Liza Minnelli is baring all in her gossip-filled memoir, Kids, Wait Till You Hear This!
The 79-year-old Oscar winner shares details about her time working with Gene Hackman, and her drug-fueled affair with director Martin Scorsese, which ultimately led to the end of both their marriages.
Affair with Scorsese
Minnelli and Scorsese’s “passionate romance” started during the filming of their 1977 musical drama New York, New York.
She added that the romance had “more layers than a lasagne” as they “couldn’t get enough of each other.” Not only that, but it “was the worst-kept secret on the set.”
However, Minnelli had a reason for the affair.
She wrote, “I got lost in amour fou, the French term for a passionate relationship that becomes a self-destructive obsession. The relationship becomes a powerful, hypnotic drug in every way.”
Drug-Filled Love
Their romance wasn’t the only thing that was a drug. The pair also partook in cocaine while filming the musical, both on- and off-set. However, one of them delved into the drugs a little more than the other.
“Marty became a heavier and heavier user of cocaine,” she revealed. “It seemed that it was no longer recreational for either of us. It was day and night. On the set, in between takes, and when we went out in the evening. We were constant companions, and I was right there beside him. Line by line.”
She added, “Marty claimed the drug helped his creative juices. Sure it did. Or is that just one more fabulous lie you tell yourself when you’re in the grip of substance abuse?”
Unfortunately for the pair, New York, New York flopped both critically and commercially, and only recouped $16.4 million on its increased budget of $9 million.
The most interesting part of the affair was that both Scorsese and Minnelli were married at the time. Scorsese was married to writer Julia Cameron, who divorced him that year. Minnelli was married to Jack Haley Jr.
“We were on a runaway train,” Minnelli admitted. “Nothing good could come of it.”
Eventual Breakup
The affair continued after New York, New York’s release.
Minnelli insisted that Scorsese direct her next Broadway project, The Act, even though he had limited live theater experience. However, when Scorsese demanded his own theater dressing room, Minnelli knew she would have to fire Scorsese.
“It damn near killed me and broke my heart,” she wrote.
While the toxic affair eventually ended, the bad feelings were still there and lingered for decades. Minnelli described a run-in with Scorsese later in Greenwich Village, where Scorsese publicly berated her.
He knew she was having another affair when Russian dancer Mikhail Baryshnikov and Scorsese outed her in front of her husband.
He screamed, “How can you do this to me?” over and over to her.
Minnelli shared, “Jack and I quickly walked away, trying to laugh it off. It would be impossible to forget. Marty was incensed. I’d been outed. Mikhail got caught up in a messy situation. And Jack now had a good reason for us to part.” The pair divorced two years later, in 1979.
While many years have passed since the affair and the fallout, there is still some tension between the former lovers. Almost 40 years later, Minnelli bumped into Scorsese backstage at the Academy Awards. However, the meeting was less than ideal.
“Not all of the bad feelings have healed,” she wrote. “Years later, I saw Marty at the Oscars ceremony in 2014 and walked up to say hello. Unfortunately, he turned away from me. Very sad.”
Experiences with Gene Hackman
Minnelli’s alleged affair wasn’t the only topic discussed in her memoir.
Within the same pages, Liza Minnelli claimed that Gene Hackman was rude and “very dismissive” of her on the set of the 1975 film Lucky Lady.
She wrote, “I don’t like to whine, but [director] [Stanley Donen] later shared publicly that Gene was very dismissive of me during the film. It’s hard to go to work when the chemistry is absent. I think it’s fair to say that Gene was downright rude.”