ARI SHAPIRO, HOST:
The most successful movie musical opening ever keeps on flying high.
(SOUNDBITE OF SONG, "DEFYING GRAVITY")
CYNTHIA ERIVO: (As Elphaba, singing) I think I'll try defying gravity.
SHAPIRO: Long before the new movie "Wicked" made a sympathetic character of the Wicked Witch of the West, she was played by actress Margaret Hamilton in the classic film "The Wizard Of Oz." As NPR's Neda Ulaby reports, it was not easy being green.
NEDA ULABY, BYLINE: In the original book, author L. Frank Baum did not even imagine his witch with green skin, says writer Ailea Merriam-Pigg.
AILEA MERRIAM-PIGG: She has one working eye that is as good as a telescope.
ULABY: Pretty cool. But not cool enough for the MGM filmmakers who made "The Wizard Of Oz" in 1939. They wanted to flaunt the glorious new technicolor.
MERRIAM-PIGG: They made her green because they wanted to have high-contrast colors to have a huge impact.
ULABY: And they cast an actress who was apparently one of the sweetest people off-screen to play the Wicked Witch of the West. Margaret Hamilton was a former kindergarten teacher and a newly divorced single mom when she signed up to play the character that engraved her into movie history. The part nearly killed her.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE WIZARD OF OZ")
UNIDENTIFIED ACTOR: (Screaming).
ULABY: Remember when the Wicked Witch first appears in Oz? Dorothy's house has dropped upon and flattened her sister. She vows revenge for the homicide.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE WIZARD OF OZ")
MARGARET HAMILTON: (As the Wicked Witch of the West) I'll get you, my pretty. And your little dog, too (laughter).
ULABY: The witch disappears in a puff of orange smoke, but the fire was all too real.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ: THE MAKING OF A MOVIE CLASSIC")
HAMILTON: I stepped down, and smoke all came up, and I went down.
(SOUNDBITE OF MUSIC)
HAMILTON: I felt just something - warmth on my face.
ULABY: That's Margaret Hamilton in a documentary that came out in 1990 about the making of "The Wizard Of Oz." She remembered the makeup melted into her skin.
(SOUNDBITE OF DOCUMENTARY, "THE WONDERFUL WIZARD OF OZ: THE MAKING OF A MOVIE CLASSIC")
HAMILTON: I had a second-degree on my face and third on my hand.
ULABY: The green makeup contained high concentrates of copper. In the documentary "The Wonderful Wizard Of Oz: The Making Of A Movie Classic," Hamilton described burns so severe they kept her from work for weeks. She returned with exposed nerves on one hand from the injury and refused to film another dangerous scene.
(SOUNDBITE OF FILM, "THE WIZARD OF OZ")
BERT LAHR: (As The Cowardly Lion) Surrender Dorothy.
ULABY: To create the moment when the Wicked Witch uses skywriting to issue a demand, stuntwoman Betty Danko pretended to fly on a broomstick with a hidden pipe belching smoke.
(SOUNDBITE OF BROOM WHIZZING)
ULABY: But the stunt went wrong, the pipe exploded, and poor Betty Danko spent nearly two weeks in the hospital.
(SOUNDBITE OF EXPLOSION)
ULABY: Many of the actors suffered while filming the beloved movie. Judy Garland became addicted to the amphetamines she was prescribed to lose weight. The Cowardly Lion's costume weighed nearly 90 pounds. The first actor cast as the Tin Man had to bow out after inhaling aluminum dust that was part of his makeup. And the actor who played the Scarecrow was scarred literally for life by his mask, which was glued to his face every day.
Ray Bolger went on NPR in 1985 to remember his dear friend Margaret Hamilton, who had recently died.
(SOUNDBITE OF ARCHIVED NPR BROADCAST)
RAY BOLGER: Margaret Hamilton was a warm person interested in so many things. She was so interested in ecology and environmentalism.
ULABY: Ecology and environmentalism - turns out being green for Margaret Hamilton was more than just skin deep. Neda Ulaby, NPR News. Transcript provided by NPR, Copyright NPR.
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