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MGM's 1939 musical fantasy film ''The Wizard of Oz'' was first shown in theatres that year, then re-released nationwide in 1949 and 1955. It was first telecast on television on Saturday, November 3, 1956. The film was shown as the last installment of the CBS anthology series ''Ford Star Jubilee''. Since that telecast, it has been shown respectively by CBS, NBC, the WB Network, and several of Ted Turner's national cable channels, but never simply by a local affiliate. From 1959 to 1991 it was an annual tradition on American commercial network television. During these years, and for several afterwards, it was always shown as a television special. After the film was shown on television for the second time, network telecasts of it became a much-anticipated family event in the United States, drawing large audiences annually for many years. Between 1956 and 1980, commercial broadcast television was virtually the only means by which families were able to see it, unless they attended the MGM Children's Matinees in 1970. Until 1999, the film had been telecast in the U.S. only on commercial broadcast television. After the film went to cable that year, TV showings of it became more frequent, and the tradition of televising it only once a year was abandoned, at least in the U.S.〔http://www.combustiblecelluloid.com/classic/wizardoz.shtml〕 ''The Wizard of Oz'' has become perhaps the most famous film to be shown regularly on U.S. television, and one of the most cherished. Of the many family-oriented musical fantasies telecast after the successful 1955 version of the Mary Martin ''Peter Pan'', ''The Wizard of Oz'' is the only one which is still shown regularly as of 2013. Although the film was first telecast in 1956, it was not rebroadcast until 1959. The 1959 to 1962 telecasts occurred later in the year, between Thanksgiving and Christmas. However, beginning in the 1963–64 season the showings would occur in the early months of the year. The movie did not air in 1963. The film became available on home video in 1980.〔http://www.thewizardofozmovie.com/movie.html〕 ==First telecast == ''The Wizard of Oz'', which had been a critical but only a modest financial success during its theatrical run, was chosen to be the first Hollywood film to be shown uncut in one evening on an entire television network rather than just a network affiliate. Its first telecast took place November 3, 1956 on ''Ford Star Jubilee''. It was the last program in the CBS anthology series, which had already been canceled. The network paid MGM $225,000 for the rights to televise the film and to re-broadcast it if the telecast was a success.〔 Abstract; full article requires fee.〕 This 1956 airing was shown as CBS's response to the successful color telecast of the Broadway musical ''Peter Pan'' with Mary Martin, which had been restaged especially for TV at NBC Studios as part of the anthology series ''Producers' Showcase''. ''Peter Pan'' had first been shown live on TV by NBC in 1955, and been repeated (again live) by public demand in 1956. Its enormous success on television ushered in a temporary "fad" of mostly live family-oriented specials based on fantasy tales, such as ''Aladdin'' (1958, and no relation to the Disney film), ''Alice in Wonderland'' (1955) (a live-action version), Rodgers and Hammerstein's ''Cinderella'' (1957), ''The Pied Piper of Hamelin'' (1957), and ''Pinocchio'' (1957-no relation to the Disney film). As part of this trend, CBS bought the rights from MGM to telecast ''The Wizard of Oz''. For the first telecast of ''The Wizard of Oz'', the normally 90-minute ''Ford Star Jubilee'' was expanded to a full two hours to accommodate the entire film, which, in addition to having commercial breaks, was celebrity hosted. The main reason that CBS arranged for a host for the film was that a 101-minute motion picture was not considered long enough to run in the allotted 120-minute slot at that time, even with commercial breaks, without additional content to pad the telecast out to two hours.〔''The Wizard of Oz: The Official 50th Anniversary Pictorial History'', page #?〕 The 1956 telecast of the film marked the only time any actor who had appeared in the movie was selected to host it: Bert Lahr, who had played both the Cowardly Lion and farmhand Zeke in the film, appeared alongside then 10-year-old Liza Minnelli, and young Oz expert Justin G. Schiller. Lorna Luft, Minnelli's half-sister, did not appear on the telecast, as she was only four years old at the time, although she did have her picture taken with Minnelli in a promotional photo. Unlike several of the other ''Oz'' telecasts, no stills were taken during the hosting sequences of the 1956 telecast.〔Fricke, John, and Jay Scarfone and William Stillman. ''The Wizard of Oz: The Official 50th Anniversary Pictorial History'', Warner Books, 1989〕 The practice of a show business celebrity regularly "hosting" ''The Wizard of Oz'' lasted from the film's first television showing until 1968, when the film went to NBC after being telecast on CBS nine times. The film was always telecast uncut in a two-hour time slot between 1956 and 1968, despite having commercials and hosted segments. The Professor Marvel sequence has never been omitted (at least in American telecasts of the film), and the tracking shot of Munchkinland was not edited until the film went to NBC in 1968. The film's telecast received positive critical notices in newspapers the following day. ''Variety'' magazine prophetically suggested that the film could be telecast annually and at an earlier time.〔Fricke, John, and Jay Scarfone and William Stillman. ''The Wizard of Oz: The Official 50th Anniversary Pictorial History'', Warner Books, 1989, p.215〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「The Wizard of Oz on television」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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