{"id":194572,"date":"2025-09-22T15:01:14","date_gmt":"2025-09-22T15:01:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2025\/09\/22\/original-wizard-of-oz-star-dies\/"},"modified":"2025-09-22T15:01:14","modified_gmt":"2025-09-22T15:01:14","slug":"original-wizard-of-oz-star-dies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/2025\/09\/22\/original-wizard-of-oz-star-dies\/","title":{"rendered":"Original Wizard of Oz star dies"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<p class=\"byline\">\n    <span itemprop=\"author\" itemtype=\"http:\/\/schema.org\/Person\">by <span itemprop=\"name\" style=\"color: #60178e;\">Feeds-Bang<\/span> | <\/span><\/p>\n<p>        <time itemprop=\"datePublished\" content=\"2025-09-22\" datetime=\"1758553274\" pubdate=\"\">22 September 2025<\/time>\n    <\/p>\n<p>The Wizard of Oz actress Elaine Merk Binder has died.<\/p>\n<p>                            <\/p>\n<p class=\"image-caption landscape\">One of the original Munchkins has died<\/p>\n<p>\nThe passing of Elaine &#8211; who was one of the last surviving cast members from the 1939 classic movie &#8211; at the age of 94 has been confirmed by her daughter, Annette Phillips.<\/p>\n<p>\nShe auditioned for the musical in 1938 and was one of the eight children selected to dance and sing as part of the Munchkin ensembles and she previously recalled how &#8220;scary&#8221; the process was.<\/p>\n<p>\nShe said: \u201cI tried out for the \u2018Wizard of Oz\u2019 Munchkins. For me it was scary. It was my first big call for girls from a major studio.<\/p>\n<p>\n\u201cI was relieved when Bud told the dance director, \u2018She\u2019s O.K.\u2019 I did not have to perform like the others did. And they selected me as one of the eight who would both dance and sing. We learned later that they had added girls to the Little People because they had the mistaken impression that the Little People were not athletic.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\nElaine was just eight years old when she filmed The Wizard of Oz and can be seen in a scene that features the song Come Out, Come Out, Wherever You Are.<\/p>\n<p>\nBefore The Wizard of Oz, she performed in the Our Gang shorts and she also appeared in the film Nothing Sacred with Carole Lombard and Frederic March.<\/p>\n<p>\nParamount offered Elaine a contract as a teenager, but she declined in order to study at Occidental College. After graduating in 1951, she completed her master&#8217;s degree at Cal State Los Angeles two years later with qualifications in music and education.<\/p>\n<p>\nShe then went on to study computer science and theology, and worked as a computer consultant for USA and First Interstate Bank.<\/p>\n<p>\nAs well as Annette, Elaine is survived by son George and six grandchildren.<\/p>\n<p><!-- Pagination --><\/p>\n<p><!-- playbuzz --><br \/>\n<!-- end playbuzz--><\/p>\n<p><!-- \n\n<div data-cn-project=\"femalefirst\">\n    \n<\/div>\n\n --><\/p>\n<p><!-- Outbrain { date: 2018\/06\/08 } --><br \/>\n<!-- Outbrain { date: 2018\/06\/08 } --><\/p>\n<p>    <!-- Outbrain { date: 2018\/06\/08 } --><br \/>\n    <!-- Outbrain { date: 2018\/06\/08 } --><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p><br \/>\n<br \/><a href=\"https:\/\/www.femalefirst.co.uk\/celebrity\/original-wizard-star-dies-1430130.html?f=rss\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>by Feeds-Bang | 22 September 2025 The Wizard of Oz actress Elaine Merk Binder has died. One of the original Munchkins has died The passing of Elaine &#8211; who was one of the last surviving cast members from the 1939 classic movie &#8211; at the age of 94 has been confirmed by her daughter, Annette [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":194573,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[12489],"class_list":{"0":"post-194572","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-make-up","8":"tag-elaine-merk-binder"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194572","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=194572"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/194572\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/194573"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=194572"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=194572"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/entertainment.runfyers.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=194572"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}