Judy Garland
Frances Ethel Gumm
BORN: June 10, 1922, Grand Rapids, MN
DIED: June 22, 1969, London, England
Singer/actress Judy Garland had a varied career that began in vaudeville
and extended into movies, records, radio, television, and personal appearances.
She is best remembered as the big-voiced star of a series of movie musicals,
particularly The Wizard of Oz, in which she sang her signature song, "Over
the Rainbow." But unlike most other film stars of her era, she also maintained
a career as a recording artist, and after her movie-making days were largely
over, she was able to transfer her stardom to performing and recording,
culminating in her Grammy-winning number one album Judy at Carnegie Hall.
The third daughter of former vaudevillians running a theater in Grand Rapids,
MN, Garland made her stage debut singing "Jingle Bells" during the holiday
season when she was two years old. Soon after, she joined the singing group
formed by her two sisters. Early on, her surprisingly mature voice caused
her to dominate the group. Her family moved to California in the fall of
1926, where the sisters found occasional work on-stage and on radio, even
appearing in several film shorts in 1929 and 1930. In the summer of 1934,
they toured in the Midwest, where George Jessel suggested they change their
name from the Gumm Sisters to the Garland Sisters; eventually, each sister
also picked a new first name, with Garland choosing hers for the Hoagy Carmichael/Sammy
Lerner song "Judy."
The Garland Sisters broke up in the summer of 1935 upon the marriage of
Garland's oldest sister, Mary Jane. Soon after, Garland successfully auditioned
for the MGM film studio, and she was signed to a contract that fall. Within
weeks, she made her network radio debut on The Shell Chateau Hour. The movie
studio did not have immediate plans for her, but her career did advance in
another area. She had made test recordings on two occasions in 1935 for Decca
Records; finally, in June 1936 the label recorded her singing "Stompin' at
the Savoy" and released it the following month as her debut single, although
she was not yet signed to a term contract with the label.
Garland made her feature film debut in the musical Pigskin Parade, on loan
to the 20th Century Fox studio, in November 1936. She finally made an impression
at MGM when she sang a version of "You Made Me Love You" with special material
written by Roger Edens that transformed it into a tribute to film star Clark
Gable, at Gable's birthday party on February 1, 1937. The performance was
re-created in Broadway Melody of 1938, released in August. After attending
a preview, Decca president Jack Kapp finally decided to sign Garland to
a recording contract, and the label soon released her studio versions of
"Everybody Sing" and "Dear Mr. Gable: You Made Me Love You" from the film.
Garland made four more films (Thoroughbreds Don't Cry, Everybody Sing,
Listen, Darling, and Love Finds Andy Hardy) and a couple more singles through
1938, but she didn't achieve major stardom until the release of The Wizard
of Oz in August 1939. Glenn Miller had jumped the gun on the film by recording
"Over the Rainbow," and the song was already a hit before the movie was released.
But Garland's recording for Decca also became popular, and her success was
sealed by the release of Babes in Arms shortly after The Wizard of Oz. At
the 1939 Academy Awards in February 1940, she was presented with a miniature
Oscar for her outstanding performance as a screen juvenile. In March, Decca
released her first album, Judy Garland Souvenir Album, a three-disc, six-song
set combining the "Dear Mr. Gable: You Made Me Love You" single with her
current singles "In Between" (from Love Finds Andy Hardy) and "Figaro" (from
Babes in Arms).
Garland appeared in three films in 1940, Andy Hardy Meets Debutante, Strike
Up the Band, and Little Nellie Kelly, and she scored a Top Ten hit with
her recording of "I'm Nobody's Baby," featured in the first of them. Her
December recording session for songs from Little Nellie Kelly was conducted
by David Rose, whom she married on July 28, 1941. She appeared in another
three movies that year, Ziegfeld Girl, Life Begins for Andy Hardy, and Babes
on Broadway. Her only film released in 1942 was For Me and My Gal, also
starring Gene Kelly, who paired with her on a recording of the title song
that became a Top Ten hit. In 1943, she starred in Presenting Lily Mars and
Girl Crazy, and made a guest appearance in Thousands Cheer. She also made
her concert debut during the year, appearing on July 1 with the Philadelphia
Orchestra under André Kostelanetz at an open-air performance at the
Robin Hood Dell in Philadelphia reported to have attracted 30,000 listeners,
and toured service camps in support of the war effort.
