ABSTRACT

The Wiz, the 1975 Broadway musical, has been overlooked by musical theatre historians who have positioned the musical as the tipping point from the socially active Black musicals of the early 1970s into the commercially successful, feel-good crossover musicals of the late 1970s and early 1980s. Through this positioning, The Wiz has been de-politicized and under analyzed. This chapter revisits The Wiz in order to rewrite the history of the musical, thinking of it not as an American musical or a Black musical but as an example of musical theatre as African Diaspora drama.