Wizard of OZ Adaptions Predating 1939

[McMurphy]

Like I have said elsewhere on the Chronicles forum, I have recently been interested in the children's tale of Wizard of OZ (and its sequels) that predate the MGM version from 1939, which everyone knows best.

Honestly, I was not aware that other film adaptions existed prior to the above date until I was reading the "Notes" and "Introduction" sections of a copy of Baum's famous book. It appears, by evidence of amazon.com, that some of these adaptions have made their way onto DVD format, such as the 1925 The Wizard of OZ starring Dorothy Dwan and the 1914 His Majesty the Scarecrow of OZ.

Has anyone seen (Wikipedia Warriors need not reply) these adaptions or any other ones that predate 1939 in which would earn your recommendation for someone interested in alternative takes of the famous children's book series?

 

[littlemissattitude]

No, I've never seen any of them. I only know about them because I took a film history class in which they were mentioned briefly. Personally, I would have rather seen one of them than some of the things we did see in that class. That was years ago, though, so I don't know if they were even available for viewing back then.

 

[j d worthington]

I did see a small portion of one of those made by Baum himself, back when they were doing a documentary on the 50th anniversary of the 1939 MGM version. Because it was done through a "studio" he had himself, it was quite crude, but interesting to see his own take on his characters on film.

Here's a little from IMDB about an early Oz film:

The Patchwork Girl of Oz (1914)

And there's a site devoted to Baum and Oz that has links that will take you to various silent movie providers, one of which is the following:

American Home Entertainment

12124 Sherman Way
North Hollywood, CA 91605

email: amerhome@earthlink.net
Phone 919-765-1777 or 1-800-422-6484
Fax 818-503-5282

• L. Frank Baum's Silent Film Collection of Oz His Majesty the Scarecrow of Oz, The Patchwork Girl of Oz, The Magic Cloak of Oz, The Wizard of Oz

Here's the link for that:

Sources for Silent Films on Video in the U.S.

I know that some of these early silent versions are available on DVD here and there, and I've seen this collection at one of the local video rental places, but haven't ever watched them... however, they shouldn't be too difficult to track down....

Here's the link for the Baum site, which gives a capsule description of each of the films:

Oz Videos

 

[Foxbat]

I knew of their existence but have never seen them.

Sometimes you get quite a surprise when the iconic 'original' is not the original adaptation at all...for instance, I only recently discovered that there is a version of Frankenstein dating from 1910 by Thomas Edison (a couple of minutes of it is available on Youtube...as are various version of the Wizard of Oz).

 

[j d worthington]

I don't believe I've seen the full Edison Frankenstein, but I've seen a good chunk of it... it's quite a hoot! There are also a couple of silent versions of Dr. Jekyll & Mr. Hyde (one with John Barrymore), as well as A Christmas Carol (actually, there were several of those, as there were of She, as I recall).