By the time I was older (say 12 or 13...) I got un-scared enough to love the technology of the movie, the Munchkins (they trashed the Culver Hotel!)... and then the music.
We all knew "Follow the Yellow Brick Road" was a classic, but who'd have thought that Karl Slover would be still singing it for fans seventy years later?
Or that "Over the Rainbow" would be covered by just about everybody -- and that as grownups we would take it on as a kind of hymn, listening through tears as we send off people who leave us too soon?
I'll wager that lyricist Yip Harbug knew. When Wizard screened in San Luis Obispo, Louis B. Mayer and Mervyn LeRoy tried to cut the song on the grounds that it slowed the pace. Cooler heads prevailed. But one verse was left out, and we hardly ever hear
And in that land beyond the skies,
You'll find me
I'll be a laughing daffodil
And leave the silly cares that fill
My mind behind me
Godspeed, Karl Slover. See ya one day.
//S
---
[from http://www.nytimes.com/2011/11/17/movies/karl-slover-one-of-the-last-surviving-oz-munchkins-dies-at-93.html ]
Karl Slover, One of the Last Surviving 'Oz' Munchkins, Dies at 93
By THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
MGM, via Photofest // Karl Slover in "The Wizard of Oz" as the lead trumpeter in the Munchkins' band.
DUBLIN, Ga. (AP) — Karl Slover, one of the last surviving actors who played Munchkins in "The Wizard of Oz," died on Tuesday in a central Georgia hospital. He was 93.
The cause was cardiopulmonary arrest, said the Laurens County deputy coroner, Nathan Stanley.
Mr. Slover was best known for playing the lead trumpeter in the Munchkins' band, but he also played an Oz townsman and soldier, according to John Fricke, author of "100 Years of Oz."
Long after the 4-foot-5 Mr. Slover retired, he appeared around the country at festivals and events related to "The Wizard of Oz." He was one of seven Munchkins at the 2007 unveiling of a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame dedicated to the film's little people. Only 3 of the 124 actors playing Munchkins remain.
Mr. Slover was born Karl Kosiczky on Sept. 21, 1918, in what is now the Czech Republic.
"In those uninformed days his father tried witch doctor treatments to make him grow," Mr. Fricke said. Young Karl was immersed in heated oil until his skin blistered and then attached to a stretching machine at a hospital, all in an attempt to make him taller. When he was 9, he was sold by his father to a traveling show in Europe, Mr. Fricke said.
Mr. Slover was paid $50 a week for "Oz" and told friends that Toto, Judy Garland's canine co-star, made more money.###
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