The Return of RETURN TO OZ

This fine French Return to Oz picture book was discovered a few months ago by my Ozzy friend Freddy. I had never seen one before and it wasn't listed in the published Return to Oz bibliography.

Given my fondness for Return to Oz and my interest in learning French, I had to have one! Knowing what to look for, my Ozzy friend Freddy pointed me toward a second copy - and voila! - I immediately ordered it from a fellow named Jordan in France. It took quite a few e-mails, some in my mediocre French and some in the seller's much better English, but finally the deal was done, the book was shipped. Then one day a few weeks later I go to the mailbox and the postman greets me saying he has a damaged package for me. Indeed, he ONLY has the damaged package for me - the large envelope covered in French stamps is ripped open and empty. The book is missing.

I scold the post office. I sob a little. I call the dead letter office, describe the missing book, and leave my cell phone number, then sob a little. I call Freddy and sob a little. And then Eric and I take off for our holiday trip.

One day out on the road I get a call from a nice woman named Roseanne at the dead letter office. She has found my book! I explain I am on the road for the holidays and will be back on January fourth. She says she will hold it and mail it to me to arrive on the fifth. It arrives. My book and I are happily united and my faith in the U.S. Post Office is greatly renewed. Thanks to Freddy, Jordan, and Roseanne for helping me get such a nice copy of Oz un Monde Extraordinaire!

RETURN TO OZ Babies

These cute little guys from Walt Disney Studio's Return to Oz were produced by Hart á Hart as part of the Japanese merchandising for the 1985 film. They each stand about four inches high, except for Tik-Tok who clocks in at about three inches. These little guys are not quite as hard to find as the big Return to Oz  "plushies," like the Tik-Tok and Scarecrow I have previously blogged about. But these little guys are still quite uncommon.

They are really well molded and the attention to the costumes for figures so small is striking.  The figures are minimally articulated, too. Their heads rotate and their arms can be posed. The Tin Woodman's legs are articulated as well. Back in the old MySpace days I made an animated GIF of Tik-Tok waving his arms and blinking. You can see it here if you like.

I got my first Tik-Tok and Scarecrow at the Winkie Con in 1987, not too long after the toys were released. I finally found the other two at a Disney Collectibles Convention in one of the Disneyland Hotels in 1989. I had to buy a set of the four to get them. So I had two duplicates. Don't ask! The two extras have been long sold off.

I've always wanted to make a Gump for them to hang out in - perhaps one day I shall!

I am Tik-Tok. I am De-lic-i-ous!

This last week I wanted to make a surprise birthday cake for a friend named Freddy. There was little doubt what the theme would be - Freddy is an avid Return to Oz fan who adores a certain Tik-Tok. So the subject matter wasn't what was troubling me. It was how to do it! These things must be done delicately!

I had already decided on a fairly fancy dinner of Beef Wellington, so I wanted a special dessert. I remembered a cake developed by Julia Child called le bombe aux trois chocolats. When I thought of that cake, which is molded in a round mixing bowl, I knew what had to be done. It would become Tik-Tok's face. Here he is!

As I mentioned, Julia Child's recipe bombe au trois chocolates is a molded cake. The outer layer is brownie-like, carefully fitted into the bowl, and filled with a very dark, rich chocolate mousse. Then melted chocolate is poured over the whole thing. Those are the three chocolates (trois chocolats) in the name of the recipe.

My first step was to select a bowl the size I wanted the finished cake to be. Then I made a paper pattern to be used to cut out the assorted shapes of cake needed to line the bowl. I cut a small circle for the bottom of the bowl and a large one for the top. I then divided the side of the bowl into eight wedge-shaped pieces. I spent a lot of time on the side-pieces. You could do it much sloppier and it would probably work fine. But I have a perfectionist streak.

Next I made the mousse (shown at left). After folding in the egg whites it looks a lot like ice cream! There was almost a pound of chocolate in the mousse. I used Trader Joe's 72% Dark Belgian Chocolate, supplemented with a couple squares of unsweetened chocolate. This mousse also contains a pack of gelatin to give it a bit more body to keep it stiff.

