Judy Garland

Margaret O'Brien shares her recollections of working with Judy Garland and Vincente Minnelli—and why she thinks the film's charm endures.

“At Christmastime I always do think of what it was like to make the movie,” she says. She also had particular fun playing a character so unlike the self-described “easy” and “quiet” and well-behaved child. “He was such a wonderful director, and he was so perfect for that movie because he was a Victorian historian. “The dancing was very easy for me, but I was very nervous about singing the song with Judy,” O’Brien says. “I was a very inquisitive child, so I wanted to know a lot about it,” she says. I think of those people at Christmastime.” “A lot of people [think of her as a very sad person,](https://time.com/5684673/judy-garland-movie-true-story/) but Judy was not that way in person. “Of course, they were going to give me the money,” O’Brien says. “She was feisty and very pretty, so Mr. “They had too much invested in me at the time. When her mother, flamenco dancer Gladys Flores, learned that her daughter was to be paid less than the $5,000 a week that her co-stars would be earning, she walked into MGM studio head Louis B. These triumphs are creditable mainly to the intensity and grace of Margaret O’Brien and to the ability of director Minnelli & Co.