The Story of Heartbreaker

Judy Garland and John

What she meant was, Take me the hell out of this claustrophobic hellhole. She'd been living free in Richard's Carnegie Hall studio, but had to endure a kind of smothering attention from Richard and his gay friends that was rapidly becoming unbearable.

"I mean really," she remarked later, "it's like being in the beige hole of Calcutta." So I took her out of there. I'd come down simply to sing a song for Judy, a song I'd composed called "I'd Like to Hate Myself in the Morning (and Raise a little Hell Tonight)" and she -with her marvelous sense of humor- had embraced the number instantly. In fact, she insisted on learning it the next afternoon, in my parent's apartment. You see, I spirited her away from Richard and took her to live with me.

John and Judy

And, incidentally, with my mother and father.

You see, I couldn't very well ask them to leave, it was their apartment, a big floor-through at 993 Park Avenue in New York City. I'd recently moved back, having lost my own place to Lefrak Realty Development. If it sounds like I was a New Yorker, I was. It stood me in good stead with Judy, who was as sharp, urbane and knowledgeable as they come. It also helped that I knew much of her repertoire, since I had to play for her the very next night.

Judy Garland with John signing autographs

Play for her? Would you believe I got Judy Garland one hundred dollars to appear at the little club where I entertained? And she was glad to get it. She had a five dollar bill in her purse and was in debt to the IRS for over three hundred thousand dollars. They snatched any income she earned. With this little job she'd get paid under the table, so that's a hundred free and clear. So that afternoon, October 26th, 1968, we had to put together a few numbers. I turned on the tape recorder, as I often did when coaching, and by God, thirty-seven years later, I still have the tape. A CD of it is tucked into the back of Heartbreaker, my memoir of the two months I spent with Judy.

That was the beginning. People had told me Judy was 'all washed up' that her voice was 'shot'. I refer you to this CD. I refer you to the recollection of people who saw her at the Lincoln Center tribute to Harold Arlen just three weeks later. Earl Wilson's column in the Post the next day describes her as "in good voice, confident and self assured".

Judy started to climb back up.

We started the climb back up. I booked her on three network TV shows, Dick Cavett, Merv Griffin and Johnny Carson. I brought in an accountant to sort out her taxes and allow the IRS to let her keep a percentage of what she earned. I arranged a contract with a new record company after all the other companies had given up on her. I got her agent, Begelman, to promise a cash advance once she'd signed for a concert date. And from the initial hundred-a-night I upped the ante to seventy-five hundred a week by negotiating a nightclub appearance at London's Talk of the Town. I also made sure she looked after her health. Against her violent objections, I had a doctor admit her to the hospital to give an ugly lesion on her heel a chance to mend.

But I'm not going to tell you the whole story right here. I want you to read it in Heartbreaker, in detail. I want you to see the pictures of me and Judy, of Judy and her shifty agent David Begelman, of my mom and dad. I want you to listen to the CD of that rehearsal we made together.

The whole package is absolutely fascinating, a window into Judy's persona that's unlike any other.

Here are some comments from readers of the first edition: