Liza Minnelli blasted Gene Hackman more than one year after his death.
In the “Cabaret” star’s new memoir, “Kids, Wait Till You Hear This!,” she recalled Hackman’s “downright rude” behavior while they were filming the 1975 movie “Lucky Lady.”
“I don’t like to whine, but Stanley [Donen] later shared publicly that Gene was very dismissive of me during the film,” Minnelli, 75, writes.
Liza Minnelli (seen above in a blue outfit) blasted “downright rude” Gene Hackman more than one year after his death. Corbis via Getty Images
In her new memoir “Kids, Wait Till You Hear This!” (shown above), the “Cabaret” star recalled Hackman’s behavior while they were filming the 1975 movie “Lucky Lady.”
“It’s hard to go to work when the chemistry is absent,” she adds. “I think it’s fair to say that Gene was downright rude.”
In “Lucky Lady,” Minnelli starred as Claire, a widow who begins smuggling alcohol with her lover, Walker (portrayed by Burt Reynolds), and his friend, Kibby (played by Hackman), during the Prohibition era.
The trio gets into a messy love triangle as they try to avoid jail for their crimes.
The film, directed by Donen, flopped at the box office and received negative reviews from critics.
Roger Ebert gave the comedy-drama two stars out of four, calling it “a big, expensive, good-looking flop of a movie; rarely is so much effort expended on a movie so inconsequential.”
“I don’t like to whine, but Stanley [Donen] later shared publicly that Gene was very dismissive of me during the film,” Minnelli (seen above with Hackman in “Lucky Lady”) writes. ©20thCentFox/Courtesy Everett Collection
Minnelli (seen above dancing with Hackman) said the “chemistry [was] absent” with the Oscar winner. AP
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Elsewhere in the memoir, Minnelli revealed that while she was married to producer Jack Haley Jr., she had an affair with Martin Scorsese.
The “New York, New York” star also disclosed that she was engaged to two men at the same time, all while being married to her first husband, Australian entertainer Peter Allen. Minnelli later found Allen having “passionate sex” with a man.
Minnelli’s revelation about Hackman comes more than a year after he died on Feb. 18, six days after his wife, Betsy Arakawa, passed away. The Oscar winner was 95, and the classical pianist was 65.
Hackman (seen above with his wife in 1996) and his wife Betsy Arakawa’s bodies were found in their home in February 2025. Getty Images
The “Unforgiven” actor (seen above with Arakawa in 2001) died six days after his wife passed away. GC Images
Officials believe the “French Connection” star had been unknowingly living with his wife’s dead body for days.
Hackman died of hypertensive and atherosclerotic cardiovascular disease, with “advanced Alzheimer’s disease” being a contributing factor, while Arakawa’s death was caused by hantavirus pulmonary syndrome, a rare rodent-transmitted virus.
The couple’s partially mummified bodies were discovered inside their cluttered home on February 25, 2025.