Minnelli's 'Liza with a Z' to Air on Showtime on April 1
By: BWW News Desk Jan. 26, 2006
Fully restored and digitally remastered, the 1972 concert will feature Minnelli performing trademark numbers such as "Ring Them Bells," the title song and several songs from Cabaret as well as standards like "Bye, Bye Blackbird," "Mammy," and "Son of a Preacher Man." "Liza with a Z" netted Emmy Awards for Minnelli (for Best Performance), Bob Fosse (Best Direction and Best Choreography), John Kander and Fred Ebb (Best Music, Lyrics and Special Material) and Outstanding Single Program--Variety and Popular Music. The concert, which was filmed live at the Lyceum Theatre, also won the coveted Peabody Award.
"Liza with a Z" has not been seen on TV since a re-airing in September of 1973. Producers Neil Meron and Craig Zadan (the Chicago film, TV musicals of "Annie," "The Music Man"), as well as Minnelli herself, are responsible for the Showtime deal.
The concert was missing for several years in the mid-1980s after the film was stored in NBC's vaults; it was thought by some to have been destroyed. Negatives were finally found in New York and Los Angeles, and talk of restoration began in the late '90s. The restored print that will be aired on Showtime will be accompanied by a re-recorded soundtrack: "the film's original soundtrack had been... re-recorded as a 16mm mono track negative, which is decidedly Lo-Fi by today's standards. Surprisingly, no master mix source survived for the show itself, although a soundtrack album with subtle differences was released in 1972," wrote restorer Michael Arlick in production notes.
He was aided in the restoration by Minnelli, who had stored away all of the concert's sound rolls. He noted that due to Fosse's painstaking attention to the concert's sound, nothing was missing. "And best of all, Phil Ramone had recorded most of the musical program that evening in a multi-track format. So while the show was never designed for a stereo presentation, a full Dolby 5.1 mix was suddenly possible."
Videos