Welcome to our collection of quotes by Judy Garland. We hope you enjoy pondering them and please share widely.
Wikipedia Summary for Judy Garland
Frances Ethel Gumm (June 10, 1922 – June 22, 1969), after 1934 known by her stage name Judy Garland, was an American actress, singer, dancer, vaudevillian and television and radio presenter. She is widely known for playing the role of Dorothy Gale in The Wizard of Oz (1939). With a career spanning 45 years, she attained international stardom as an actress in both musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist, and on the concert stage. Renowned for her versatility, she received an Academy Juvenile Award, a Golden Globe Award, and a Special Tony Award. Garland was the first woman to win the Grammy Award for Album of the Year, which she won for her 1961 live recording titled Judy at Carnegie Hall.
Garland began performing in vaudeville as a child with her two older sisters, in a vaudeville group "The Gumm Sisters" and was later signed to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer as a teenager. She appeared in more than two dozen films for MGM. Garland was a frequent on-screen partner of both Mickey Rooney and Gene Kelly and regularly collaborated with director and second husband Vincente Minnelli. Other starring roles during this period included Meet Me in St. Louis (1944), The Harvey Girls (1946), Easter Parade (1948), and Summer Stock (1950). In 1950, after 15 years with MGM, the studio released her amid a series of personal struggles that prevented her from fulfilling the terms of her contract.
Although her film career became intermittent thereafter, two of Garland's most critically acclaimed roles came later in her career: she received a nomination for the Academy Award for Best Actress for her performance in A Star Is Born (1954) and a nomination for Best Supporting Actress for her performance in Judgment at Nuremberg (1961). She also made record-breaking concert appearances, released eight studio albums, and hosted her own Emmy-nominated television series, The Judy Garland Show (1963–1964). At age 39, Garland became the youngest and first female recipient of the Cecil B. DeMille Award for lifetime achievement in the film industry. In 1997, Garland was posthumously awarded the Grammy Lifetime Achievement Award. Several of her recordings have been inducted into the Grammy Hall of Fame, and in 1999, the American Film Institute ranked her as the eighth-greatest female screen legend of classic Hollywood cinema.
Garland struggled in her personal life from an early age. The pressures of early stardom affected her physical and mental health from the time she was a teenager; her self-image was influenced by constant criticism from film executives who believed that she was physically unattractive and who manipulated her onscreen physical appearance. Throughout her adulthood she was plagued by alcohol and substance use disorders, as well as financial instability, often owing hundreds of thousands of dollars in back taxes. Her lifelong substance use disorder ultimately led to her death in London from an accidental barbiturate overdose at age 47 in 1969.
Always be a first rate version of yourself and not a second rate version of someone else.
For it was not into my ear you whispered, but into my heart. It was not my lips that you kissed, but my soul.
Always be a first-rate version of yourself and not a second-rate version of someone else.
Always be a first rate version of yourself instead of a second rate version of somebody else.
For it was not into my ear you whispered but into my heart. It was not my lips you kissed but my soul.
Always be a first rate version of yourself, instead of a second rate version of somebody else.
Always be a first-rate version of yourself instead of a second-rate version of someone else.
If you're ever in a jam, here I am
If you're ever in a mess, S-O-S
If you ever feel so happy, you land in jail, I'm your bail.
It's friendship, friendship, just a perfect blendship.
When other friendships have been forgot,
Ours will still be hot.
Wouldn't it be wonderful if we could all be a little more gentle with each other, and a little more loving, have a little more empathy, and maybe we'd like each other a little bit more.
The sound of applause is delicious
It's a thrill to have the world at your feet
The praise of the crowd, it's exciting
But I've learned that's not what makes a life complete.
I've been in love with audiences all my life, and I've tried to please. I hope I did.
My life, my career has been like a roller coaster. I've either been an enormous success or just a down-and-out failure.
The greatest treasures are those invisible to the eye but found by the heart.
You shouldn't be told you're completely irresponsible and be left alone with too much medication. It's too easy to forget. You take a couple of sleeping pills and you wake up in twenty minutes and forget you've taken them. So you take a couple more, and the next thing you know you've taken too many.