Garland's film work became less frequent after 1943, tending to average
a single major release each year. Meet Me in St. Louis, her next movie, was
released in December 1944, directed by Vincente Minnelli, whom she married
on June 15, 1945, just after her divorce from David Rose. Her recording
of "The Trolley Song" from the score became a Top Ten hit, as did her album
of songs from the film. She followed with another Minnelli-directed film,
The Clock, in May 1945, her first non-singing dramatic role. In June, she
joined Bing Crosby on a recording of the novelty "Yah-Ta-Ta Yah-Ta-Ta (Talk,
Talk, Talk)," her first Top Ten hit with a song not featured in one of her
films. Lyricist Johnny Mercer got the jump on all competitors in scoring
a hit with his song "On the Atchison, Topeka and the Santa Fe" (written with
composer Harry Warren) from Garland's upcoming film, The Harvey Girls, taking
it to number one in July. But Garland's version, released in September, was
also a Top Ten hit. The film appeared in January 1946.
Garland gave birth to a daughter, Liza Minnelli, on March 12, 1946, and
cut back on her work schedule, though she made guest appearances in two other
1946 films, Ziegfeld Follies and Till the Clouds Roll By. The latter, a
biography of Jerome Kern, marked the birth of MGM Records and with it the
soundtrack album, its aural equivalent reaching the Top Ten. Although Garland
remained nominally signed to Decca, the rest of her record releases through
1950 were MGM soundtrack recordings.
Garland returned to filmmaking full-time with The Pirate, released in June
1948, followed quickly by Easter Parade, co-starring Fred Astaire, in July,
and then by a guest appearance in Words and Music in December. The last,
a biography of Richard Rodgers and Lorenz Hart, produced a number one soundtrack
album. At this point, Garland's relationship with MGM began to unravel.
Decades of diet pills to control her weight, amphetamines to give her energy,
and barbiturates to help her sleep -- reportedly given to her by her mother
early on and later by the studio -- had resulted in addiction and emotional
instability inconsistent with the grueling demands of making lavish movie
musicals. At the same time, the studio, losing audiences to television and
facing a severing of its relationship with the Loews' theater chain, was
more dependent on big-budget films and more constrained financially. Cast
in a second Fred Astaire film, The Barkleys of Broadway, Garland was fired
from the production and suspended by the studio for her erratic behavior.
She was then reinstated and made In the Good Old Summertime, released in
the summer of 1949. By then, she had been fired from Annie Get Your Gun and
suspended a second time. She was again reinstated and made Summer Stock,
which was released in the summer of 1950 and produced a Top Ten soundtrack
album. But when she was fired from Royal Wedding and suspended a third time,
on July 17, 1950, she made a halfhearted suicide attempt that got into the
papers and substantially changed her image from the ingenuous child of The
Wizard of Oz to a tragic Hollywood casualty. In September, MGM formally
canceled her contract. She divorced Minnelli on March 22, 1951.
Garland turned from the movies to the concert stage, accepting an offer
from the London Palladium to appear for four weeks starting on April 9, 1951.
It was the beginning of a major comeback. Returning to the U.S., she re-opened
the Palace Theatre in New York as a live venue for what was scheduled to
be a four-week engagement on October 16, 1951; it stretched to 19 weeks,
finally ending on February 24, 1952, at a reported gross of $750,000. As
a result, she was given a special Tony Award "for an important contribution
to the revival of vaudeville." On June 2, 1952, she married her manager,
Sid Luft. She gave birth to Lorna Luft on November 21, 1952.
Garland and Luft formed a production company and signed with Warner Bros.
Pictures to produce a remake of A Star Is Born. It opened in October 1954,
resulting in an Academy Award nomination for Garland. The soundtrack album,
released by Columbia Records, was a Top Ten hit. Garland gave birth to a
son, Joey Luft, on March 29, 1955. She toured the West Coast in July, and
in September starred in a live, 90-minute television special tied in to her
debut Capitol Records album, Miss Show Business, which reached the Top Ten.
The show brought her an Emmy nomination for Best Female Singer. There was
another 30-minute TV special in April 1956, a four-week engagement at a Las
Vegas hotel in July and August, and a two-month return to the Palace in September,
during which Capitol released the chart LP Judy. She did another three weeks
in Las Vegas in May 1957 and that month released her third Capitol LP, Alone,
which again was a chart item. She toured the U.S. through October, then
spent a month at the Dominion Theatre in London. She continued to perform
all over the U.S. in 1958 and 1959, and to record for Capitol (Judy in Love
and the concert album Judy Garland at the Grove in 1958, The Letter in 1959).