Next up was making the sheet of Brownie Fudge Cake. After it cooled about ten minutes I removed it from the pan and flipped it over. It was baked with a layer of wax paper under it to facilitate the flipping.

I then laid out the paper pattern pieces on the cake and carefully cut them out. I made a small circle for the bottom of the bowl, a big circle for the top, and eight angled side-pieces. Note how each edge of the angled pieces is slightly curved to make a good fit!

Here are all the cake pieces cut out. I then lined the molding bowl with plastic wrap for easy unmolding and arranged the pieces in the bowl pretty-side out. I found that despite my careful patterning of the eight sides I still had a half-inch gap to fill. So I simply cut a little wedge out of the cake scraps to fill the gap and made a mental note to hide the patch under the chocolate drizzle.

Here I began filling the cake-lined bowl with the chilled mousse. For a bit of additional support I added a layer of cake scraps when the bowl was half filled with mousse.

When the bowl was almost full, I topped it all with the big circle of cake, pulled plastic wrap over the whole thing, and refrigerated it overnight, still in the bowl, with a weighted saucer on top.

Now to turn the cake into the Return to Oz Tik-Tok. I looked at photos and decided what details to use and whether anything could be done with preexisting materials. I knew I'd have to make/mold several parts, but the mustache seemed like it would be difficult to make from scratch.

I recalled that Godiva made some chocolate shells that I thought might work for the mustache. But they were made of milk chocolate and that dictated that his head be drizzled in milk, rather than dark, chocolate. So be it! I then thought, "Gosh, Tik-Tok's nose looks an awful lot like a Rolo!" So that's what I used. His eye sockets and ears were created by pouring the melted chocolate on wax paper until it was about an 1/8" thick. I used some circular cookie cutters to cut the shapes while the chocolate was still a bit soft. The inner cut-outs from the eyes became Tik-Tok's ears. The trickiest part was making his hat. In the photo above you can see I've positioned a piece of paper to get the curve around the head correct. I then drew another curve to create the outer brim which gave me a pattern. I cut the hat shape out of a piece of thin foam core and used the resulting hole as a mold. I taped the foam mold to the countertop over some wax paper, poured in melted chocolate, and scraped off the excess. When it was cool I popped the chocolate hat brim out of the foam core. Voila!

Here is the cake soon after I poured on the melted chocolate and began positioning the facial elements. I made rivets for the hat by using an exacto-knife to saw the points off chocolate chips. I made six facial rivets the same way. I attached the rivets by using melted chocolate for glue. Once all the chocolate work was done I chilled him to firm everything up.

The last step was the eyes. I squirted blue glitter cake gel and green cake gel into his eye sockets, mixed them a bit, and smoothed the mixture with a spatula. Then with my (incredibly clean) finger dipped in water I smoothed it out more. And then Tik Tok was ready. He was a big hit at the birthday dinner. He was very tasty, too!

Oz, un mundo fantástico!

I recently got a very interesting and quite pretty Return to Oz book.  

Oz, un mundo fantástico is a Spanish picture book published by Everest in 1987. The hardback book measures approximately 8 1/2" x 11". What makes the book so interesting is that it is illustrated with drawings - not just photos from the film like most of the foreign Return to Oz books feature. And the illustrator has borrowed (or ripped off) character designs for many other Disney films to create the illustrations. It's kind of neat actually.

On the cover you can see that Tik-Tok, Jack Pumpkinhead, and the Scarecrow are all based on their RTO film likenesses. The Dorothy does not look like Fairuza Balk but she looks very familiar. Alas I haven't been able to place her. Note that Billina is green! I have no idea why, but the ultra-rare Japanese stuffed Billina was green, too.

Ok, now the fun starts! Notice that Toto is actually Tramp from Disney's Lady and the Tramp. Aunt Em looks a bit like the wife in that film, too. But I could be wrong. Anyone recognize Uncle Henry? Note too how much that copper lamp on the table resembles Tik-Tok. As always, you may click on an image to enlarge it.

Look who the illustrator picked to play the blonde girl from Dr. Worley's hospital! Can you identify the character filling in for Nurse Wilson. I really like the way the illustrator has made each spread work as both a double-page illustration as well as two "single" pages - a trick created by having one background serve for both pages.

