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A Wizzable Wiz Indeed

“How can you talk if you haven’t got a brain?”

“I don’t know…but some folks without brains do an awful lot of talking…don’t they?”

The above bit of dialogue is my favorite exchange from “The Wizard of Oz” – and probably explains my ability to fill a blog with over 1,000 words every week.

The reason L. Frank Baum’s timelessly popular tale leads off this week’s missive on Milton is because I had the great pleasure to attend Milton High School’s stage production of the story this past weekend.

There's just something about “The Wizard of Oz” that draws you in. It has a special place in the hearts of those who grew up watching it in its annual television appearance – and had their childhoods traumatized by visions of flying monkeys.

When my children were young, we read them all of the Oz books written by Baum. A lot of people are surprised to hear there is more than one. Baum actually wrote 14 over the course of two decades. After the wild success of the original and the public's appetite for more, he kept writing them - introducing wonderful characters like Jack Pumpkinhead and the Thoroughly Educated Woggle-bug – which helped him finance his disastrous dabbling in movies and the theatre.

But it's the first story that lives on, mainly through the 1939 movie with Judy Garland and various related projects like “Wicked.” So it was no surprise that Milton High School's production of the stage musical last weekend drew some very full houses.

There was no way I was going to miss this, for many, many reasons. First, my daughter was playing in the pit orchestra. Two, I knew several of the students in the cast as well as their parents. Three, I love the story. And four, I had the honor of playing The Cowardly Lion seven years ago in a wonderful SpotLight on Kids production of this same show at the Edgerton Performing Arts Center. So I, of course, wanted to see how this show compared to the one I was in. (In an ironic twist, a couple of the MHS cast members had played Munchkins in the Edgerton show.)

I expected it to be well done, and it didn't disappoint. The level of talent at Milton High School amazes me. We had some talented individuals in my MHS class, but what I've witnessed the past few years in various school performances has been astonishing.

I also have to give props to MHS instructors Bill Schrank and Heather Slosarek for how well the show was cast. With a well-known show like this, the audience expects the characters to look a certain way, and they did. All of the leads were perfect for their roles.

Lindsay Pratt as Dorothy did a wonderful job of maintaining the wide-eyed wonder of an innocent young girl throughout – no small feat when you’re on stage almost the entire show. Other standout performances included Scarecrow James Lima, Tin Woodsman Andrew Collins and Katie Miller as Glinda, the essence of goodness.

As the Wicked Witch of the West, Madison McCarthy was dead on. At times, she seemed to be channeling Margaret Hamilton herself. Madison also provided the best spontaneous moment of the night when a winged monkey lost her hat. Staying totally in character, she cackled, “Put your hat back on – you look like an idiot!”

To my amazement, the high school production was, in some ways, more ambitious than the show I was in. For one thing, unlike my show, the three lead Ozian characters (Scarecrow, Tin Woodsman and Cowardly Lion) also had to play the farmhands at the beginning and end of the play. This led to some very quick costume changes. Andrew Collins needed the assistance of several crew members for his transformation from tin back to flesh, the only evidence of which was a slight grayish cast on his face.

Also, where we had the advantage of using real vertically challenged people – children – as Munchkins, the high school had to either use all pre-growth spurt freshmen or be creative. They opted for creative. Some actors walked on their knees with shoes sewed to their pants (think Tim Conway’s Dorf character) or in the case of the Lullaby League, on camouflaged rolling chairs. This is also a good spot to give credit to Kristine Moser’s brilliant work on the costumes.

And in a twist I hadn’t seen before, the high schoolers used a real dog for Toto. In my production, Toto was played by a young girl, but MHS used what might possibly be the best behaved dog in the state. She was also well trained – when she was meant to bark, a tape-recorded bark was her cue, and she never missed her cue.

But when all was said and done, I knew that during the second half of the show I would find myself living vicariously through Dakota Williams, who played my cherished role of the Cowardly Lion.

My family knew I would, too. Before the show started, my mother asked if I was going to recite all of the Lion's lines. I told her that no, the gene that causes someone to talk during a performance ended with her generation.

And sure enough, the minute Dakota graced the stage in his leonine attire, I was transported back to the EPAC show. It was an initially difficult adjustment, seeing someone do the part differently than the way I had it ingrained in me during all of those rehearsals. Eventually, though, I relaxed and appreciated Dakota’s performance. Like the other leads, he was well suited for the role and carried it off with enjoyable aplomb.

The two actors who played the Tin Woodsman and Scarecrow in the Edgerton production are now in L.A. launching their professional acting careers. It would not surprise me if at least one of the young people from this production followed in their footsteps.

p.s. In case you think that last statement is hogwash that is unattainable for a Milton High School graduate, I direct you to the Internet Movie Database page for 1987 MHS grad Tracy Douglas.

Jim Lyke is a Milton native who works in Janesville. He participates in local community theater and writing projects. Jim is a community blogger and is not a part of Janesville Gazette staff. His opinion is not necessarily that of the Janesville Gazette staff or management.