Liza's Cabaret date
WHEN your birth certificate reads 'Hollywood', is there any other option than to follow a path to super stardom?And, moreover, when you come into the world as the daughter of Judy Garland - not only the ultimate diva of musical theatre but also one of the greatest and most tragic figures of her generation and a film star herself by the age of 13 - and director Vincente Minnelli, can you expect a bump free ride?
As the experience of Liza Minnelli shows, the route - and the bumps - were both a sure bet.
She might not have recognised her special start ("Growing up in Hollywood it seemed like every kid was the child of some star," she once commented. "We had no idea that other people would think we were special, because there was no other lifestyle to compare it to.") but she certainly made the most of the possibilities it opened up.
Thrust into the limelight when she was just a child, often clutching her mother's hand to gee Garland's own sagging confidence, Liza began performing for large crowds in her teens.
Often tense and even competitive performances alongside her mother, those famous London Palladium shows acquainted an audience with Liza's considerable talent, eventually turning her into a box office star by the late-1960s.
She still remains best remembered for her remarkable portrayal of Sally Bowles (a flirty singer and dancer in depressed pre-Nazi Germany) in the film production of post-war musical Cabaret, not least because Sally's vivacious, wide-eyed appearance was one that Liza went on to adopt as her own.
Cabaret
But her list of credits extend far further: The Sterile Cuckoo and Cabaret both won her Academy Awards, but she's also picked up a Grammy, an Emmy, two Golden Globes and three Tonys for parts in her signature movie New York, New York as well as Arthur, Lucky Lady and even a Muppet movie.
She's still performing on the silver screen today (at 62, she's outlived her mother by 15 years despite struggling with the same vices), and is currently working on a film version of hit US TV show Arrested Development - due for release next year.
It's not all been a glorious ride, though. But remember those bumps? Well, back in the real world, Liza's private life has certainly suffered for her public profile.
"I inherited the disease of alcoholism," she once commented, referring to her mother's own battle with the bottle. "I believe all drunks go to Heaven, because they've been through Hell on Earth."
Stints in rehab have been the result, but there's also been drug addiction, four failed marriages (most of which ended in scandals or ugly episodes, the most acrimonious split of all was from her last husband, eccentric producer David Gest) and a host of medical problems from miscarriages to hip and knee replacements and, in 2000, even a paralysing bout of encephalitis contracted from a mosquito bite.
But, as Liza well knows, it's impossible to keep a good woman down. "Reality," Liza once quipped with Wildean verve, "is something you rise above." Quite.
Liza Minnelli plays the Bridgewater Hall on Monday, June 2. Tickets are priced £35 to £95. Call 0161 907 9000 .
Published: Thu, 29 May, 2008
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