Judy Garland tried butcould never make headway writing an autobiography. Randy L. Schmidt intends tofill the space with Judy Garland on Judy Garland: Interviews and Encounters(published by Chicago Review Press). The collection spans interviews conductedin the early months of her contract with MGM (1935) through the final monthsbefore her death (1969). For those who want Garland’s voice—as it was heard offthe soundstage or the concert stage—this book is as good as it will get.
Garland had been calledthe greatest creation and greatest tragedy of the old Hollywood studio system.She was a child star whose natural radiance MGM nurtured to a luminous glow infilms such as The Wizard of Oz (1939). The studio, which operated like anautonomous country, had its own medical department that hooked Garland on pillsfor maintaining her ability to perform. When she began drinking, troubleensued. After several career and ups and downs, Garland died of an accidentaloverdose.
And so an aura ofsadness and frustration clings to Interviews and Encounters. The earliestmaterial in the anthology was produced under MGM’s censorship and conveys the studio’scarefully crafted image of its child star as much as the star herself. Onewonders if there was much difference between image and reality for a girl “bornin a trunk” (as she sang in A Star is Born) and reared in a fantasy factory.Garland’s interviews after leaving the studio are unfiltered, the words of awoman with a hard time imagining life without an audience and the anxiety of aperformance. She summed it up well to one reporter: “In my business every nightis opening night,” she said.
