Back by popular demand! The complete 1939 epic shown on large screens in-house and on the lawn, with the full score played live by the NSO. It’s a journey to Oz like you’ve never experienced before!

Ticket Scale	Boxes	Front Orch	Rear Orch	Loge	Lawn
B	$48	48	38	32	20

Pre-Performance Discussion Series
Join us at the park an hour before the show for a free Pre-Performance Discussion with Nicole LaCroix, the evening host on Classical WETA 90.9 FM.
More information on the Pre-Performance Discussion Series.

At Home in Oz
A note on the evening's performance by 
NSO@Wolf Trap Festival Conductor Emil de Cou.

At home in Oz The Wizard of Oz was once a motion picture. Previewed in Pomona, California, in 1939 it was not supposed to do more than put MGM in competition with Disney for the light, frothy, singing, and dancing child-like entertainment market. What happened between then and now regarding that odd round-trip flight in a two-bedroom house is another story all together.

Much has happened since we premiered The Wizard of Oz at Wolf Trap in 2005. A movie that I thought I had memorized long ago has seeped even further into my consciousness—I have performed it several times and with each one I find something new about it and about those watching it. Of course, it is still a life and death struggle to keep it all in sync—and not only with the wicked witch (who I have great affection for since her music is the most fun to conduct), but also with Munchkins, talking trees, and those slightly ironic “Optimistic Voices.” They never get any better at staying with me and the orchestra—singing “you will be a bust, be a bust, be a bust in the hall of fame” or “you’re out of the woods, you’re out of the dark, you’re out of the night” blissfully ignorant of the fact that I might be a tad ahead or behind them. Sort of like Alvin and the Chipmunks meets Chucky, they mock me with their squeaky falsettos. But I’ve finally made my peace with them—the Tin Man who can’t dance in time, the flying monkeys who tear up the Scarecrow a moment before they should, and Dorothy’s heels clicking every so slightly off of the music in her dream return to Kansas. We are all good friends now, and the above complaints are just inside jokes for us to enjoy (and hopefully for you not to notice).

One thing I love to do when I am not conducting concerts—or even when I am if I can sneak a peak behind my back—is to look at you! Audience watching has long become a sort of spectator’s sport of mine—even a wee bit of an obsession. Take tonight for example—it is possible that on this 70th anniversary we could still have people in the audience who saw Oz when it was brand new. Many more saw it when it was re-released to theaters in the 1950s, and still more (me included) in the Baby Boomer generation, when it was a much-anticipated stay-up-late-in-your-jammies television event. There may be children here tonight who are seeing this Technicolor classic on the big screen for the very first time, and are amazed at how beautiful it is (take that, iPhone 3Gs). As I watch people watching this most iconic of films, I think of how differently we all see the same thing.
 
Author Frank Baum’s The Wizard of Oz has spanned nearly a third of our country’s history, and the story is one of the great archetypal tales of 20th century popular culture—a quest, a mission, Homer’s Odyssey in Technicolor with a calico dress—a very American story about the meaning of home. Of course, Dorothy’s adventure, like Jonah’s or Frodo’s, is really about the quest for a vague and usually unattainable idea in some far off imagined place. But what makes this unintended masterpiece of a movie (and those here tonight watching and listening to it) endlessly fascinating to me is how we will all experience it in a slightly different way depending on our personal ideal of home. Wrapped in this candy-coated confection is something surprising—a mirror. Nothing is richer than a children’s story well-told. Which is why, when we are young, we follow the characters in all of their silly quirkiness so intently for 109 minutes. This is why, when we are older, we find the ending, and it’s final melding of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” and “Be it ever so humble there’s no place like home” so poignant.

Throughout our short history, we as Americans have always been preoccupied with the idea of home, in folksongs, campfire stories, and tales of explorers in the Wild West in search of a new life. Home is something we’ve all had to invent, just like the sepia-toned Kansas backyard nestled in a Hollywood backlot. As you can probably tell I love this movie and will never tire of performing it live with my friends on stage and in the audience. Tonight, I hope you will laugh at Glinda’s chirpy upper-crust intonations, smile when the Lollypop Guild does their soft shoe (in perfect time with the music I hope), or maybe boo the Wicked Witch as she appears in that hourglass, taunting the condemned Dorothy with her signature cackle. But more importantly, I hope you will see something gentle, hopeful, and innocent in yourself and those around you—that’s what keeps this story so fresh to all of us, young and old, all these many years. The part that rings most true is found in the movie’s final line of dialogue, that real or imagined, there is indeed no place like home—and remembering that brings you closer to your own.
 —Emil de Cou


Robert Osborne
Host

As primetime host and anchor of Turner Classic Movies (TCM), Robert Osborne brings viewers out of their living rooms and into the world of classic Hollywood, providing insider information, facts and trivia on TCM movie presentations.

Osborne is also a columnist-critic for The Hollywood Reporter, the daily show business trade paper. He is known as the official biographer of Oscar^®, thanks to a series of books he’s written on the subject of Hollywood’s annual Academy Awards^®. His latest book, 80 Years Of the Oscar, written at the request of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, has been called “the most comprehensive and definitive book ever done on the subject.”

Osborne was born in Colfax, Wash., and graduated from the University of Washington’s School of Journalism, appearing in local plays in his non-study hours. He eventually went to Hollywood as an actor under contract to Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz. It was Lucy who encouraged him to pursue writing, which he considers “the best advice at the best time” he’s ever been given. Lucy remained a friend and mentor to him until her death.

Osborne joined the staff of The Hollywood Reporter in 1977 and six years later began writing the paper’s influential “Rambling Reporter” column, which covers all aspects of the movie and television business. In 1982, he also began as the on-air entertainment reporter for the nightly news on Los Angeles’ KTTV. In 1987, he was signed by CBS to make daily appearances on the CBS Morning Program, and from 1986-1993, he was also a regular host of The Movie Channel cable network.

From 1981-83, Osborne served as president of the Los Angeles Film Critics Association (LAFCA). He is a frequent guest on Entertainment Tonight, Good Morning America and other network shows; was twice a CableACE nominee for his “Osborne Report” segments for The Movie Channel; and was nominated for an Emmy^® as Best Host Moderator. Osborne is also the winner of the 1984 Press Award from the Publicists Guild of America. On Feb. 1, 2006, he received a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and in January 2008, he received a special award from the National Board of Review for his contributions as a film historian.

In addition to his hosting duties for TCM, Osborne has also done several specials for the network, including Private Screenings, an hour-long interview series with such Hollywood luminaries as Shirley MacLaine, Lauren Bacall, Angela Lansbury, James Garner, Jane Fonda, Sidney Lumet, Norman Jewison, and Tony Curtis. He also hosts TCM’s Guest Programmer series, in which he has been joined in introducing movie line-ups by an eclectic mix, including David Mamet, Alec Baldwin, Mia Farrow, Martha Stewart, Whoopi Goldberg, Tom Ford, Liz Smith, Bill Cosby, Donald Trump, James Elroy, Evander Holyfield, Danny DeVito, Renee Feming, Gore Vidal and Kermit the Frog.