Judy Garland Biography

MARITAL STATUS
Profession Actress
Birth name France Gumm
American nationality
Birth June 10, 1922 (Grand Rapids, Minnesota – United States)
Died June 22, 1969 (Chelsea, London, England)
BIOGRAPHY
Daughter of music hall artists converted to operating a cinema, little Frances Ethel Gumm revealed her talents at the age of 2 during a Christmas show. She soon formed with her older sisters Mary Jane and Virginia the Gumm Sisters, a trio which multiplied the shows in California, where the family settled in 1926. It was also within the Gumm Sisters that she made her first appearance at the screen, in the short musical film The Big revue , in 1929.

Quickly becoming the main attraction of the group, the child prodigy chose the pseudonym Judy Garland. In 1935, Louis B. Mayer , amazed by his vocal performances, signed him to his first contract. MGM made her appear in the short film “Every Sunday” in 1936 alongside another budding actress, Deanne Durbin – which allowed the studio to compare their talent – and “loaned” her to Fox for the duration of the film. musical comedy The Bandstand . The same year, she recorded her first record – a contract with the Decca label followed in 1937. After a very notable performance at Clark Gable ‘s birthday , she played an admirer of the actor with a thin mustache in “Broadway Melody of 1938. Mickey Rooney ‘s stage

partner since 1933, she formed a popular tandem with him in several films (“Thoroughbreds don’t cry” in 1937 and later the “Andy Hardy” series). Propelled to the top of the bill by MGM (“Everybody sing”, “Listen, Darling”, released in 1938), she achieved consecration in 1939 with The Wizard of Oz by Victor Fleming, which earned her a ( very rare) Oscar for young talent. Red duvets and shoes, she perfectly embodies Dorothy, an orphan transported to a magical world. His interpretation of the song Over the rainbow will leave a lasting impression. The same year, the triumph of Place au Rhythm established his status as an early star. Establishing herself as the queen of the musical comedy which was then experiencing its golden age, Judy Garland shines in films choreographed by Busby Berkeley , such as Debut on Broadway , Girl Crazy or For Me and My Friend with Gene Kelly in 1942 The young woman continues filming at a steady pace, to which are added albums, concerts and other radio broadcasts. At the same time, an unhappy first marriage in 1941 marked the start of a troubled private life. Radiant in The Song of Missouri (1944), an enchanting family portrait, she married her director,

, who then directed her in “Ziegfeld Folies”, “L’Horloge” – in which she did not sing – and The Pirate (1948). During the filming of this last film, the actress, exhausted, fell ill. Before being fired by MGM in 1950, she still had the opportunity to dance alongside Fred Astaire ( Spring Parade ).

At the beginning of the 1950s, the career of Judy Garland, then married to a manager, continued on stage. In 1954, under contract with Warner, she made her return to cinema with A Star is Born by Cukor . The one who already has a star past portrays with disturbing grace an actress on the rise – the Oscar narrowly escapes her. Far from making a series of films, she devoted herself mainly to the music hall (her concert at Carnegie Hall in 1961 became legendary) and presented television shows. His latest films are characterized by their dramatic dimension: Judgment at Nuremberg (with a new Oscar nomination), Cassavetes’ Un Enfant Waits , or The Shadow of the Past (his last role in 1963), portrait of a star who sacrificed his personal life. If she continues to sing in front of won over fans, she struggles to find personal stability, between hospital stays and fleeting unions. At 47, she succumbed to a medication overdose. Having become an icon, Judy Garland, virtuoso artist and fragile woman, remains one of the most striking symbols of the ambivalence of the Hollywood star system.