Judy Garland trip to Hong Kong, when she went into a coma, the spark for new play about troubled star’s visit and her life
Candice Moore stars as the American singer and actress in a play premiering at the Hong Kong Fringe Club about 1964 visit, in which she met Australian Peter Allen, who was to marry her daughter Liza Minnelli, and was rushed to hospital
On June 22 next year it will be half a century since Judy Garland died in London, aged 47, of a prescription drug overdose. But she nearly checked out the same way five years earlier in Hong Kong.
This dramatic episode in Garland’s life inspired actor and singer Michael Sharmon to write a play, Lions, Typhoons and Judy, Oh My!, which runs from June 27 to 30 at the Hong Kong Fringe Club Underground Theatre, starring Candice Moore as Garland.
The show is based on Garland’s May 1964 visit to Hong Kong, during which the troubled star, fleeing from a hostile press response to a disastrous tour of Australia, checked into the then newly opened Mandarin Oriental Hotel. In the midst of Typhoon Viola she was rushed to Canossa Hospital in Mid-Levels, where she spent 15 hours in a coma.
Thanks to some misinformation from a nurse she was wrongly reported to have died. In fact, Garland recovered and stayed in Hong Kong to recuperate.
During the trip she and her soon-to-be fourth husband Mark Herron discovered a talented young Australian singer called Peter Allen who was working at the Hilton. He went on to enjoy a successful international career, and became the first husband of Garland’s daughter Liza Minnelli. He died from an Aids-related illness in 1992, aged 48, by which time he was also a well-known songwriter.
