Actors’ Gang plays “˜Wizard of Oz,’ “˜Dark Side of the Moon’
By Alex Goodman
Nov. 16, 2009 8:36 p.m.
The Actors’ Gang, the provocative theater group led by Oscar-winning actor and UCLA alumnus Tim Robbins, will not be performing theater on Wednesday. Instead, as part of the ongoing and eclectic WTF?! Festival, they will screen the classic musical “The Wizard of Oz” synchronized with Pink Floyd’s seminal art rock album “Dark Side of the Moon.”
Robbins started the group in 1981 along with several of his friends from the UCLA School of Theater, Film and Television, and they have produced dozens of award-winning plays since. The festival, which began in October and will continue through the end of the year, was devised by Robbins to help the gang survive these dark economic times.
“We are learning in this terrible economy that we have to be as flexible an organization as we can be, and yet not stray too far from our mission in order to make revenue,” said Elizabeth Doran, the managing director of The Actors’ Gang. “We’re able to expand our audiences by bringing in those who enjoy music or dance or film, but at the same time we are focusing so closely on our artistic aesthetic and our social mission.”
The pairing of “The Wizard of Oz” and “Dark Side of the Moon” was first commented upon in the mainstream media in 1995, and fans of the film and of the album had been aware of a connection for much longer. If the album is started at the beginning of the film, as the MGM lion finishes his third roar, the music and lyrics appear at times to coincide with the images on the screen. The line “balanced on the biggest wave,” for instance, is sung as Dorothy balances on the rail of a pigpen.
Members of Pink Floyd have repeatedly denied any intentional connections between “The Wizard of Oz” and “Dark Side of the Moon,” which was released in 1973 and became one of the best-selling rock albums of all time. At least one fan Web site, though, has designated over one hundred moments of synchronicity.
“It lends another layer,” said Shana Sosin, the WTF?! Festival producer and an Actors’ Gang company member. “All of a sudden, things deepen a little bit.”
Sosin said that anyone who revisits the film as an adult will find deep themes at the end of the Yellow Brick Road. Film and television visiting associate professor Jonathan Kuntz acknowledged that “The Wizard of Oz” is indeed guilty of propagating the mirage of the Emerald City, but also related to the film on a more emotional level.
“It’s a very poignant movie about people longing for home,” Kuntz said. “And how it’s fun to explore all the extremes of your imagination and so on, but ultimately you want to return home to the bosom of your family ““ you might say back to Kansas.”
V.J. Foster, the Actors’ Gang’s associate artistic director, pointed out that “The Wizard of Oz” is also geographically relevant. The MGM Studios where it was filmed are mere blocks away from the Gang’s 99-seat theater, as is the Culver Hotel, where the actors playing the Munchkins stayed during production.
The WTF?! Festival has already included musical performances by Jackson Browne and Tenacious D, whose members Jack Black and Kyle Gass were both UCLA students and part of the Actors’ Gang. Other nights have featured one-person shows, a conversation with author Gore Vidal and a teen poetry troupe.
“When you diversify your audience and what it is you are offering, … people are much more open to coming down to see something that they maybe have never seen before but are interested in,” Sosin said. “Maybe now they’ll come down to see some theater because they liked what they saw with Jackson Browne.”
Future events include a conversation with author TC Boyle and concerts by Ben Gibbard of Death Cab for Cutie and guitarist Tom Morello. On Dec. 19, the Vox Femina choral ensemble will perform then take the audience out caroling.
The profits will fund the troupe’s upcoming theater productions as well as their projects bringing the arts to both local schools and prison inmates.
“The community is helping us so that we can help the community, and at the same time expand our audience,” Foster said. “It’s wonderful.”
