The Wizard of Oz is an American musical fantasy film directed by Victor Fleming released in 1939. The film stars Judy Garland, Frank Morgan, Ray Bolger, Bert Lahr, Jack Haley, Billie Burke, Margaret Hamilton, and Charley Grapewin. This film is considered among the most important and iconic films ever made. Its score, script, and cinematography are immediately recognizable by millions throughout the world.
Franchise connections[]
Return to Oz was a sequel released in 1985. While not an official sequel to the 1939 film, Return to Oz featured the Ruby Slippers, an element unique to the 1939 film, being that the original story by L. Frank Baum and prior silent films indicated that the slippers were silver. In the 1939 film, the slippers were changed from silver to ruby because bright red would be more visually dazzling than silver when filmed in technicolor. Thus, this change links the two films together.
There are two prequels, which are linked due to the fact that in both prequels the skin of the Wicked Witch of the West is green, which is unique to the film: Oz the Great and Powerful and Wicked.
Westphall connections to The Wizard of Oz[]
- The Ruby Slippers can be seen as an artifact in Warehouse 13 "Fractures" and in The Master of Disguise.
- In Brewster McCloud, Daphne Heap wears the Ruby Slippers. Heap is played by Margaret Hamilton who played the Wicked Witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz.
- The Wicked Witch of the West appears in The Paul Lynde Halloween Special.
- The Wicked Witch of the West appears in Sesame Street.