In November 1959, she was hospitalized for hepatitis and advised to give
up performing, but she returned to action with a performance at the London
Palladium in August 1960, followed by more European dates through December
and a new Capitol album, Judy! That's Entertainment!, in October. She had
a cameo in the film Pepe, released in December. There were more European
shows in January and February 1961. Then, on April 23, 1961, she appeared
at Carnegie Hall in New York, and the show was recorded for a double-LP set.
Judy at Carnegie Hall was number one by September and a gold record within
a year; it won Grammy Awards for Album of the Year and Best Solo Vocal Performance,
Female.
In December 1961, she returned to films with a dramatic role in Judgment
at Nuremberg that earned her an Academy Award nomination for Best Supporting
Actress. She starred in her first television special in six years in February
1962, earning Emmy nominations for Program of the Year and Outstanding Program
Achievement in the Field of Variety. Her next album, The Garland Touch,
released in July, reached the Top 20. In September, she returned to performing
in Las Vegas, spending six weeks at the Sahara, with additional dates through
February 1963. November saw the release of Gay Purr-ee, an animated musical
film for which she provided one of the character voices. In January 1963,
she starred in the dramatic film A Child Is Waiting. There was another television
special in March that brought an Emmy nomination for Outstanding Program
Achievement in the Field of Music. Its success led CBS to offer her her own
weekly variety series. In May, she portrayed a troubled singing star in I
Could Go on Singing, her final film appearance. The soundtrack album reached
the Top 40.
The Judy Garland Show premiered on Sunday, September 29, 1963, programmed
directly opposite NBC's Western drama Bonanza, the second-highest rated
show on television. As such, it never had a chance to become a success,
but it ran for 26 weeks, through March 30, 1964, and earned an Emmy nomination
for Outstanding Performance in a Variety or Musical Program or Series. Capitol
released Just for Openers, an album of performances drawn from the series,
on the day of the final broadcast.
In May 1964, Garland undertook a tour of the Far East marred by illness.
In November, she returned to the London Palladium, performing with her 18-year-old
daughter, Liza Minnelli. The performance was filmed and recorded. A special
was broadcast on British television in December, and a double album, "Live"
at the London Palladium, was released on Capitol in August 1965, spending
several months in the charts. Garland toured the U.S. during 1965. She married
actor Mark Herron on November 14, 1965, just after her divorce from Sid
Luft became final. (She divorced Herron on April 11, 1967.) She was less
active in 1966, restricting herself to a few live and television appearances.
But she worked extensively in 1967, including a month-long return to the
Palace that summer which produced a new live album on a new label, Judy
Garland at Home at the Palace -- Opening Night, in the charts for ABC Records
in September. There were a handful of dates in the U.S. in 1968, the last
of them being a performance on July 20 at JFK Stadium in Philadelphia. On
December 30, she opened a five-week engagement at the Talk of the Town nightclub
in London. She married her fifth husband, nightclub manager Mickey Deans,
on March 15, 1969. In March, she embarked on a trio of Scandinavian dates,
the last of which was at the Falkoner Center in Copenhagen on March 25. Three
months later, she died of an accidental overdose of barbiturates.
In the decades following her death, Judy Garland's troubled personal life,
which contrasted so starkly with the exuberance and innocence of her film
roles, has been the grist for numerous books and other accounts, to the
point that her career is sometimes viewed more as an object lesson in Hollywood
excess than as the remarkable string of multimedia accomplishments it was.
But even the salacious and exploitative material is dependent on her star
power and vocal pyrotechnics to have any appeal. Garland herself, who was
so attracted to the backstage Hollywood story of A Star Is Born, performing
it both on radio and later on film, certainly understood the attraction
of a tragic image and may have used it deliberately. Nevertheless, the core
of her significance as an artist remains her amazing voice and emotional
commitment to her songs.
Garland's extensive work as a singer, including her appearances in films
and on radio and television, in addition to live performances and studio
recordings, makes her discography lengthy and chaotic. In the '90s, her soundtrack
recordings saw reissue through Rhino Records, while MCA undertook a box set
of her '30s and '40s Decca studio recordings (The Complete Decca Masters
[Plus]) and Capitol compiled its own box of her '50s and '60s material, (The
One & Only). Beyond these lies a vast and ever-increasing sea of quasi-legal
releases that consumers should approach with caution. ~ William Ruhlmann,
All Music Guide
Entertainer Judy Garland was both one of the greatest and one of the most
tragic figures in American show business. The daughter of a pushy stagemother,
Judy and her sisters were forced into a vaudeville act called the Gumm Sisters
(her real name), appearing in movie shorts and at the 1933 Chicago World's
Fair. It was clear from the outset that Garland was the star of the act,
and as such was engaged by MGM as a solo performer in 1936. The studio adored
Garland's adult-sounding singing but were concerned about her puffy facial
features and her curvature of the spine. MGM decided to test both Garland
and another teenage contractee, Deanna Durbin, in a musical "swing vs. the
classics" short subject, Every Sunday (1936). The studio had planned to
keep Durbin and drop Garland, but through a corporate error, the opposite
took place. Whatever the case, MGM decided to allow Garland her feature-film
debut in another studio's production, just in case the positive audience
response to Every Sunday was a fluke.
