Wizard of Oz comes to Morrow Little Theater

By LEANNE GOMPF –

“The Wiz­ard of Oz” graced the Mor­row County Com­mu­nity this past week­end and was a huge success.

The Good Witch Glinda tells the munchins it’s safe to come out and Dorothy is no threat.

The play closely fol­lows the 1939 movie, includ­ing songs, char­ac­ters and scenes every­one knows and loves. My four-year-old grand­son Lan­don even gave me a play by play of what was going to hap­pen next. The entire audi­ence was cap­ti­vated as the four main char­ac­ters trav­eled down the yel­low brick road. The musi­cal ver­sion of the movie veers away from the orig­i­nal in a few small spots, but for the most part, stays true to the orig­i­nal with the same famil­iar songs and plot. The story fol­lows young Dorothy as her dreams take her over the rain­bow where she

The Lol­lipop Guild wel­comes Dorothy with a sweet treat and a song.

and her dog, Toto, meet the brain­less Scare­crow, the heart­less Tin Man and the Cow­ardly Lion. The four take the yel­low brick road to adven­ture as they each seek what they are miss­ing. The only way for them to suc­ceed involves con­quer­ing the Wicked Witch of the West, who has it in for Dorothy because Dorothy has her Ruby Slippers

Annie Robertson’s por­trayal of Dorothy, the young Kansas farm girl, was heart­felt, gra­cious and endear­ing. I even found myself tear­ing up sev­eral times

The Lul­laby League wel­comes Dorothy to Munchkin­land with a song and dance.

as she deliv­ered her lines with extreme sin­cer­ity and emo­tion; truly a stand­out per­for­mance for this young actress. Her trio of side­kicks gave impres­sive per­for­mances as well. Aaron Vance was notable as the flex­i­ble and endear­ing Scare­crow and Zac Conaway was excel­lent as the gen­tle, lov­able Tin Man. How­ever, steal­ing the stage was Joey Pow­ell as he growled his way down the yel­low brick road as the “hammy”, yet lov­able Cow­ardly Lion. You could hear belly laughs from chil­dren and adults as he shrieks and screams and goes from his girly, cow­ard voice to his character’s attempt at a brave, roar­ing voice.

The Tin Man tries out his newly oiled legs as Dorothy and the Scare­crow steady him.

Other stand­outs in the large cast were: Mandy Rocks as Miss Gultch and the cack­ling Wicked Witch of the West; the beau­ti­ful Rebecca Mor­ri­son as Glinda; Cindy Weiss as Aunt Em; Tom Hutchins as Uncle Henry and Ken Bar­nett as Pro­fes­sor Mar­vel and the Wiz­ard of Oz.

With mul­ti­ple scene changes and tech­ni­cal chal­lenges I thought the Mor­row Lit­tle The­atre pro­duc­tion was enter­tain­ing, prov­ing that you to do not need a big bud­get to cre­ate impres­sive visu­als and keep the story mov­ing along.

The Cow­ardly Lion lets every­one know what he would do if HE were king of the forest.

The show would not have been nearly as enter­tain­ing with­out the numer­ous extras that were inter­min­gled through­out the pro­duc­tion. Young aspir­ing actors took on the roles of the munchkins, Crows, Trees, Oz Cit­i­zens, and Jit­ter­bugs includ­ing Daysia Elliot, Dar­ian McCoy, Meaghan McGill, Kelly Baer, Mal­lory Cooper, Sarah Cooper, Heather Emberg, Logan Gregg, Gen­e­sis Rocks, Katie Slusher, Christa Seckel, Alexis Seitz-Adkins, Izzy Cham­bers, Danielle Tim­mons, Grace Partick, Kate Mor­gan, Far­rah Gregg, Chelsea Chafin and Sarah Oliver. The youngest mem­bers of the large cast included, John McGill as the Mayor; Matthew Emberg as the Bar­ris­ter, Far­rah Gregg as both Coro­ner and Nikko; Gavin Gra­ham as WInkie Gen­eral; Thomas Emberg, Phillip Emberg, Gar­ret Lamb-Hart and Samuel Baer and the Lol­lipop Guild and Olivia Mor­ri­son, Kayleigh Mor­gan, Mad­di­son Hursey and Mary Kelty as the Lul­laby League.

Poor Toto is in the clutches of the Wicked Witch of the West, who has grim plans for the pooch.

The Mor­row Lit­tle The­atre would like to thank their spon­sors for this sum­mer musi­cal pro­duc­tion: First Know National Bank, Dr. Melissa McRae, Rose­mary Brown and fam­ily, Stephen Ritz,DDS, and Gompf Funeral Ser­vice. A spe­cial thank you to Cardington-Lincoln High School, Mon­ica Hub­bard and Mount Gilead Park Ave Ele­men­tary, Bucyrus Lit­tle The­atre, Brae­lyn Snow, Mr Brimm, Trin­ity United Methodist Church and the com­mu­nity who so gra­ciously embraces Mor­row Lit­tle Theartre.

There’s no place like home, and Glinda the Witch is help­ing Dorothy get there.

The Mor­row Lit­tle The­atre meets the 4th Tues­day of every month at Trin­ity United Methodist Church. They can also be found on face­book and at morrowlittletheatre.org.

Posted by Randa Wagner on Aug 8 2012. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS Feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.