“Nobody Beats The Wiz”: Signifyin(g) #BlackExcellence in a Moment of Anti-Blackness by I. Augustus Durham

“Nobody Beats The Wiz”: Signifyin(g) #BlackExcellence in a Moment of Anti-Blacknessby I. Augustus Durham | @imeanswhatisays | NewBlackMan (in Exile)
As a youngster, right on Boston Post Road in Orange, I remember that electronics store called The Wiz. Its slogan: “Nobody beats The Wiz!” When I went to YouTube looking for the footage of the jingle in reference to the rebroadcast of The Wiz, I stumbled upon this commercial and thought, “Hmmm, that could be an intriguing way to reconstruct my feelings about December 3.” So, here it is:Sale: when the news broke that The Wiz would be NBC’s next live musical, some of us were skeptical; the two previous live offerings—The Sound of Music and Peter Pan—were…meh. The sale was a good and bad thing. On the one hand, it was an opportunity to nostalgically return to yesteryears of VHS and film broadcasts on Afrocentric television channels, even if the formatting of the film cut out scenes like “Be a Lion”. At the very least, the practicality of the sale was instead of purchasing the DVD or going to the musical on the great white way, one could watch “for free”. On the other hand, the nostalgic ones were confused by some of the castings: if the goal was to reinvigorate that former love by having previous Wiz kids impart that love to a new generation, members of the cast are as old as, if not older, or younger, than, those VHS-ers . . .Integrity: Admittedly, I am too young to have seen the Broadway musical, but knowing that cast, specifically the Stephanie Mills, it was nice to have that crossover of a previous Dorothy as Aunt Em—it symbolizes, albeit coincidentally, growth. Confession notwithstanding, my frame of reference is the film, and the live version had high and low moments of homage. Instead of rehashing them, what I will say is: something I learned, in a former performative life, is when one performs something renowned, unless s/he comes at it in a COMPLETELY different way, that first iteration usually trumps that piece’s performance in perpetuity. For example, as much as I love this aria, Nina will always be on replay because of its immense difference: melancholy made gorgeous, executed with genius precision. That said, the integrity of the live version left me, and perhaps others, somewhere in the middle. It was the little things, like waiting for the great MJ run (start at 2:30) that never came, even though the rendition was well-executed—a 21st century update for sure—, or the infusion of new songs to bring the musical into the age of millennials. Yet, the fantasy created still maintains that aesthetic edge, that whimsy that the black performance archive almost always accomplishes. (I still long though for a more pronounced presence of Toto!) This perhaps provides a perfect transition to the . . .Customer: Personally, the customer is not always right, but I do recall an admonition by Leontyne Price, and for that matter Ralph Ellison via Miss Hazel Harrison: there is always a little (hu)man behind the stove, or at Chehaw Station, whom one does not expect to be at the performance, and s/he knows the music, the tradition, the standards of musicianship. Price says this in different words (notice the reaction of the crowd as the Verdi aria is played!). As a watcher who live-statused that Thursday night, I, and others, presumably got it, even if the getting was just a simple reminder: Just as The Wizard of Oz only acknowledged blackness by way of animality, The Wiz, as conceived for the stage (1974/5) and the cinema (1978) then, underwent a monumental fast-forward. The gravity of it being broadcast, on television, at this moment, in This (Black) American Life, is one of the most public moments of signifyin(g) we have seen this year (this and this included). This is to say, with all of the anti-blackness that pervades our national optics ad infinitum, to have a moment when the dominant narrative is interrupted to say, “Hey y’all, nobody beats The Wiz!” is to give recitation to Kendrick Lamar: despite being down before, we continually work in excess of our pain to find a pleasure that confirms we gon’ be- done been-already-all really-are-been already alright! All right! What if The Wiz is a truncated, or extended, episode of the Soul Train franchise inasmuch as for almost three hours, a nation, which many persons find calling “home” to be catachresis, was able to see that blackness, and its art, is the hippest trip in America?Excellence: which is really #blackexcellence, is easy to trace because words have never captured that thing we all know, (ir)regardless (!) of SCOTUS bunk or people *raises hand* chronicling on social media what work, or werk, looks like. In many ways, Amber Riley (and Mills) set the tone for the night because it is difficult to follow someone singing at a 10 within the first seventeen minutes of a 2.5 hour musical—she sang so well, Toto hid until the end! Other notables: Shanice Williams—she plays Dorothy, as ingénue, refreshingly! David Alan Grier—a wonderful surprise! The transformation, both before and during the telecast, of Queen Latifah is noteworthy: what would it mean to imagine such an evolution—from queer green Wiz to homely introvert to ballooning Covergirl—as some persons’ material, everyday conditions AND choices for personal truth, rather than something to behold from a critical distance? We know more Wizes than we think, or care to acknowledge. The costuming and dancing were perhaps the most consistent aspects of the presentation, and although I hoped for the Emerald City Scene from the film (disregard the ambient commentary), the live intervention affirmed forms of contemporary sociality. (Nevertheless, here is an example of how the film and the live version could have been hybridized in my opinion.)Respect: I respect the black performance archive—I am a product of it—and that is why my DVR will be running, again, tomorrow.+++
I. Augustus Durham is a third-year doctoral candidate in English at Duke University. His work focuses on blackness, melancholy and genius.