Loaned to 20th Century-Fox, Garland was ninth billed in Pigskin Parade
(1936), but stole the show with her robust renditions of "Balboa" and "Texas
Tornado." Garland returned to MGM in triumph and was given better opportunities
to show her stuff: the "Dear Mr. Gable" number in Broadway Melody of 1938,
"Zing Went the Strings of My Heart" in Listen, Darling (1938), and so on.
When MGM planned to star 20th Century-Fox's Shirley Temple in The Wizard
of Oz, Garland almost didn't get her most celebrated role, but the deal fell
through and Garland was cast as Dorothy. Even after this, the actress nearly
lost out on her definitive screen moment when the studio decided to cut the
song "Over the Rainbow," finally keeping the number after it tested well
in previews.
The Wizard of Oz made Garland a star, but MGM couldn't see beyond the little-girl
image and insisted upon casting her in "Hey, kids, let's put on a show"
roles opposite Mickey Rooney (a life-long friend of Garland's. Garland proved
to the world that she was a grown-up by marrying composer David Rose in
1941, after which MGM began giving her adult roles in such films as For
Me and My Gal (1942) -- though still her most successful film of the early
'40s was in another blushing-teen part in Meet Me in St. Louis (1944). Once
very popular on the set due to her infectious high spirits, in the mid-'40s
Garland became moody and irritable as well as undependable insofar as showing
up on time and being prepared. The problem was an increasing dependency upon
barbiturates, an addiction allegedly inaugurated in the 1930s when the studio
had Garland "pepped up" with prescription pills so that she could work longer
hours. Garland also began drinking heavily and her marriage was deteriorating;
in 1945 she married director Vincente Minnelli, with whom she had a daughter,
Liza, in 1946. By 1948 Garland's mood-swings and suicidal tendencies were
getting the better of her, and in 1950 she had to quit the musical Annie
Get Your Gun. That same year, she barely got through Summer Stock, her health
problems painfully evident upon viewing this film. Before 1950 was half
over, Garland attempted suicide, and upon recovery, she was fired by MGM.
Garland and Vincente Minnelli divorced in 1951, whereupon she married Sid
Luft, who took over management of his wife's career and choreographed Garland's
triumphant comeback at the London Palladium, a success surpassed by her
1951 appearance at New York's Palace Theatre. Luft strong-armed Warner Bros.
to bankroll A Star is Born (1954), providing Garland with her first film
role in four years. A Star is Born was Garland's best film to date, allowing
her a wealth of songs and a full range of emotions.
Riding high once more, Garland was reduced to the depths of depression
when she lost the Academy Award to Grace Kelly. Her subsequent live appearances
were wildly inconsistent, and her film performances ranged from excellent
(Judgment at Nuremberg [1961]) to appallingly undisciplined (A Child is
Waiting [1963]). Her third marriage on the rocks, Garland nonetheless pulled
herself together for an unforgettable 1961 appearance at Carnegie Hall,
which led indirectly to her 1963 weekly CBS series, The Judy Garland Show.
As with most of the significant moments in Garland's life, much contradictory
information has emerged regarding her CBS series and her behavior therein;
the end result, however, was cancellation after one year, due less to the
wavering quality of the program (it started poorly, but finished big with
several "concert" episodes) as to the competition of NBC's Bonanza.
Garland's marriage to Sid Luft, which produced her daughter Lorna, ended
in divorce in 1965, and from there on in Garland's life and career hit a
rapid downslide. She made a comeback attempt in London in 1968, but audiences
ranged from enthusiastic to indifferent -- as did her performances. A 1969
marriage to discotheque manager Mickey Deems did neither party any good,
nor did a three-week engagement in a London nightclub, during which Garland
was booed offstage. On June 22, 1969, Judy Garland was found dead in her
London apartment, the victim of an ostensibly accidental overdose of barbiturates.
Despite (or perhaps because of) the deprivations of her private life, Judy
Garland has remained a Show Business Legend. As to her untimely demise, Ray
Bolger summed it up best in his oft-quoted epitaph: "Judy didn't die. She
just wore out." ~ Hal Erickson, All Movie Guide