A friend of Liza Minnelli recalls asking the star whether she had enjoyed a dinner party. “Oh, it was okay,” Minnelli replied. “They wanted her ” — meaning the hurricane of limbs with the saucer eyes ...

“He invented me.” From there, Klein realized that Minnelli had leaned on five key mentors after her mother died in 1969, people who helped shape the then-raw performer — Ebb, Kay Thompson, Charles ...