Field report: The “Oz” convention

Thu, 27 Jul 2000 17:32:00 +0000

Yes, it's true: There were reports of Munchkins unwinding with wild orgies after a hard day's work skipping around the Yellow Brick Road during the filming of 1939's "The Wizard of Oz." And yes, Judy Garland once referred to the actors who depicted the denizens of Munchkinland as "drunks," telling a national TV audience, "They got smashed every night, and the police had to pick them up in butterfly nets."

But Jerry Maren, the original Lollipop Kid, says that reports of the Munchkins' debauchery were greatly exaggerated. In fact, he recently told a roomful of fans, the misadventures of fewer than a dozen wild-and-crazy actors unfairly sullied the reputation of all 124 Munchkins. You'd have learned all kinds of things like that if you'd attended the International Wizard of Oz Club's special centennial celebration at Indiana University in Bloomington last weekend.

At the "Meet a Munchkin" panel, for example, Maren, now in his 80s and sporting a salt-and-pepper beard, noted that he and his fellow little people on the set made $50 a week (less than half of Toto's pay) during the making of the classic film. "How could you get drunk on $50 a week?" groused Maren, who presumably made more for his appearance much later in the "Yada Yada" episode of "Seinfeld."

A Blackwellian nightmare

Tue, 11 Jan 2000 17:00:00 +0000

And now, for the announcement that has celebrities everywhere quaking in their Manolos: Mr. Blackwell's 40th annual worst-dressed women list.

For four decades now, the alliteratively acerbic designer and self-appointed arbiter of taste has gleefully chronicled each year's fashion flops and tops. This is the guy, after all, who once likened Diana Ross to "a Martian meter maid," called Elizabeth Taylor "a boutique toothpaste tube, squeezed in the middle" and dubbed Linda Tripp "a sheepdog in drag."

When Blackwell announces his latest list of fashion victims, I'll take a moment, as I have for four years now, to recall the surreal afternoon I spent with him on a beauty magazine assignment that went disastrously (though hilariously) wrong.

"Hey," my editor at Allure had said, "we think it'd be funny for you to go to L.A. and hang out in a mall with Mr. Blackwell. Get him to comment on what real people are wearing! Take a few pictures, have him toss off a few quips. It'll be fun!"

When I phoned him to suggest the idea, Blackwell gushed that he'd be honored. As it happened, he'd be signing copies of his autobiography at a mall the following week. Why didn't I join him for a stroll and dinner beforehand?

Salon.com > Martha Barnette

Field report: The “Oz” convention

A Blackwellian nightmare