Whilst The Wizard of Oz waits until December to begin rehearsals with Danielle Hope as Dorothy, the public’s eventual favourite, an interesting picture is building up of the various activities from news surfacing from the rest of the Over The Rainbow Contestants. So if you were wondering, “Where are They Now?” Let’s take a look :

Sophie Evans

Sophie Evans, the runner up to Danielle will be Dorothy after all, she gets to play understudy for Danielle Hope’s holidays and also every Tuesday night at The London Palladium. Sophie has had some high profile appearances in Wales, particularly when the alternate Dorothy role was announced at the Cardiff Millennium Centre, at the big weekend festival in Pontypridd and helping to promote a new ice cream venture for the valleys.

Sophie Evans Will be Alternate Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz

Sophie is also joining some of her fellow Dorothies at the Arts Educational School (AES), on a musical theatre training course as funded by Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Lauren Samuels

Lauren Samuels who came third, was the first Dorothy to appear on the West End Stage as a leading lady when she snagged the lead role as Sandy in Grease and she’s been working hard at it every night and twice on Saturdays since July. Well done Lauren!

Lauren Samuels in Grease

Steph Fearon

Steph Fearon rushed straight into a London theatre role in Smokey Joe’s Cafe at the tiny Landor Theatre off West End in South London. The show and Steph have met with much critical approval and there’s a good chance it will transfer sometime after finishing this week. Meanwhile Steph is going to be in “Wizz” a kind of motown version of “The Wizard of Oz” in Milton Keynes.

Stephanie Davis

Stephanie Davis was offered some musicals but chose to take up a regular part on Channel Four TV as a new character in Hollyoaks, her favourite TV soap. Stephanie plays 15-year-old Sinead O’Connor on Hollyoaks, part of a new family called the O’Connors.

Jessica Robinson

Jessica Robinson was called up to stand in for Steph Fearon in Smokey Joe’s Cafe for a few nights while Steph had an operation on her hand. Jessica has also moved down to London and will be attending the Arts Educational School alongside Danielle Hope and Sophie Evans.

Jenny Douglas

Jenny Douglas will be playing the prestigious part of ‘Meat’ in the touring version of ‘We Will Rock You‘

Emilie Fleming

As the Wild Card Dorothy, Emilie secured a place in the final eleven but, went out against Sophie Evans in week 4. Emile is now training at the Guildford School of Acting.

Bronte Barbe

Bronte was an early favourite for the top five but left in week two after finding herself in the sing-off against Lauren Samuels. Bronte is currently studying at Mountview Academy.

Dani Rayner

will be playing Jasmine in Aladdin at the Liverpool Empire this Christmas! With Pamela Anderson and Les Dennis. 10th December-2nd January.

Amy Diamond

Amy Diamond has been cast in The Drowsy Chaperone so that’s another Dorothy in London, although not quite the West End.

Danielle Hope

While Danielle Hope waits to begin rehearsals for The Wizard of Oz in December, there is little else to report. She’s done a few chat show interviews and that kind of thing, finished off her exams, and has been going to see a lot of London theatre shows.

Danielle Hope is Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz

Proceeds from the sale of the single will go to 2 charities, one for prostate cancer – Prostate UK and the BBC Performing Arts Fund

Danielle Hope – Over The Rainbow Single

One of the recent missions was about maintaining the Kansas accent and here you can see each of four contestants in a scene from Wizard of Oz that allows us to really evaluate their abilities as actors.

Now Andrew Lloyd Webber seemed to be bowled over by Danielle, so we get a clue here perhaps as to who he would like to see the public vote for tonight, but he also praises Lauren’s professionalism and wonders if she can pull out just a little bit more from inside her own emotion for us. Personally, I found the Danielle performance just a tad drawn out and over done, but there’s no doubt she would make a smashing Dorothy, as would any of them really.

Over the rainbow – Mission

After watching them each have a go at the real acting, who do you think comes out of this mission in the best position for tonight’s vote?

From Monday May 31st, the charity single will be available as a physical CD, complete with The Wizard of Oz Medley, as performed by all three finalists and other Dorothy contenders from earlier episodes of the Over The Rainbow show, as a bonus B-side to the titular track. The medley will consist of some of the classic Wizard of Oz songs sung throughout the competition by the Dorothys including:

• Follow The Yellow Brick Road
• We’re Off To See The Wizard
• It Really Was No Miracle
• Ding Dong The Witch Is Dead
• The Merry Old Land Of Oz
• If I Only Had A Heart

For the three remaining Dorothys Lauren, Sophie and Danielle there is just one more live show left in which to convince the nation that each has the necessary qualities to win.

The three finalists will sing a range of songs including their own favourites from the series, as well as performing an exclusive group performance with the eight Dorothys who have already left the competition, all back on the Over the Rainbow stage set for the last time.

Over The Rainbow – Dorothys

On Saturday 22nd May, the winning Dorothy will be finally chosen by Over The Rainbow viewers, and now it has been announced that the lucky Dorothy, as well as going on to play the part in The Wizard of Oz when it opens in London next April, will also get to release a single of the iconic ‘Over The Rainbow’ song, as first sung by Judy Garland in the 1939 film.

Wizard of oz

The charity single will be rushed out as a download available from midnight on Sunday 23rd May and all profits net of agreed expenses will be split fifty-fifty between two favoured charities of the TV show’s producers, Lord Andrew Lloyd Webber and the BBC: Prostate UK and The BBC Performing Arts Fund.

But the big question remains, whose voice will be singing “Over The Rainbow” on the charity single – will it be Lauren, Sophie or Danielle?

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

Steph’s Performance of Rule The World:

The Sing off, Sunday

Another Suitcase in Another Hall from Evita

Goodbye Steph

“I’m disappointed not to have gone that little bit further but at the end of the day I wanted whatever the public wanted,” said Steph.

Steph Fearon, admits she would love to star in the West End musicals The Lion King, Wicked or Sister Act, and also said that Andrew Lloyd Webber had asked to meet her later this week to discuss her future.

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.

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.