When I die I have visions of fags singing 'Over the Rainbow' and the flag at Fire Island being flown at half mast.
I truly have a great love for an audience, and I used to want to prove it to them by giving them blood.
If I'm such a legend, then why am I so lonely? If I'm such a legend, then why do I sit at home for hours staring at the damned telephone, hoping it's out of order, even calling the operator asking her if she's sure it's not out of order?
Hollywood is a strange place if you're in trouble. Everybody thinks it's contagious.
I'm a woman who wants to reach out and take 40 million people in her arms.
People en masse have always been wonderful to me. I truly have a great love for an audience...I want to give them two hours of just pow.
My father's death was the most terrible thing that happened to me in my life.
As for my feelings toward Over the Rainbow, it's become part of my life. It is so symbolic of all dreams and wishes that I'm sure that's why people sometimes get tears in their eyes when they hear it.
From the time I was thirteen, there was a constant struggle between MGM and me -- whether or not to eat, how much to eat, what to eat. I remember this more vividly than anything else about my childhood.
There have been a lot of stories written about me, some of them fantastically distorted.
Well, we have a whole new year ahead of us. And wouldn't it be wonderful if we could all be a little more gentle with each other, a little more loving, and have a little more empathy, and maybe, next year at this time we'd like each other a little more.
Soon the sun beams will smile through. Before you jump out of that bed, just know, the thought of you was the first thing that hit my head. Good morning my darling.
Somewhere over the rainbow, skies are blue, and the dreams that you dare to dream really do come true.
Be a first rate version of yourself, not a second rate version of someone else.
If I'm such a legend, then why am I so lonely? Let me tell you, legends are all very well if you've got somebody around who loves you.
I've seen the ticket, and I still can't believe it. When I see the money, I hope I don't hit the floor.
You are never so alone as when you are ill on stage. The most nightmarish feeling in the world is suddenly to feel like throwing up in front of four thousand people.
I wasn't close to my father, but I wanted to be all my life. He had a funny sense of humor, and he laughed all the time -- good and loud, like I do. He was a gay Irish gentleman and very good-looking. And he wanted to be close to me, too, but we never had much time together.
I believe that the real expression of your religious beliefs is shown in the daily pattern of your life, in what you contribute to your surroundings and what you take away without infringing on the rights of other people.
I was always lonesome. The only time I felt accepted or wanted was when I was on stage performing. I guess the stage was my only friend: the only place where I could feel comfortable. It was the only place where I felt equal and safe.
A really great reception makes me feel like I have a great big warm heating pad all over me. People en masse have always been wonderful to me. I truly have a great love for an audience, and I used to want to prove it to them by giving them blood.
I don't always have to sing a song. There is something besides 'The Man That Got Away' or 'Over the Rainbow' or 'The Trolley Song.' There's a woman. There are three children. There's me! There's a lot of life going here.
I think that I have every right to write a book. I think I'm interesting. I have perspective about me.
I think there's something peculiar about me that I haven't died. It doesn't make sense but I refuse to die.
I've never looked through a keyhole without finding someone was looking back.
We cast away priceless time in dreams, born of imagination, fed upon illusion, and put to death by reality.
In the silence of night I have often wished for just a few words of love from one man, rather than the applause of thousands of people.
How strange when an illusion dies. It's as though you've lost a child.
Always be a first-rate version of yourself, instead of a second-rate version of somebody else.
There have been times when I have deliberately tried to take my life... I think I must have been crying for some attention.
I try to bring the audience's own drama -- tears and laughter they know about -- to them.
When you get to know a lot of people, you make a great discovery. You find that no one group has a monopoly on looks, brains, goodness or anything else. It takes all the people -- black and white, Catholic, Jewish and Protestant, recent immigrants and Mayflower descendants -- to make up America.
I've always taken 'The Wizard of Oz' very seriously, you know. I believe in the idea of the rainbow. And I've spent my entire life trying to get over it.
For it was not into my ear you whispered, but into my heart. It was not my lips you kissed, but my soul.