Salman Rushdie Brings Fresh Eyes to a Hollywood Classic: The Wizard of Oz

"Now find yourself a place where you won't get yourself into any trouble."
--Auntie Em

* * * 

To my surprise and delight, this week I acquired a copy of Salman Rushdie's little volume about The Wizard of Oz, one of many great books written by various writers for the British Film Institute (BFI). The Nobel laureate begins by declaring this movie to be his very first literary influence, prompting him to write his first short story at the tender age of ten.

I've always know that for many of my generation the story of Dorothy's adventures in the land of Oz are interwoven in various ways with many of our personal life stories. The 1939 film classic did so-so at the box office that year, but with the advent of television in the 1950s it became an annual favorite in a nation filled with young families during the post-war years. As a youth it was a family tradition to watch Saturday Night at the Movies, with many film classics being in the rotation year after year.

Television sets were only black-and-white then, so most of us missed the most amazing feature of the film, the c0ntrast between Kansas -- dusty shades of grey -- and Oz, an explosive pallet of color. Only later, with the advent of color TVs, did we experience the full effect of this magical story. When I went to see it in a theater in college it was a most memorable occasion.

* * *

When Rushdie was contacted to select a film to write about for the BFI Film Classics series, choosing this one was an easy decision, based on the impact it had on his own life. To prepare, he not only studied the film itself and all the anecdotal legends surrounding the making of the movie (eg. Buddy Ebsen, who later became Jed Clampett in The Beverly Hillbillies, was the original scarecrow.) he also read all the L Frank Baum book that the film was based on, and its host of sequels.

A central premise of Rushdie's essay, which in my opinion he successfully defends, is that a driving force of the story is "the inadequacy of adults, even good adults."  Despite Dorothy's anguish regarding the threats of the spinster Miss Gulch, whom we re-encounter in Munchkinland as the Wicked Witch of the West, she's unable to feel safe or at peace because Auntie Em, Uncle Henry and the farmhands (the adults) are taken up with farm business. Her fear of losing her dog Toto impels her to seek refuge elsewhere. At which point Rushdie notes one of the striking insights I'd not considered before. 

At various times throughout my life I've reflected on the incantation Dorothy makes while clicking her ruby slippers at the climax of The Wizard of Oz. "There's no place like home, there's no place like home..." I've even written about this longing for home that resides in most of our hearts. But Rushdie delivers a contrarian pitch, which appears five minutes into this bigger-than-life story. 

Auntie Em has just told Dorothy to find a place where there isn't any trouble, and Dorothy ponders what kind of place that might be. This becomes the backdrop for the most famous song from this most famous movie, "Somewhere Over the Rainbow."

The song speaks of a place where dreams come true and "troubles melt like lemon drops." It ends with the wistful question, "If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow why, oh why, can't I?" 

 

Dorothy sings this song at a time of trouble in her life. The threat of losing something she loves, her precious dog Toto, looms over her. Life doesn't seem fair, but she feels powerless in this situation and decides to run away. 

The National Endowment for the Arts voted "Somewhere Over the Rainbow" as the greatest song of the 20th century. It's not hard to understand why. The song Judy Garland sang as Dorothy in The Wizard of Oz resonates with another of our deepest longings, quite contrary to the longing for home: this world is not my home, my truest home is somewhere else.

"At its beginning, the weaknesses of grown-ups force a child to take control of her own destiny (and her dog's). Thus, ironically, she begins the process of becoming a grown-up herself," Rushdie writes. In short, the movie is a "coming-of-age" genre film, though both spectacular and surreal. 

I was recently reading about the origins of the surrealist art movement of the 1920s and the Surrealist Manifesto by Andre Breton. A significant feature of this movement was its attempt to dive below the surface of the conscious mind into the ethereal subconscious, inspired most significantly by Sigmund Freud's work. Freud purposely published his Interpretation of Dreams in the year 1900 as a means of kicking off the new century with new understandings of the inaccessible deeper layers of the mind. Breton wrote about automatic writing and other techniques to achieve this. Dali's vivid paintings were intentional embodiments of this nether world.

Though there is no evidence that L. Frank Baum's Oz was influenced by Freud, it feels easy to connect the Hollywood version of the story to the notion that Oz may have been a concussion-dream, recycling Kansas faces as Oz characters, especially since it begins and ends in a bed. 

 

* * * 

I've never read the original Oz books, so Rushdie's inquisitive examination of the source material is insightful. For Baum, Kansas is a depressing place. Everything is grey as far as the eye can see. This grey wasteland has taken the sparkle out of Auntie Em's eyes, cheeks and lips and left them a sober grey. Uncle Henry never laughed and was grey, too. What's interesting to me is that Baum's books were written in the first decade of the century, whereas the film was released at the tail end of the Dust Bowl years which coincided with the Great Depression.

