With help of a new state tax credit, ‘The Wiz’ could put Baltimore on the map again as a Broadway tryout town

Polish up your ruby slippers. In six weeks, a much talked-about Broadway-bound production of “The Wiz” will ease on down the road and into the Hippodrome Theatre for its world premiere — pouring millions of dollars into the local economy and potentially elevating Baltimore’s importance nationwide as a theater destination. The revival of “The Wiz,” the iconic, 1975 all-Black musical retelling of “The Wizard of Oz,” will be the first show to take advantage of financial incentives the Maryland General Assembly approved last year.