The Munchkins’ sordid legacy: As one of the last surviving Wizard of Oz cast dies aged 94… how the Hollywood film was marred with drunken orgies and ‘little people’ pimping

Elaine Merk Binder, one of the last surviving actors who played a Munchkin in the Oz Wizard, died at the age of 94.

The child star from Colorado became eight years old when he filmed his beloved 1939 film, and made him one of the eight children dancing and singing as part of the Munchkin Group.

Elaine was one of the innocent children who exhibited their talents in the film, but the cast added Munchkin’s legacy to the scandal heritage of the production because of their ‘naughty’ behavior on the set.

In the Oz Wizard, the gentle small people who lived at the head of the Yellow Brick Road were the loyal friends of Young Dorothy, the role that made Judy Garland famous.

Garland’s third husband Sid Luft, who wrote in the 2017 biography, announced that some of the 124 actors thrown as Munchkins are not always innocent.

Luft, a Hollywood producer who allows Garland to work during his 13 -year marriage, tells him how he once told him that he was repeatedly harassed by them for the eight challenging months to make a magnificent 1939 film.

‘The men were naughty. They thought they could get rid of everything because they were very small, ‘Luft, Judy and I wrote a book he had never finished before his death in 2005.

A deputy director was assigned to keep them in the same way and to enable them to bail quickly because they would not miss their calls on the set.

Children’s Star from Colorado (depicted in his childhood) joined the eight -year -old oz magician

Munchkins, who is still wearing her make -up, will retire to Culver City’s bars near Hollywood after a long -day working and will be drunk in a terrible way, Luft remembers.

“ They were irregular like hell, shouting and screaming. The next day, on the set, hanging, Judy’s life under his clothes would make miserable, ” he added.

Judy looked only young for 16 years when he played 4FT 11 inches and the child Dorothy. Luft was hugged to hide the developing figure with his breasts, and he struggled with what the men who were disrespectful to him call the ‘little girl/woman dilemma’.

“Munchkins, of course, complained to him in size and could not resist him, he made his life into misery,” he wrote. ‘The men were 40 years old and was more and more Judy had boyfriends and they felt sophisticated at the age of 16.’

Luft’s amazing revelation can be rejected as standard – if they do not reopen one of the hottest controversial debates of the film industry, a unique disturbing –terneltown Lechery.

Forget the rats package and bed jumping for generations, Matine idol exploding pills exploding. Was Munchkins actually Hollywood’s worst kids?

Since he could come to everyone who sees the squeak, childish mascara in the film, this amazing theory has been put forward for years.

The fairy tales were infinite and terrible: for months only in a hotel with each other, Munchkins Bacchanalian was pampered in his sockets and heavy drinking seizures, swinging from the beams, swinging illegal gambling, mixed with prostitutes, and usually the police had to be placed on every floor of the hotels.

In the picture: Elaine Merk Binder, one of the last surviving actors playing Munchkin in the Oz sorry

The fairy tales were so terrible that they even revealed rumors that one of the Munchkins – that he crossed with love – in fact committed suicide on the set.

Garland, although he never claims to be a target, objected to his terrible behavior. ‘They were drunk. They torn apart every night and the police would put them in butterfly nets’ he remembered.

The butterfly network was a reference to the reports that some actors should be caught on the roofs of the hotel on the roofs of the hotel and on the networks placed underneath.

When Garland went on an appointment with one of them, when he didn’t get the chance by bringing his mother, Munchkin told him: ‘Fair enough, two widths for someone’s price’. Others of production had less salty memories.

Merven Leroy, the producer of the film, “ We spent a time with these little men, ” he said. Every day when the shooting is finished ‘fights and origin and how all kinds of transportation process’ explained.

The authority added: ‘Almost every night, the Culver City police had to run to the hotel to prevent them from killing each other. . . We should have had the police on almost every floor. ‘

He wondered if they had little blocking to go to their small height ‘as a patronage.

Bert Lahr, who played the coward lion, wrote in his memory: ‘Most of the Munchkin made their lives with Panhandling, Pimp and prostitute. The assistants were ordered to watch the dwarf crew, who stabbed knives and usually think of other, larger passions. [studio] employee. ‘

Elaine was only eight years old when he filmed his beloved 1939 film. It was one of the eight children dancing and singing as part of the Munchkin community

Speaking about the 1938 auditions for the MGM, Elaine said: ‘He was scary for me. It was my first big call for girls from a big studio ‘

It is not a surprise that some Munchkins, who cannot believe their chances of coming to Hollywood, bring some of the bad old ways with them.

The truth is that the actors had limited career opportunities, especially during the depression of the thirties, and often resorted to crimes or begging them to end.

While the female Munchkins was accused of proposing studio electricians, a bad -fame munchkin, Count, was never sober – she paid a terrible price for drunkenness.

Jack Dawn, the chief makeup artist of the film, “ We heard a whining sound from the men’s room, ” he said. ‘He was plastered for lunch, he fell into the toilet bowl and could not come out.’

Many of the other members of the production team did not help the actors like a child.

For example, the collapse of the toilet bowl ordered great people that Munchkins should accompany the sink.

Meanwhile, a studio school teacher once tried to round a group of actor for the class and misled for young people.

The wardrobe mistresses were also shocked to discover that ‘shy men’, which they helped to undress, were actually entirely adult men.

They were adults. They didn’t like to touch them or remove their makeup chairs, ” he said. ‘They insisted on climbing on their own.’ ‘

Considering that they are treated as children, is he worried about influencing that some munchkins are other, less calm, ‘adults’ on the roads?

In recent years, it has been fashionable to reject stories about Munchkin Madness as’ height ” bigotry – a mixture of exaggeration and invention cooked by people who are shocked to discover that actors behave like themselves.

Survival Munchkin actors do not remove the stories out of control and admit that there is a certain amount of party.

However, a handful of ‘lush greyhound’ gained a bad reputation. These rotten apples were definitely drunk Charles Kelley, who was definitely a set of two -loaded pistol packaging after hearing that he had looked at Jessie’s wife Jessie, who played the Mayor of Munchkinland.

He threatened to kill Becker and was thrown out of production for anti-social behavior.

A fact that every Munchkin will happily admit is to make bad payments to them. They bought only $ 50 a week (about $ 900 today) – more than one -third of Cairn Terry Terry, who plays Dorothy’s dog Toto, who still plays Dorothy’s dog Toto.

After half of the earnings, after effective purchasing from their parents, he did not help his pocket by Leo Singer, a cut -off executives, an impresario that runs a large group of actors.

The film MGM, Munchkins should not be played by children. Singer won the contract with the Munchkin army to ensure the film studio.

Most of them were Germans, and highly escaped from the country to escape the program of the Nazis killing people.

In their hotels, they slept on one bed on three side roads apart from the rest of the oz casting. They took shots and shots like children.

None of the actors of Munchkin, regardless of the problems with Gopers, had no bad words about Garland, who gave each of them a signed photo and chocolate box when the shooting was finished.

However, in two years, he said he had sent a search for help from a psychiatrist, the pressures of adolescent stars and what else.

When the Oz Wizard was released in England in 1940, censors gave him a certificate of ‘only for adults’. Critics toppled the decision, but perhaps censors knew something they didn’t do about all the cute little people who covered the yellow brick path.

On Monday, the death of Elaine Merk Binder was confirmed by her daughter Annette Phillips. No cause of death has emerged.

It can be seen during the output performances, and he goes out to see as one of the eight dancers in a wizard pavilion.

Speaking about the 1938 auditions for the MGM, Elaine said: ‘He was scary for me. It was my first great call for girls from a big studio. ‘

“I was relieved when the BUD dance director said,” OK “.

‘We later learned that they added girls to small people because there were wrong impressions that small people were not athletic.’

When he was a young man, Elaine was offered a contract from Paramount Studios, but refused and continued to study at the university and graduated with music and education degrees.

He continued to study computer science and theology and worked as a computer consultant for USC and First Interstate Bank.