It's against this backdrop that Dorothy sings her poignant lament of a place where dreams come true and "troubles melt like lemon drops." It ends with the wistful question, "If happy little bluebirds fly beyond the rainbow why, oh why, can't I?" 

No wonder this song became so epic. Who has not, at one time or another, felt this sensation in which fear and hardship prod us to seek escape. (Another digression could be inserted here about the world's migrants who long for freedom and safety, who have envisioned America as such a place. Visit Ellis Island sometime if you are able.)

* * * 

For such a short volume Rushdie's book is packed with anecdotes, insights and thought-provoking observations. Part one, the first sixty pages, features the film itself. There is also a second essay, part two, that describes Rushdie's experience at an auction of Dorothy's ruby slippers.

Of all these things much more can be said. And if able, in another blog post I would like to touch on the significance of Judy Garland at the center of this film. Did you know that Shirley Temple was seriously considered for the role of Dorothy? Did you know that Judy Garland was born in Grand Rapids here in Northern Minnesota as Frances Ethel Gumm? 

To Be Continued

"Somewhere Over the Rainbow."

Duluth’s Theatrical Heritage Is a Treasure Worth Fighting For

Duluth’s theatrical heritage is a legacy of iconic venues like The West Theater and The Alhambra Theater, two theaters that have long stood as cultural lighthouses, illuminating the soul of our West Side community. These aren’t just buildings. They’re the threads that weave our shared history, drawing crowds from far and wide and binding us together in moments of wonder, laughter, and awe. 

I've attended events at the West that brought in fans from the Dakotas to Milwaukee, from Canada to the Twin Cities. To let these theaters fade would be to lose a piece of ourselves—but we have the power to keep them alive.

What Bob Boone has accomplished with the West on a shoestring is nothing short of remarkable, restoring the West Theatre to its 1937 glory: an Art Deco masterpiece, its sleek lines and bold design a magnet for showgoers and neighbors seeking connection. It was a beating heart of Duluth until 1976, when shifting entertainment tides and a recession forced its doors shut. For decades, it slept—silent, but not forgotten. Then, in 2019, it roared back to life, its vintage charm restored, its stage ready for a new generation. This wasn’t just a renovation; it was a resurrection.

From the era of silent films and vaudeville.

Today The Alhambra Theatre next door is on the threshold of becoming another palace of dreams with its lavish façade and opulent halls. At one time vaudeville stars and silver-screen legends lit up its stage, whisking audiences away to realms of imagination. Like The West, it battled the rise of modern media, but today, its restoration is on the cusp of completion. This isn’t mere construction—it’s a promise kept, a vow to reclaim a grandeur that once defined Duluth.

As I see it, the past 40 years the city has given lavish attention to Canal Park, Downtown and the former West End, now known as Lincoln Park or the Craft District. A number of small businesses have planted their seeds here in Spirit Valley, striving to renovate this region of our city. Wussow's, Zenith Books, The West Theatre and the Alhambra (which opened last year) are among many contributing to this effort to bring new life to an important part of town. 

These efforts go beyond bricks and mortar. They’re about safeguarding our artistic soul, reigniting the spark of community. The West and The Alhambra are sanctuaries where art breathes, performances inspire, and culture flourishes—living proof that Duluth’s spirit endures.

But this revival isn’t guaranteed—it needs us. By championing these theaters, we don’t just preserve history; we hand our children and grandchildren the gift of live theater, the thrill of cinema, the joy of gathering in spaces that echo with our past. Will you stand with us?

Uprooted: The Ralph Kand Story, Part Ten. Schruns

By late 1944, as the Red Army advanced westward, refugees were arriving in Schruns and other communities in Austria's Vorarlberg region. Some were ethnic Germans fleeing Eastern Europe. Others were families who had left German and Austrian cities because of Allied bombing. Ralph was one of many people moving west as the war closed in from both directions.

Ralph arrived in Schruns in late October. The town was the main village in Austria's Montafon Valley. Cold rain had been falling for three days. Ralph took refuge in one of the local pubs, partly to get out of the weather and partly to learn what he could about the area.

By the end of his first night, he had learned two things. There would be no easy passage farther west through the Alps. German border patrols guarded the routes. For the time being, this was as far as he could go. He also learned that he needed a job. Without work, he could not obtain the documents or food allotment he needed to live.

Finding a room was easier. Schruns had been a ski resort before the war, but tourism had fallen sharply. There were plenty of rooms available.

Ralph rented a small room in the rear of a chalet on the north side of the valley. It faced the mountains. The room was clean, and Frau Marsden, who ran the house, seemed friendly enough. For the moment, Ralph had somewhere to live.

There were several places in town where Ralph could meet people and find out what was going on. The German he had learned during the occupation of Estonia was again proving useful. He particularly liked a pub called the Blue Moon.