Here we get a Nome King created by "petrifying" one of the Kings from Sleeping Beauty. This double-page spread isnt quite as successful as the others.

So where did this Lion come from? He too looks familiar and he doesn't appear to be very based on the RTO lion. These were only a few of the pages - it's a handsome volume and very atypical of the foreign RTO books. This hardcover also features a second story, El patito feo (The Ungly Duckling).

There is also a much smaller paperback version of this Return to Oz book. It does not have a second story and it lacks one page of Return to Oz artwork included in the hardcover edition.

And a special thanks to Sam of Oz - he knows why :)

Stuffed with Pins!

Not a long post tonight but I thought I would share the news that my Return to Oz Tik-Tok pin just got a friend.

I really rather like these pins now - which is odd, because I never much cared for them in the mid-late 80s when they were a lot easier to find.

Longer blogging will return soon - convention season has just taken its toll on my blogging time.

Return to Oz - Return to the '80s

A friend from England just sent me this charming little record. I've known about it for a while; I even have an mp3 recording of the song. But until now I didn't have the actual 45 rpm disc. Now I do.

The song is wonderfully mid 80s and extremely Ozzy in its lyrics. I'm not sure why Victoria Wood recorded it. It was not used in the film in any way. Wood is best known in the UK for writing humorous songs. This one is fairly atypical. But I actually really like it.

So, click the video below to hear Victoria Wood's Return to Oz!

Tik-Tok Pin!

It's always nice to add a new Return to Oz item to the collection - and today's mail brought this little guy. He missing some gold paint but he's still cute. He has a pin on his back so you can attach him to your shirt and he stands about 2 1/2" high. He was distributed in the United Kingdom and in Japan at Tokyo Disneyland.

I tweaked the photo a bit to make the gold-loss areas a bit more visible. I wonder how hard it would be to re-gild him.

You can check out our previous Return to Oz blog posts by clicking here.

Another Novel Idea

Yesterday I posted about an unusual Italian "novelization" of the 1939 MGM film The Wizard of Oz. Today you get to read about an unusual Japanese "novelization" of Disney's 1985 Return to Oz.

Perhaps this book isn't really a "novelization" but, at 97 pages of text, the story is much more substantial than a picture book. This dust-jacketed hardcover was published in 1986 by Kodansha. It measures approximately 6"x 9" and has a photo from the film on almost every page - some are in color, most are in black and white.

 The book also features very nice illustrated endpapers showing characters from the film (see below). There is, in fact a real Japanese "novelization" of Return to Oz - a tiny paperback translation of the Joan D. Vinge American Return to Oz novel. But I'm saving that for another blog.

Tiny Tik-Tok Time!

The little guy at right is the 3" tall plastic Tik-Tok toy from Disney's Return to Oz film. He was made by Hart á Hart for sale in Tokyo Disneyland in 1985.

Several years ago I made an animated gif of him. In fact, he used to have a mySpace page of his very own! He's been living on my computer for quite a while and he wanted to come out and play. While his arms are articulated, and he will rotate at the waist, these little Tik-Toks do not actually move by themselves (except at night when you aren't looking)

The same toy company made little versions of the Scarecrow, Jack Pumpkinhead and the Tin Woodman as well - in addition to a number of much bigger Return to Oz toys.

Click on either of the two links that follow to check out the large-size Tik Tok and Scarecrow in these older blog posts. I'll try to post a report on little Tik-Tok's three friends in the coming weeks.

Ozma in Japan

This weekend I bring you another post focusing on L. Frank Baum's third Oz book, Ozma of Oz. Many of you are following Eric Shanower and Skottie Young's adaptation of that book from Marvel Comics and I thought you might like a look at Ozma through foreign eyes.

This weekend's Ozma post focuses on a charming Japanese picture book published by Popura Shabunko, of Tokyo, in 1987. The book's title is a bit unusual, Ozu no Mahoutsukai to Ozuma Hime which translates as "the Wizard of Oz and Princess Ozma". Other Japanese editions of Ozma translate the title more traditionally as Ozu no Ozuma Hime "Princess Ozma of Oz". There are picture book editions of The Wizard of Oz and The Land of Oz as well. I suspect that the popularity of Disney's Return to Oz film that motivated the publication of these three titles. There is similar set with different illustrations by another Japanese publisher, also published in 1987.

