Judy and I: My Life with Judy Garland

by Sid Luft, Randy L. Schmidt (Foreword by)

Overview

The third of Judy Garland's five husbands, Sid Luft was the one man in her life who stuck around. He was chiefly responsible for the final act of Judy’s meteoric comeback after she was unceremoniously booted off the MGM lot: he produced her iconic, Oscar-nominated vehicle A Star Is Born and expertly shaped her concert career.
 
Previously unpublished, Sid Luft’s intimate autobiography tells his and Judy’s story in hard-boiled yet elegant prose. It begins on a fateful night in New York City when the not quite divorced Judy Garland and the not quite divorced Sid Luft meet at Billy Reed’s Little Club and fall for each other.
 
The romance lasted Judy’s lifetime, despite the separations, the reconciliations, and the divorce. Under Luft’s management, Judy came back bigger than ever, building a singing career that rivaled Sinatra’s. However, her drug dependencies and suicidal tendencies put a tremendous strain on the relationship.
 
Sid did not complete his memoir; it ended in 1960 after Judy hired David Begelman and Freddie Fields to manage her career. But Randy L. Schmidt, acclaimed editor of Judy Garland on Judy Garland and author of Little Girl Blue: The Life of Karen Carpenter, seamlessly pieced together the final section of the book from extensive interviews with Sid, most previously unpublished.
 
Despite everything, Sid never stopped loving Judy and never forgave himself for not being able to ultimately save her from the demons that drove her to an early death at age forty-seven in 1969. Sid served as chief conservator of the Garland legacy until his death at the age of eighty-nine in 2005. This is his testament to the love of his life.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781613735831
Publisher:	Chicago Review Press, Incorporated
Publication date:	03/01/2017
Pages:	480
Product dimensions:	6.20(w) x 8.40(h) x 1.50(d)

About the Author

Sid Luft (1915–2005) was an amateur boxer, test pilot, Hollywood producer, and impresario. He was married to Judy Garland from 1952 to 1965. Randy L. Schmidt edited Judy Garland on Judy Garland and wrote Little Girl Blue: The Life of Karen Carpenter. He lives in Denton, Texas.

Table of Contents

Foreword Randy L. Schmidt vii

Part I Manhattan, 1950 1

Part II The Boy from Bronxville 31

Part III Lost in the Stars 87

Part IV The Black Irish Witch 155

Part V On and Off the Road 375

Part VI Leopold and Loeb 393

Part VII End of the Rainbow 431

Index 451

Editorial Reviews

"More than the love of his life, Judy Garland was Sid Luft's passion, and their tempestuous relationship was one of the great untold stories of the twentieth century. Garland left him, returned, and left him again, but Luft thought of Garland every day from when they met until the day he died, and it shows in this riveting page-turner of a memoir." —Lawrence Schulman, music producer, critic, and translator


"Sid Luft's long-awaited autobiography is finally here and doesn't disappoint. Judy Garland fans and fans of Hollywood's Golden Age will enjoy Luft's honesty and insight from his very unique vantage point. A definite must-read!" —Scott Brogan, founder and webmaster of TheJudyRoom.com


“Luft writes with neither sensation nor sentiment. Much like himself, his writing is masculine and unflinching. Imagine Hemingway writing about the girl from Oz. It makes for a pretty fascinating book.” —The Bay Area Reporter



“Garland fanatics will gobble up [Luft’s] detailed, insightful backstage accounts of Garland's classic late productions and gossipy tidbits about their social circle.” —Kirkus Reviews


“In prose so brassy that it bruises the sensibilities, Luft, who died in 2005, illuminates the dark side of life in the spotlight and dispels any sentimental illusions about the glories of show business in Hollywood’s classic age.” —The New Yorker


"A rare glimpse into old Hollywood that you don't get to see these days..." —Red Carpet Crash

From the Publisher

2017-02-06
Hollywood producer Luft reflects on his relationship with show business legend Judy Garland, whom he married (and managed) during the final great phase of her performing career.The author, who died in 2005, had a reputation as a controlling Svengali, but he comes across here as concerned, pragmatic, and, more often than not, right about Garland's professional trajectory. Luft was instrumental in the production of her critically heralded film comeback, A Star Is Born (1954), and he orchestrated her triumphant performances at the London Palladium and Broadway's Palace Theatre, epochal shows that cemented her late-period legacy and led to the creation of her own TV series. Throughout, Luft credits Garland's genius and gallantly excuses her erratic behavior, drug dependency, and financial recklessness as the inevitable results of a lifetime of exploitation at the hands of Hollywood. More interestingly, he candidly expresses his physical attraction to Garland and appreciation of her unconventional sexual appeal—his ardor reads as completely sincere—and expresses concern about the consequences of his laissez faire disposition toward Garland's peccadilloes. Luft's memoir was written in fits and starts over a period of many years and completed after his death with the aid of interview transcripts and other scattered sources, and the narrative frequently feels choppy, with strangely abrupt transitions. Still, Luft, a former boxer and test pilot, has a winningly direct and confident authorial voice. A Hemingway-esque man's man, he doesn't delve too deeply into psychology, but Garland fanatics will gobble up his detailed, insightful backstage accounts of Garland's classic late productions and gossipy tidbits about their social circle, which included Humphrey Bogart and the Prince of Wales. The story ends darkly, as Garland falls under the sway of agents Freddie Fields and David Begelman, who, according to Luft, ruthlessly manipulated Garland into excising him from her career and personal life. On the evidence here, that was a terrible mistake. A revealing look behind the curtain—if not the persona—from the man who helped Garland reclaim the limelight after Hollywood let her down.

Kirkus Reviews