sunday’s show and then it’s semi-final next weekend.
Saturday Night’s double eviction part one show ended with the five doing a Wizard Of Oz medley starting with Follow The Yellow Brick Road and including Ding Dong The Witch Is Dead, The Merry Old Land of Oz and If I Only Had A Brain.
Dorothys at Sweet Charity
May 6th
The six remaining Dorothys attended the West End opening night of Sweet Charity at the Theatre Royal Haymarket. Tamsin Outhwaite, the brilliant star of this fantastic musical was already know to the Dorothys having been an expert guest in one of the earlier episodes of Over The Rainbow.
Andrew Lloyd Webber had made a point of celebrating Tamsin Outhwaite’s performance in Sweet Charity having seen it at The Menier Chocolate Factory, where this production originates and I must say, he is not wrong. This is a truly well put together show, with a big band, great atmosphere and clever choreography.
Also present on the red carpet were Sheridan Smith from Legally Blonde, Joanna Page and also Heidi Range, Amy Nuttall, Amanda Lamb and Holly Willoughby.
Sweet Charity director Matthew White gave the benefit of his advice and encouragement to Dorothys during the interval, so I don’t know if we will see some brief footage from this visit during the summary of the Dorothys’ week in this weekends Over The Rainbow.
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