The edition was published in hardcover with a dustjacket and has 44 pages. Below you can see several of the more interesting illustrations. At right, Dorothy gale enjoys a meal from the Lunch Pail Tree while Billina looks on. The way these lunches grow you can sort of see what you're getting - they're more like cafeteria trees - you just pick a couple sandwiches, a piece of fruit, and a doughnut and you're all set!

I think the design for Tik-Tok is pretty cute.I'd love a toy version! The wind-up key at the front is a bit odd as it seems like Tik-Tok might be able to wind himself. I've always assumed Tik-Tok's manufacturers placed his wind-up keys on his back and under his two arms so that Tik-Tok couldn't be self-winding, thus preventing their robot from attaining true autonomy. The inability of the traditional Tik-Tok to wind himself is one of the things that helps define him as "non-living."

The Japanese illustrator did follow Baum's text and hang Tik-Tok's "operating instructions" from a clunky cardboard sign around Tik-Tok's neck. It seems like it could easily get lost, IMHO. Below you can see Tik-Tok giving the Wheelers a hard time.

The arrival at the entrance to the Nome King's caverns is striking and very different. We also get a nice view of the Nomes slaving away in the jewel mines. Click on any of the images to see them enlarged.

 

Every spread of the picture book contains one full page color illustration and one page of text with a small illustration echoing the larger image. Below you can see a sample showing Dorothy giving the Nome King what-for. The book is really cute!

Strumming the Mandolin

When I first saw Disney's Return to Oz I remember being surprised that the Mombi / Langwidere character was introduced while playing the mandolin. The mandolin worked well in the film - it provided a screen motivation for David Shire's creepy Mombi music.

But a few months ago I saw that Eric Shanower and Skottie Young's graphic novel adaptation of Ozma of Oz has Princess Langwidere also playing the mandolin. My first thought was, "Oh, Eric and Skottie are referencing Return to Oz, isn't that cute." But Eric quickly informed me that the mandolin was straight out of Baum - and indeed it is - though the fact that Baum's heady Princess played the mandolin was news to me! Here's the panel from Marvel's Ozma of Oz followed by Baum's original text:

"Princess Langwidere's sitting-room was panelled with great mirrors, which reached from the ceiling to the floor; also the ceiling was composed of mirrors, and the floor was of polished silver that reflected every object upon it. So when Langwidere sat in her easy chair and played soft melodies upon her mandolin, her form was mirrored hundreds of times, in walls and ceiling and floor, and whichever way the lady turned her head she could see and admire her own features."

The mandolin was a popular instrument when Baum wrote that in 1907, indeed the mandolin was a very popular instrument from the 1880s through the 1930s. 

The instrument is a member of the lute family. Mandolins were played both solo or in pairs, and sometimes with other instruments. There were even mandolin orchestras! Baum also references the mandolin in his lyrics for the song Niccolo's Piccolo from the 1903 Wizard of Oz stage musical:

Not with the violin,

Sought he my heart to win,

Nor with the mandolin

Came he a-wooing.

You can listen to Niccolo's Piccolo and download sheet music in our TIGER TUNES archive by clicking here. And there are even more Ozzy mandolin connections!

The music book (above) includes a medley from the 1903 Wizard of Oz arranged for mandolin by T. P. Trinkaus. I recently got another neat set of Wizard of Oz mandolin music - an arrangement of When You Love, Love, Love, one of the hits from the 1903 Wizard of Oz arranged for two mandolins, guitar and piano.

If anyone wants to get up a performance and has access to two mandolins, a guitar, and a piano, I'll be happy to supply copies of the music. Youtube, here we come! And if all the musicians are willing to dress up as Mombi, well, that's even better!

A Belated Ozzy Christmas Present

A friend just gave me a slightly late Christmas gift . It's a charming, and very Ozzy pencil case and pen. They were obtained at Mitsukoshi, a Japanese shop at Epcot Center in Disney World. I don't know much about them except that they're cute and well made. The metal case has Oz scenes printed on its interior as well.

