After last year’s “Peter Pan Live” crashed and burned, NBC changed course for its broadcast of “The Wiz Live”: Bring on the stars!
Gone were the Allison Williamses and Christopher Walkens of this world. Thursday’s telecast of “The Wiz” — a funky, all-black retelling of “The Wizard of Oz” that premiered in 1975 — was studded with the likes of Ne-Yo, Mary J. Blige, Queen Latifah, Common and Amber Riley from “Glee.”
And then there was Uzo Aduba, whose Glinda was quite the departure from her part as Crazy Eyes on “Orange Is the New Black” and whose deep-throated “Believe in Yourself” was a late-coming highlight. No surprise there: Aduba has Broadway credits under her belt.
So the takeaway is that actual singers who can handle a score do make a difference in a musical. Right there we had an improvement of approximately 100 percent over last year. The worst thing that happened is that the show ran 10 minutes late.
Even Shanice Williams, the 18-year-old newcomer who took on the key role of Dorothy, was confident. Maybe a little too much: Her Dorothy never looked daunted by her crazy adventure to the land of oversize polystyrene cake ornaments — jeez, those sets! — and had all the pluck of a showbiz kid, with little charisma but plenty of belty chops.
Seeing Williams interact with Aunt Em had special resonance, though, since the older woman was played by the great Stephanie Mills, who created the ’75 Dorothy and killed with her ballad “The Feeling We Once Had.”
Admittedly the acting ranged from adequate to “what the hell are they doing?” The emphasis clearly was on the singing, which is fine. Even with some sprucing up by Harvey Fierstein, “The Wiz” isn’t a great show. What it does have is juicy numbers in which flamboyant performers can strut their stuff.
The clearest example of “can’t act but sure can sell” was Ne-Yo, who as a loose-limbed Tin Man channeled early-’70s Stevie Wonder on “What Would I Do If I Could Feel.” The guy should teach showmanship, if it could be taught at all — you have that gift or you don’t.
Right behind him was Blige as Evillene, a cackling baddie who turns up at the very end. Blige shouted every single line of dialogue, then proceeded to blast her song, “No Bad News,” into the stratosphere.
Other memorable moments included a deliciously bizarre vogueing interlude at the wizard’s compound, which suddenly looked like a discotheque filled with people in green lycra. Even the new song written for the telecast, “We Got It,” wasn’t terrible — though it lacked the rest of the score’s mid-’70s je ne sais quoi.
Imagine that: a TV musical you could enjoy and not just hate-watch for the sake of a few pithy tweets. NBC might well be on the right track.