 Joel Schumacher 's script for The Wiz was influenced by Werner Erhard 's teachings and his Erhard Seminars Training ( " est " ) movement , as both Schumacher and Diana Ross were " very enamored of Werner Erhard " . " Before I knew it , " said Rob Cohen , " the movie was becoming an est @-@ ian fable full of est buzzwords about knowing who you are and sharing and all that . I hated the script a lot . But it was hard to argue with [ Ross ] because she was recognizing in this script all of this stuff that she had worked out in est seminars . " Schumacher spoke positively of the results of the est training , stating that he was " eternally grateful for learning that I was responsible for my life . " However , he also complained that " everybody stayed exactly the way they were and went around spouting all this bull * * * * . " Of est and Erhard references in the film itself , The Grove Book of Hollywood notes that the speech delivered by Glinda the Good Witch at the end of the film was " a litany of est @-@ like platitudes " , and the book also makes est comparisons to the song " Believe in Yourself " . Although Joel Schumacher had seen the Broadway play before writing the script , none of the Broadway play 's writing was incorporated into the film 's . 
