Judy Garland in Annie Get Your Gun

Do any of you think that she would've been great as Annie Oakley? Even though Betty Hutton was energetic and funny in the final film, I believe that Judy would've made another great role for her to play if the sad circumstances never happened to her during that time.

The footage they shot shows me she would not have been great as Annie Oakley, at least not at that point in her life.

Ten years earlier, maybe, if her heart was in it, which it definitely was NOT when they fired her from the film. You can see it the takes. She looks bored, disconnected, she has lost all sense of comic timing, even her singing isn't good.

---

All you have to do is watch Betty Hutton in the movie and you get how it makes all the difference in the world to have someone with "wattage" in that part.

And it's even more remarkable when you realize that Hutton was given the big cold shoulder by Howard Keel and everyone else at MGM. Hutton was "borrowed" from Paramount at a HUGE expense to step in for Garland. And they all treated her like crap because they were Garland supporters.

That had nothing to do with Betty Hutton. She was just doing her job (incredibly well). And to think she gives such a joyful, focused, and nuanced performance in that movie, knowing she was completely miserable every single day she showed up on the set ... it makes Hutton all the more wonderful in the role.

---

The reports of her ill health are, as always exaggerated.

Garland would have been brilliant if MGM had fired the sadistic hack choreographer Busby Berkeley a few weeks sooner. Hell, he should have been fired a few YEARS sooner.

Berkeley was an asshOle to her, making her life hell all over again, as he had done 10 years earlier, when he was choreographing the numbers in the Andy Hardy and "Babes in Arms/on Broadway" musicals she did with Mickey Rooney.

By the end of the 1940s, Berkeley was a washed-up, sadistic (did I say that already?), one-trick pony whose kaleidoscopic choreography was outdated and Garland knew it. She wanted him replaced with her good friend, the young and talented Chuck Walters--and she let everyone know.

In return Berkeley declared war on Garland, berating and humiliating her as he had done in the 1930s. It worked. She started taking more uppers to wake up and downers to sleep, which resulted in showing up late or not at all.

In the end, both lost. Both were fired.

But just listen to her recording of "You Can't Get a Man With a Gun" (audio only) here. She would have been PERFECT:

http://gamerchick02.tumblr.com/post/17579312200/i-listened-to-judys-version-of-this-posted-here

---

The cast and crew were furious that Garland had been fired and treated Betty Hutton badly.

---

She most certainly would have been better than Betty Hutton. Hutton was a professional victim all her life, constantly complaining about her ungrateful children. I could never stand her. And she was terrible in Annie (when she replaced the irreplaceable Dotty Loudon).

She never lost her "sense of comic timing." That's the kind of mindlessly repeated "Poor Judy" drivel that gets on my tits.

Even in her worst shape, her "sense of comic timing" was flawless.

---

Busby Berkeley was sinking the film.

---

In her autobiography Merman claims that MGM hoped Judy woudl take over the role of Annie on Broadway while Merman was on vacation, as a kind of warm up for the film. I don't doubt the idea was floated but it never happened. It's harsh to judge by the short segments filmed but Garland is on another planet in "I'm an Indian Too" and given her performance you can understand why she was fired from the film.

Her soundtrack pre-recordings give a better idea of what the film AGYG might have sounded like.

At Colony records years ago I found an odd bootleg LP of Garland's tracks... done up to LOOK like an MGM soundtrack release (even copying the yellow label and the style of the the MGM soundtrack album liner notes.)

---

Betty was good, but no one can top Garland. I'm not very familiar with the backstory, but judging from that recording she would've been fabulous in the role with the right support.

I'm surprised that a choreographer could have that kind of power over over such a legendary icon.

I'm sure she would have made a perfect Annie Oakley with the right director and more support from the studio.

Her They Say It's Wonderful with Howard Keel is simply beautiful. I would have loved to hear her sing Anything You Can Do.