The Germans operated a cement works near Schruns, and many people in town worked there in one capacity or another. Some were regulars at the Blue Moon.

Two men Ralph came to know were a Frenchman named Carpentier and a Czech named Kapinski. 

Carpentier had been a road builder in Paris. Several years before the war he had married an Austrian woman. When the war began, she wanted to return to Austria to be near her aging mother, and Carpentier came with her.

Kapinski was an accountant from outside Prague. German officials had recruited him for work connected with the hydroelectric development in the area. At first he couldn't understand why anyone would build such a large project in this remote valley. Once he arrived, the reason became apparent. The mountains and steep changes in elevation made the area well suited for hydroelectric power.

Ralph had never intended to remain in Schruns. He still wanted to go west, but for now he had nowhere else to go.

One evening Kapinski and Carpentier saw him enter the Blue Moon. “Ah, the Estonian,” Kapinski said, waving him over.

Ralph pulled up a chair.

Both men were considerably older than he was. They liked Ralph's energy and his stories. They also discovered that he could drink without becoming foolish.

“I've decided to stay for a while,” Ralph said. “Now I need a job.”

“What can you do?” Kapinski asked.

“I'm a fast typist. And I'm good with numbers.”

Kapinski nodded.

“We need help with paperwork at the cement works. I'm in the accounting office.”

“He's the head accountant,” Carpentier added.

Ralph looked across the room and spotted a waitress.

“Fräulein!” he called. “Drinks for my friends.”

“Irma,” Kapinski said. “Her name is Irma.”

It was good to be working again. There was more paperwork than the staff could handle. Many of the younger and healthier German men had been sent into military service, leaving fewer people to do the administrative work.

Ralph never learned why Kapinski had not been drafted. Eventually he noticed that Carpentier was missing part of one hand. Carpentier had become so accustomed to concealing it that Ralph had not noticed at first.

Ralph's room was a little more than a mile from the cement works office, and he usually walked. The office itself was crowded with paperwork. Boxes stood against the walls. Papers covered desks and other available surfaces.

German soldiers occasionally appeared to make certain the work kept moving. Sometimes Ralph and the others were ordered to stay late. Even then they couldn't keep up.

“We don't need more accountants,” Carpentier said one evening at the Blue Moon. “We need shredders.” Then he laughed. “Maybe all this paperwork we're not finishing is damaging the German war effort.”

The office was also cold. “Why do they keep the place at barely fifty degrees?” Ralph asked. “If it gets any colder, I'll have to chip the ice off my coffee.”

“They're saving fuel,” Kapinski said. “Heat takes energy. Last year we sometimes wore gloves while we worked.”

Carpentier shook his head.

“You're lucky you're not working on the hydroelectric project. Those men are outside from morning until late at night.”

Ralph had seen the project. Sometimes during his lunch break he walked over to watch the construction. Men poured concrete and worked around large pipes, machinery and equipment. Ralph was particularly interested in the size of the pipelines and the amount of work underway. Even this late in the war, the Germans were still building.

CONTINUED

EdNote: Ernest Hemingway went skiing in Schruns, Austria, during the winters of 1924–1925 and 1925–1926 with his first wife, Hadley Richardson, and their son Bumby. Located in the Montafon Valley of Austria's Vorarlberg region, Schruns was famous throughout Europe for its skiing. It was here during this period that Hemingway reworked his breakthrough novel, The Sun Also Rises.

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UPROOTED: Intro and Part One

UPROOTED: Part Two

UPROOTED: Part Three
UPROOTED: Part Four
UPROOTED: Part Five
UPROOTED: Part Six

UPROOTED: Part Seven   

UPROOTED: Part Eight  

UPROOTED: Part Nine

Uprooted is a true story about a man with a singular quest: Freedom. This longing for freedom is one of the primary reasons people leave their homelands, often at great personal sacrifice.

Uprooted: The Ralph Kand Story, Part Nine -- Men on the Run

Morning came, but Ralph had not slept. Most of the people had already left the bunkhouse when he finally sat up. Only one other man remained, a short, heavyset man with small ears and greasy brown hair.

“What’s your name?” the man asked.

“Kand. Ralph Kand. And you?”

“Hans. Did you just arrive?”

“Yes.”

“This is not a place you want to stay.”

“I don’t plan to.”

“Good. I’m leaving, too.”

Ralph looked at him. “You can get us out of here?”

“I have tin snips,” Hans said. “I’ve been here three weeks. Tonight there will be no moon. I found a place along the outer fence where there are no guards and no lights.”

Ralph had found a partner.

It was well past midnight when Ralph and Hans left the bunkhouse. They had been told the camp was not a prison. The fences were there to control the large number of refugees while German authorities processed them. Ralph had no interest in waiting. Keeping to the shadows, the two men made their way toward the section of fence Hans had found. When they reached it, Ralph knelt and lifted the bottom wire.  It was loose, so they didn't need the tin snips. One at a time, they crawled underneath.

