Lights, Camera, Transcona: Judy Garland's Surprising Connection
- Jul 17
- 3 min read
It’s not just a neighbourhood in Winnipeg - Transcona once shared its name with Judy Garland’s film production company.
Judy Garland, with her then-husband Sidney Luft, formed the production company Transcona Enterprises in the early 1950s. The company would co-produce the celebrated 1954 musical remake of A Star is Born along with Warner Bros. Transcona Enterprises would co-produce one other film with Warner Bros., The Bounty Hunter (1954).
But how did Judy and Sidney choose the name "Transcona" for their production company? A few stories exist regarding the origin of the name. According to Ronald Haver in his landmark study, A Star is Born: The Making of the 1954 Movie and its 1983 Restoration, they "formed a corporation called Transcona, after a town in Manitoba where Luft used to fly." The AFI Catalog states that Transcona Enterprises "was named for a Canadian town in which Luft once lived." In his biography titled Judy, Gerold Frank notes that, "Transcona was the name of a Canadian town he [Sidney Luft] had once driven through: it stuck in his mind; it had just the right ring to it."
Lorna Luft, the daughter of Judy and Sidney, even shares a story related to Sidney's flight training in Canada. In a Winnipeg Free Press article from 22 September 2005, Lorna states that her father briefly took flight training in Transcona during the Second World War. When asked if her mother ever visited Winnipeg, Lorna replied, "I don't know." She also mentions this story in her book, A Star Is Born: Judy Garland and the Film that Got Away.
Sidney Luft served as a pilot in the Royal Canadian Air Force around 1940 and trained at various facilities across Canada. While Manitoba had air training facilities during the Second World War under the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan (BCATP), none were located in the Town of Transcona. Sidney Luft may have encountered Transcona while training at facilities in Winnipeg or elsewhere in Manitoba.
Regarding the story that Sidney Luft lived in Transcona, no verifiable information is available in the Transcona Museum Archives.
The most likely explanation for the name "Transcona Enterprises" is that Sidney Luft came across Transcona during his time in Canada in the early 1940s. Regardless of the reasoning behind the name, "Transcona" creates an unexpected and amusing link to Hollywood, especially for residents of the actual Transcona!
Sources
“A Star is Born (1954).” AFI Catalog. Accessed July 9, 2025. https://catalog.afi.com/Catalog/MovieDetails/51362
Frank, Gerold. Judy. New York: Harper & Row, 1975. Page 353.
Harris, Holly. "Show with WSO Must Go on for Grieving Luft". Winnipeg Free Press, September 22, 2005, sec. Entertainment.
Haver, Ronald. A Star Is Born: The Making of the 1954 Movie and Its 1983 Restoration. New York: Applause Theatre & Cinema Books, 2002. Page 25.
Luft, Lorna and Jeffrey Vance. A Star Is Born: Judy Garland and the Film that Got Away. Philadelphia: Running Press, 2018. Page 72-73.
Luft, Sid. Judy and I: My Life with Judy Garland. Chicago: Chicago Review Press, 2017.
Stratton, James. "A Star Is Born (1954)". Chapter. In A Star Is Born and Born Again: Variations on a Hollywood Archetype. Albany: BearManor Media, 2015.
"Training facilities and communities of the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan". Government of Canada. Accessed July 9, 2025. https://www.canada.ca/en/air-force/services/history-heritage/british-commonwealth-air-training-plan/training-establishments.html#MN