The multi-talented Liza Minnelli is having a birthday today.  She was born on this day in 1946, the daughter of genuine Hollywood royalty: her father was Vincent Minnelli, Academy Award-winning director (for Gigi), her mother Judy Garland, undoubtedly one of the most beloved performers ever to have appeared in any medium.  With a family tree like that one, it's no wonder that Liza has been a first class and tireless entertainer ever since her initial screen appearance – at fourteen month of age – in her mother’s In The Good Old Summertime.

A true child of show business, Liza Minnelli enjoyed not only the perks of the position — long days playing on the MGM soundstages while her parents created Hollywood magic — but also the pitfalls — broken marriages (her parents and a few of her own), career ups and downs, and a life lived in the spotlight.  While good genes can no doubt help explain some of Liza’s natural talents, she took those innate bequests and honed them into a package that continues to dazzle her long-time admirers and win over new ones.

I can personally admit that seeing Liza onscreen in Cabaret (1972) was a revelation to me.  The combination of the brilliant score, Bob Fosse’s edgy and imaginative direction, a depraved and decadent setting, and a collection of amusing, moving and honest performances made Cabaret one of those movies that I saw again and again and again at the theater.  I listened to the album incessantly, and I’m sure I’m not the only one who knows the whole movie practically by heart.  I hadn’t seen it for a long time when I caught it on TCM a while back, and it was as if I had seen it just yesterday.

Liza is tremendous as Sally Bowles, the kind of bravura performance that seldom comes along and when it does, you know you’ve seen something special that you will keep with you, forever.  Despite a life since then filled with more than her share of personal turmoil, never has Liza let her public down, nor given any less than everything she had to give onstage or onscreen.  It was good to see her doing a fair bit of knockabout comedy on TV’s Arrested Development a season or two ago, and reports are that her new show about songstress/author Kay Thompson (her godmother) is wonderful.  Good news for those of you out there who’ll be able to see her doing it! 

Taken in the early 1950s, the picture of Liza Minnelli which appears here is of a very young Liza giving a kiss to her devoted mother Judy Garland.  Liza would have been perhaps four or so at the time.  Judy and Vincent Minnelli divorced in 1951, and Judy married Sid Luft the next year. 

There’s an attractive website devoted to Liza, do check it out!