The back of the case says designed by Shinzi Katoh. After much poking around online i found the same image used on some other Japanese Oz collectibles, too.  It's interesting they don't refer to The Wizard of Oz at all, only "Wonderland of Oz" and the slogan "Can we find the country of Oz?"

I think it's very spiffy!

Jack Skellington in Oz

Today's blog features a drawing by Eric Shanower showing Tim Burton's Jack Skellington from Nightmare Before Christmas. The artwork was done for a friend - not publication. Jack Pumpkinhead in the background looks on as if he thinks he might be related to Mr. Skellington. I wonder if Scraps might think the same thing about Sally, the rag doll? Enjoy!

Stormwinds

A few weeks ago I posted about meeting Fairuza Balk at a screening of Return to Oz in Santa Monica.

That got me into a Fairuza mood and I immediately ordered her new Limited Edition CD single, Stormwinds, by her group Armed Love Militia. My CD just arrived! The four and a half minute song was written by Fairuza, and she provides the vocals and plays guitar on it as well.

The single is very enjoyable, well produced, and Fairuza sounds great. One can imagine the title Stormwinds might refer to Dorothy's Kansas tornado but there is nothing in the lyrics to indicate such.

The album's cover art (above) is from a painting by Fairuza in her "Rust" series. The CD came with a signed print of the painting as well. The CD single was limited to only 500 copies and is nearly sold-out at this point.

However, you can also get a download of the song: just check out Fairuza's website.

So, congratulations, Fairuza on a great CD debut!

Oz Connection Connected

Thanks to all of you who submitted answers to this installment of Oz Connection. None of your responses were the connections I had in mind, but that's just fine! There is no single correct way to connect someone to Oz!

Bill Lee

I've now posted all of the Connection threads that were sent in - so go back one blog and read the comments section to see how our readers' minds work. Okay, here's how I'm connecting these three gentlemen to Oz.

Christopher Plummer is best known for his starring role in the movie version of The Sound of Music. In the film, Plummer's singing was dubbed by Bill Lee who did a lot of voiceover work, much of it for Walt Disney. Bill Lee provided the singing voice for Woot the Wanderer in Walt Disney's 1970 children's story book recording of The Tin Woodman of Oz. Lee, as Woot, sings a love duet with Polychrome, the Rainbow's Daughter, called, "I Found My True Love." In the Disney recording Woot and Poly get hitched!

I thought F. Scott Fitzgerald might be too easy because of his very direct Oz Connection. He wrote a short-story called "Outside the Cabinet-Makers" in which a father entertains his daughter by making up a fairytale about the people they see on the street. The father describes all sorts of things, including an ogre, who is "transformed like Mombi in The Land of Oz." The story was originally published in the December 1928 issue of The Century Magazine. I reprinted the piece in Oz-story No. 1.

Last but not least, we come to Ludwig van Beethoven. The most direct connection is that the "Ode to Joy," choral section of the Ninth Symphony also served as the tune to The Seekers' 1967 recording "Emerald City." It's a good song and surprisingly unknown among most Oz enthusiasts. The song lyrics were written by Kim Fowley and Keith Potger (under the name of John Martin). You can listen to "Emerald City" from the YouTube link below:

Tik-Tok Gets a Friend!

You may remember one of my first blog posts was about my little stuffed Tik-Tok from Walt Disney's 1985 film Return to Oz.

Well, now Tik-Tok has a friend! I just got a Scarecrow for him to play with! These toys were produced by Heart á Heart for sale only in Japan at Disneyland-Tokyo. All of the Heart á Heart Return to Oz toys are super rare - but none are so rare as the big stuffed figures.

This Scarecrow is a bit sun-faded and he's missing his collar-piece but who cares! He's mine, mine, mine!

Now to find Jack Pumpkinhead and the Tin Woodman to complete the set!

Keeping a Record

After writing a few days ago about how I was first introduced to Baum's Oz, I got to thinking about my earliest Oz memories, and that made me think of this record.

I probably saw the MGM Wizard of Oz film for the first time when I was four or five years old. I watched it on a small black-and-white television my parents kept in the kitchen. After I'd seen the movie this couple times, but before I'd discovered the Oz books, I can remember sitting on the floor of my bedroom staring at this record jacket and playing the record on my small phonograph. My Dad was a Hi-Fi nut and so of course I had my own phonograph from before I can remember.

