Final Years
With the demise of her television series, Garland returned to the stage. Most notably, she performed at the London Palladium with her then 18-year-old daughter Liza Minnelli in November 1964. The concert, which was also filmed for British television network ITV, was one of her final appearances at the venue. She made guest appearances on The Ed Sullivan Show and The Tonight Show. Garland guest-hosted an episode of The Hollywood Palace with Vic Damone. She was invited back for a second episode in 1966 with Van Johnson as her guest. Issues with Garland's behavior ended her Hollywood Palace guest appearances.
A 1964 tour of Australia was largely disastrous. Garland's first concert in Sydney, held in the Sydney Stadium because no concert hall could accommodate the crowds who wanted to see her, went well and received positive reviews. Her second performance, in Melbourne, started an hour late. The crowd of 7,000, angered by her tardiness and believing her to be drunk, booed and heckled her, and she fled the stage after just 45 minutes. She later characterized the Melbourne crowd as "brutish." A second concert in Sydney was uneventful but the Melbourne appearance garnered her significant bad press. Some of that bad press was deflected by the announcement of a near fatal episode of pleurisy.
In February 1967, Garland was cast as Helen Lawson in Valley of the Dolls for 20th Century Fox. During the filming, she missed rehearsals and was fired in April, replaced by Susan Hayward. Her prerecording of the song "I'll Plant My Own Tree" survived, along with her wardrobe tests.
Returning to the stage, Garland made her last appearances at New York's Palace Theatre in July, a 16-show stand, performing with her children Lorna and Joey Luft. She wore a sequined pantsuit on stage for this tour, which was part of the original wardrobe for her character in Valley of the Dolls.
By early 1969, Garland's health had deteriorated. She performed in London at the Talk of the Town nightclub for a five-week run and made her last concert appearance in Copenhagen during March 1969.
Read more about this topic: Judy Garland
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