Tales of the Wizard of Oz Tales of the Wizard of Oz Tales of the Wizard of Oz is a 1961 animated television series produced by Crawley Films for Videocraft (later known as Rankin/Bass Productions). This is the second animated series produced by the studio, and the first by Rankin/Bass to feature traditional animation. The series features stories derived from characters created in L. Frank Baum's book "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz". Several characters are given additional names, including Dandy the Cowardly Lion, Rusty the Tin Man, and Socrates the Scarecrow. Artistic renditions of the Oz characters created for this series were later featured in the
The Wonderful Wizard of Oz Hamlin committed to making "The Wonderful Wizard of Oz" into a musical stage play to publicize the novel. The play "The Wizard of Oz" debuted on June 16, 1902. It was revised to suit adult preferences and was crafted as a "musical extravaganza", with the costumes modeled after Denslow's drawings. Hill's publishing company became bankrupt in 1901, so Baum and Denslow agreed to have the Indianapolis-based Bobbs-Merrill Company resume publishing the novel. Baum's son Harry Neal told the "Chicago Tribune" in 1944 that L. Frank told his children "whimsical stories before they became material for his books". Harry called his