The Wiz old for the part. However, she contacted Rob Cohen of Universal Pictures, who offered to have them finance the film if she were to play Dorothy, at which point he acquiesced. The resulting film version of "The Wiz" also starred former Motown star Michael Jackson as the Scarecrow, Nipsey Russell as the Tin Man, Richard Pryor as the Wizard, jazz singer Thelma Carpenter as Miss One (the name "Addapearle" was not used for this production) and Lena Horne as Glinda. Ted Ross and Mabel King reprised their roles of the Lion and Evillene from the Broadway production. Sidney Lumet served
Personal relationships of Michael Jackson her house where he played the drums and her brother played guitar. She said the relationship ended when she was 12, after he asked her to go to the premiere of "The Wiz" with him, but her agent disapproved, "maybe because they thought he wasn't a big enough star yet", and she did what she was told because she was a child. While she claimed they never spoke after that, they were actually shown to be together a number of times after this would have happened. Jackson also spoke about O'Neal in 2001 with Rabbi Shmuley. He described holding hands