Liza Minnelli does not approve of Renee Zellweger’s film about her mother Judy Garland
HOLLYWOOD, CA – MARCH 02: Actress Liza Minnelli attends the Oscars held at Hollywood & Highland Center on March 2, 2014 in Hollywood, California. (Photo by Jason Merritt/Getty Images)
Of all the gifts Judy Garland gave to the world, the greatest has to be her daughter Liza Minnelli, whose diva status is as iconic as her own.
And like all true divas, Minnelli isn’t making nice just for the sake of it – namely over Renee Zellweger playing Garland in an upcoming biopic.
Liza Minnelli has revealed that she did not approve the latest biopic on her mother Judy Garland (Roger Kisby/Getty)
Last week, Radar Online ran a story claiming that Minnelli, 72, and Zellweger, 49, were “bonding” and “taken a genuine liking to each other” during the making of the movie.
After keeping schtum on the matter, claims that she’d be friends with the Bridget Jones star appeared to be a step too far for Minnelli, who took to Facebook to denounce any bond on June 14.
She wrote: “I have never met nor spoken to Renee Zellweger…
“I don’t know how these stories get started, but I do not approve nor sanction the upcoming film about Judy Garland in any way.
“Any reports to the contrary are 100% Fiction.”
The icon also denied reports that she has ever met or spoken to Renee Zellweger (pictured playing Judy) after it was claimed they had bonded (Twitter)
The film is bound to hit a nerve with Minnelli, with it being set in 1968, the year before her mother died.
The focus is Garland playing a string of sellout shows in London, as she deals with fighting with her management, going through a divorce and coping with her longterm drug addiction.
The Tudors star Gemma-Leah Devereux plays Minnelli in the film.
Garland was just 47 when she died in June 1969 at a rented home in Chelsea following a barbiturate overdose.
Minnelli, pictured with her mother in the early 1960S, has never approved any biopic about Garland (Hulton Archive/Getty)
The film’s official synopsis reads: “Winter 1968 and showbiz legend Judy Garland arrives in Swinging London to perform in a sell-out run at The Talk of the Town. It is 30 years since she shot to global stardom in ‘The Wizard of Oz,’ but if her voice has weakened, its dramatic intensity has only grown. As she prepares for the show, battles with management, charms musicians, and reminisces with friends and adoring fans, her wit and warmth shine through.”
While Minnelli worked with her mother on The Judy Garland Show, she has never collaborated on anything else that has been made about her life.
Her half-sister Lorna Luft wrote a memoir, Me and My Shadows: A Family Memoir, which was later made into a miniseries, in which Minnelli was played by Marie Ward.