Across the road they found a stand of trees and disappeared into it. “Now what?” Ralph asked.

Hans brushed the dirt from his clothes and threw the tin snips into the weeds. “We walk. We need to put some distance between us and the camp.”

They continued through the countryside. “We have to go west,” Ralph said. “We can't stay in Poland.”

After a while Hans wanted to stop. “Let's find a place to rest.” Ralph wanted to keep moving. He continued walking, and Hans followed.

As dawn approached, Ralph heard the dull rumble of a train in the distance, followed by the blare of  a heavy brass steam whistle.

“We can't take a train,” Hans said. “We have no money and no papers.”

“It's the fastest way out of here.”

They both understood the problem. If they were going west, they needed transportation. But first they needed rest.

They came upon a small stream and stopped to drink. Ralph splashed water on his face and drank from his cupped hands.

Hans carried a small pack containing extra clothing. He put it under his head and lay down. Ralph found a patch of grass nearby. Both men quickly fell asleep. The sun was high when they woke. They were both hungry. After walking for a while, they found the railroad tracks and followed them southwest.

Eventually they came to a clearing. Below them stood a farmhouse surrounded by rolling fields and stone walls. Hans headed toward the farmhouse and Ralph followed.

As they approached the house, they saw an older Polish man sitting on the porch. He had a round face and heavy eyebrows and was whittling a piece of wood. Without saying anything he watched the two strangers coming toward him.

 

Hans asked how far it was to town.

 

The farmer continued to stare.

 

“This is Poland,” Ralph said. Hans had spoken to the man in Estonian. Ralph tried German. “Do you have any food?”

 

The farmer looked more closely at the two strangers. “Where are you from? What do you want?”

 

“We are Estonians. The Red Army has taken our country. We are trying to get west.”

 

Hans nudged Ralph. “Ask him if he has food.”

 

“I already did.”

 

The farmer began speaking. “The Germans have taken much of our corn and potatoes to feed their armies. We can feed you, but it won't be much.”

 

He asked their names.

 

After they introduced themselves, the farmer invited them into his small wooden house. Ralph and Hans sat at a table covered with oilcloth. Vegetables had been cut on a board nearby. The farmer called out in Polish.

 

A woman wearing an apron appeared, nodded to the two strangers and returned to preparing a cabbage stew. They learned that she was the farmer's daughter. His wife had died the year before.

 

They ate and talked. Ralph did most of the talking because Hans knew little German. The farmer wanted news from the east, and Ralph and Hans wanted to know what lay ahead. With armies moving and reliable news difficult to obtain, travelers learned what they could from one another.

 

The farmer told them how to reach the nearest railroad station. “You should be able to get on a train,” he said. “The problem will come when the Germans ask for your papers.”

He suggested they take a train to Breslau (now Wroclaw) and from there continue toward Prague. “From Prague you can go anywhere.”

 

Ralph wasn't so sure. Prague was still too close to the advancing Red Army. But he thanked the farmer.

 

“You'll stay here tonight,” the man said. “Get a fresh start in the morning.”

 

Before they left the next day, the farmer gave each of them a handful of coins. “In the name of God and His Son,” he said. “It won't take you to Prague, but it will help you reach the border.”

 

Hans made the sign of the cross. Ralph put the coins in his pocket.

 

They reached the station and boarded a train with no one stopping them. They found seats in the last car and waited. Ralph expected a conductor to come through asking for tickets. Instead, two German soldiers appeared. They were moving from car to car, checking identification papers.

 

Ralph pulled at Hans's arm. “We have to go.”

 

Hans looked at him. “Where?”

 

Along the outside of the railroad car was a narrow running board. Ralph and Hans stepped outside and held onto the railing as the train continued moving.

 

Ralph pointed up and Hans understood. Hans helped Ralph climb onto the railing. Ralph reached up, found a handhold and pulled himself onto the roof. Then he reached down and helped Hans up. There they lay flat.

 

“We should have done this at night,” Hans said. “Someone is going to see us.”

 

“Do you have another idea?”

 

Hans didn't.

 

The two men remained on the roof as the train carried them west. Ralph looked at the sky. Only a few days earlier he had been at home with his mother.

 

CONTINUED 

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UPROOTED: Intro and Part One

UPROOTED: Part Two

UPROOTED: Part Three
UPROOTED: Part Four

UPROOTED: Part Five
UPROOTED: Part Six

UPROOTED: Part Seven

UPROOTED: Part Eight

Uprooted is a true story about a man with a singular quest: Freedom. The longing for freedom is one of the primary reasons people leave their homelands, often at great personal sacrifice.