This album is rather odd and it confused me greatly for a year or so. But I loved the cover art. I could look at it for hours - and did! The confusing part to my five year old self was separating the conflicting imagery on the album cover from my memories of the film. On the one hand the Scarecrow looks quite a bit like Ray Bolger; yet the Cowardly lion seems to be a real Lion. I knew the characters were portrayed by actors - my Mom had explained all that - and I'd heard all about Bert Lahr and Judy Garland. But how, I wondered, did Jack Haley get his legs inside those super narrow tin legs in the costume on the record album? And why does Dorothy look sorta ... well ... different? She reminded me of Kathy Garver on Family Affair but with a That Girl! flip hairstyle.

But the songs on the album were really confusing!  Side A features Disney Studio singers performing four songs from the MGM film - plus a song called "Happy Glow" subtitled The Scarecrow Song. Having only seen the movie two times at this point (and each viewing a year apart) my six-year-old imagination plugged this oddball song into my memories of the film. Side B of the album was even weirder. It featured songs from something called The Cowardly Lion of Oz. I paid little attention to this and think on the whole I didn't like the B side much. But I remember when I next saw the movie,  the year after I got the album, that I was really surprised when Margaret Hamilton didn't sing "Just Call Smarmy." In the year of playing the record to pieces, my imagination had smooshed this song into my memories of the film.

This Disneyland LP was originally released in 1969. That year The Wizard of Oz aired on March 9th. I suspect that I got the record shortly after seeing the movie on TV. I have one other major Oz memory from 1969. I was lying in bed and supposed to be asleep. I could hear my Mom and Dad in the kitchen watching the news on the little black-and-white TV that I'd watched The Wizard of Oz on a few months before. My Mom heard me stirring and she came in to check on me; she was obviously kind of upset. She said, "Honey, Judy Garland died tonight."

I don't think I knew exactly what it meant. But I remember asking her if we could still watch The Wizard of Oz on TV. I worried that if Judy Garland was dead, somehow the movie might cease to exist, too. Or perhaps I thought of it as something that was enacted live each year.

Mom assured me that we could still watch the movie. And of course we did. Who's to think one could get nostalgic for watching The Wizard of Oz on a ten inch black-and-white television with commercial interruptions.

Drew Struzan in Oz

One of the Ozzy highlights of San Diego Comic Con International this year was the chance to meet legendary movie poster artist Drew Struzan. While Drew has created the posters for such blockbusters as the Star Wars films, E.T., Indiana Jones, Harry Potter, Back to the Future, and many, many more, my interest in meeting Drew was because he painted the poster for Disney's 1985 film Return to Oz.

At the presentation I saw a short preview of a wonderful new documentary on Drew, heard him speak about his career, and then many of us lined up to get things signed. I took along my main Return to Oz poster, a copy of Drew's other "Mombi Head" Return to Oz poster, and being a bit compulsive, I also took my copy of the original press kit (shown at right) and the Scholastic graphic novel which also featured Drew's poster design.

Drew's Return to Oz poster is much more rooted in the world of illustration than many of his other film posters which often have a more photo-realistic quality. It was most interesting to see the close-ups of his photo realistic posters. These show an incredibly stylized design and painting technique which strongly reminded me of J.C. Leyendecker.

Advance copies of a new book on Drew's posters,  The Art of Drew Struzan, premiered at Comic Con. Alas, they sold out very quickly and I didn't get one.

So Drew signed my RTO stuff, we chatted for a few minutes, and the nice fellow behind me in line snapped a photo for me (Drew's the one in black). It was a neat little escape from our Comic Con booth.

Tik-Tok Twice

A while ago I blogged about the 10" Return to Oz stuffed Tik-Tok toy who was sold only in Japan at Tokyo Disneyland. I mentioned that Tik-Tok also came in a jumbo 20" size.

Well, this last weekend someone else's big Tik-Tok came for a playdate and photo shoot. I had never seen the two sizes side-by-side before and thought I'd share some of their Tik-Tok antics.