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Liza, hubby want payback
18/12/2002 07:50 - (SA)
Ben Berkowitz
Los Angeles - Liza Minnelli is upset that cable music channel VH1 cancelled her planned reality series before it even aired - and the singer has more than 10 million reasons why.
Minnelli and her husband, producer David Gest, filed suit on Monday in New York state court against VH1 and MTV Networks, units of Viacom, as well as Viacom itself, seeking more than $10 million in damages for VH1's October cancellation of Liza & David.
The high-profile couple said that VH1 breached their contract to do the show and that an anonymous Viacom employee defamed Gest in an interview.
According to the suit, Gest and Minnelli agreed to make 10 one-hour episodes for up to four seasons.
The suit said The couple were paid $100 000 on July 18, as an advance on a $1.25 million fee for the first season and that production began October 1 with producers shooting more than 60 hours of footage.
On October 21, Minnelli and Gest said they held a dinner party and concert at their home for purposes of the show. However, they claim, a VH1 producer told Gest he would cancel the show if certain artists were not included on the concert programme.
On October 29, the suit said, MTV Networks, the Viacom division that includes VH1, cancelled the show.
Defamation claim
Then in mid-November, the suit alleges, an unnamed Viacom employee defamed Gest in an interview with the New York Post by calling him a "control freak" and "impossible to work with", among other things.
The suit asks for $1.15 million in damages related to the unfinished production of the show, and damages of up to $12 million for the alleged defamation of Gest in the Post.
In a statement in October, the network, in explaining why the show was cancelled, said "we were not given the co-operation and access that we were promised".
The show was to have featured musical performances, dinner parties with the couple's celebrity friends and inside looks at their high-society lives.
Minnelli, who has been in ill health in recent years in addition to battling weight problems and an addiction to painkillers, has been making a comeback push of late. She released a new CD, Liza's Back!, in October.
Celebrity reality programming has become a big-ticket item ever since the runaway success of The Osbournes, MTV's look at life and times of shock-rocker Ozzy Osbourne and his wife and children.
- SAPA
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South Africa
