Following up on its ratings hits of Peter Pan Live! and The Sound of Music Live!, NBC has found its next live musical special in The Wiz.
The special is set to air with Dec. 3 and will be a co-production with Cirque du Soleil, who hopes to bring the musical to Broadway for the 2016-17 season. The Wiz’s original Broadway run began in 1975 and lasted four years, retelling the classic story of The Wizard of Oz. Perhaps more famously, The Wiz was a 1978 theatrical film starring Diana Ross as a grown-up Dorothy Gale, Michael Jackson as the Scarecrow, Nipsey Russell as the Tin Man and Richard Pryor as the wizard that was co-produced by Universal Pictures and Motown Productions. Considering that casting and the show’s overall urban feel, The Wiz falls right in line with TV’s current trend toward diversity.
Peter Pan and Sound of Music executive producers Craig Zadan and Neil Meron are back for The Wiz. Kenny Leon has signed on to direct both the TV event and Broadway revival, and Harvey Fierstein will produce new material for the show. No casting announcements have been released yet.
Fox has joined the live musical trend as well, airing a live production of Grease on Jan. 31, 2016 starring Julianne Hough and Vanessa Hudgens.
Read more at The Hollywood Reporter.
Brief Take: The Wiz’s brief run on Broadway and the commercial and critical flop of the film means that this generation is much less familiar with this musical, but hopefully curious enough to tune in.
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