The Hollywood abuse of Judy Garland
Reported by Erin Elizabeth Health Nut News:
Judy Garland's Wizard of Oz screen test, 1938. Garland was merely 16 years old when she started filming the Wizard of Oz. On set, as legend has it, she was shunned by better known older actors like Scarecrow, Tinman and the Cowardly Lion. This teen was relatively unknown and they were hoping for a Shirley Temple and were worried she could make the whole thing flop. It is said that her only friend was Margaret Hamilton who played the Wicked Witch of the West. Garland was also placed on a strict diet which consisted of chicken soup, coffee and at least 80 cigarettes a day. They thought smoking would keep her thin. And don’t forget the pills. Lots of pills. Rumor has it that the director even slapped her once when she was giggling during a scene. She then became reliant on amphetamines in her late teens and at 19 she collapsed from exhaustion. Instead of being told to rest, or help her get off these drugs, doctors prescribed her even more. There were no kids’ rights and she worked the hours they told her to. The studio wanted a hit and if it involved child abuse, then so be it. Legend says they almost cut one song from the film that they didn’t like “somewhere over the rainbow”. Which thankfully they decided to keep after all. You have to wonder what else they did to a 16-year-old girl on that set. Another past down tidbit was that at least one munchkin tried to look and get up her dress. Around the same time, my grandmother was about her age living in Manhattan and her father died and they put her to work at 16 full-time nonstop double shifts. No high school graduation. That’s how it was for kids then. Not everybody got an award. It was seldom anyone did it all. Because of what Hollywood did to Judy, she became addicted to those pills and lifestyle and died at barely 47 years old. Barbiturate overdose. So many children are a product of this today and we don’t have to look far to see many child stars who have ended up like Judy. I started as a young reporter in Los Angeles for 10 years and saw it all too frequently . And if you dared to uncover the incredible abuse and illegal activity going on, they wouldn’t mess around. They would try to take you down. But now Hollywood is crumbling, and the script is falling apart. And same goes for Washington. This is a time you want to keep your eyes wide open, and not eyes wide shut , another film we can discuss next time, as I watched that one being made, as it’s good versus evil right now. And we cannot let Evil win.
And we shouldn’t leave out her mother who forced Judy to perform even when she was very ill. Her mother was a vaudeville act and lived vicariously through her daughter. I have no idea how I’m writing this before. It’s even light out, but it just needed to be said this morning.
Her own mother was pretty bad. She was a vaudeville actress and lived vicariously through Judy and made her work when she was very sick. She was a stage mother and one of the worst.
The Wizard of Oz (1939)