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Production of 'Wizard of Oz' marks 50 years for Dade City dance teacher Sally Blackwood

 
Sally Blackwood instructs her dancers during rehearsal on Monday at Blackwood Studios in Dade City. Her troupe will perform The Wizard of Oz this weekend.
Sally Blackwood instructs her dancers during rehearsal on Monday at Blackwood Studios in Dade City. Her troupe will perform The Wizard of Oz this weekend.
Published June 11, 2015

DADE CITY

Sally Blackwood stands just over 5 feet tall, hardly the willowy body type of a classic ballerina. Yet her talent and hard work carried her from Lakeland to New York City's prestigious Joffrey Ballet company in 1956.

That's how she got her start, before ending up in Pasco County, where this weekend she will mark 50 years operating her Dade City dance studio with a production of The Wizard of Oz.

When Dorothy, the Scarecrow, the Tin Man and the Cowardly Lion skip over the yellow brick road, they perform a stylized pas de basque dance routine. And when the lights come up tonight and Saturday, Blackwood, the choreographer and producer, will showcase multiple dance styles with an enormous cast.

Blackwood, 79, and her daughter, Mary Ann Blackwood, 48, spent 14 hours casting more than 300 students. Meanwhile, a behind-the-scenes entourage of artists built several sets and made 761 costumes that, according to Blackwood, allow dancers to "get that leg up to here."

To spotlight every dancer, there is a different cast for each night. Only 17-year-old newcomer Seth Burden, a senior at Pasco High School, will perform twice in the role of the Wizard. Nineteen soloists highlight the production, among 364 dancers tonight and 359 on Saturday.

Audiences will be carried away to a magical place at the Wesley Chapel High School Performing Arts Center — quite a diamond jubilee celebration for Blackwood Studios.

•••

Blackwood grew up in Lakeland, the only daughter of Benjamin Franklin Atwood, who founded and conducted a Lakeland dance orchestra, and Genevieve McCleery, who played first violin. Sally joined the mix at age 5, when she improvised as a dancing mascot for their USO vaudeville troupe during World War II.

Professional dance lessons followed with choreographer Mary Fariday, who eventually introduced the 19-year-old protege to New York City and the Joffrey.

"Robert Joffrey was assembling his second company," Blackwood said, "and he was a short man who preferred shorter dancers. I studied with the Joffrey until my sweetheart lured me back to Lakeland."

After returning home to reunite with retiring serviceman Woody Blackwood, the pair were married two weeks later.

Reuniting with her mentor, Fariday, was the start of a career teaching the techniques of ballet, tap, jazz and modern dance. Her husband initiated the move to Dade City when the business took off.

"We started out performing in cafeterias and gymnasiums with no air-conditioning," Blackwood said. "We sold out, but it was miserable."

Woody was a valuable collaborator. His support included the heavy lifting of light and sound boards, along with sets. The annual recital's relocation to the state-of-the-art Wesley Chapel High proscenium theater in 2001 happened just prior to his death from colon cancer.

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In recent years, Mary Ann Blackwood, a technical theater graduate from University of Alabama, has taken on much of the workload at the studio.

"Mary Ann's been active since she was a baby," Sally Blackwood said.

• • •

A dark, whirling tornado precedes the curtain rise on the Land of Oz. Dancers Jasmine Crew, 9, and Casey Lang 9, share the featured role of Dorothy. Toto is played by a stuffed animal in a basket.

With lights up on the farmer's fencing and a field of corn, the Scarecrow displays acrobatic aerials. The Tin Man is introduced with oiled-up tap dancing, and then the Cowardly Lion gets jazzy in the forest. The first act ends inside the Emerald City with a wondrous reveal of the Wizard.

After intermission, trees and snakes cavort with flying crows (not monkeys) to accompany a menacing solo by the Wicked Witch of the West. Her curses include 16 dancing poppies that intoxicate Dorothy, Scarecrow, Tin Man and Cowardly Lion. The ultimate quandary remains: How will Dorothy get home?

"We changed the ending to the Dresden country setting at the south end of Oz," Blackwood said. "That's where Dorothy and the good witch, Glinda, encounter the mice, mouse queen, maidens and princesses. A set of upside-down buildings is staged for closing gymnastics."

• • •

Wesley Chapel theater manager Dale Miller was scheduled to supervise the extensive load-in of lights, scenery, costumes and props Thursday evening while final dress rehearsals were conducted at Blackwood's studio complex in Dade City.

Creative local residents clamor to be part of Blackwood's annual productions. A floor installer's wife carved hanging wooden dance sculptures for the studios; alumni coordinate fundraisers, and Blackwood's handyman surprised her last Christmas by painting exterior walkways with yellow bricks and a rainbow.

Ray Polk, headmaster of Academy on the Farm, performed as Blackwood's first Wizard and taught at the studio until 2011.

"Sally exposed me to many characters growing up," Polk said. "It was a small world until you got on stage and experienced the ability to express yourself.

"I traveled with Sally to conventions and seminars that demanded the highest standards. Our kids stood out as more disciplined and better people for their exposure to Sally."

Blackwood might have been tempted to add spectacle to her interpretation of The Wizard of Oz, but that seemed unnecessary.

"We always make sure that lights illuminate the performers' faces to their parents," she said. "In the end, it's all about the dancers."