Andrew McCarthy's Wildest Hollywood Story

Andrew McCarthy confirmed the story is true, then told it in full.

During the filming of St. Elmo's Fire, Rob Lowe invited him to dinner. McCarthy said Rob had never invited him out before, so he went. He assumed they were meeting Rob's girlfriend. They sat down at Spago, the restaurant at the time, and McCarthy turned to the woman next to him and realized it was Liza Minnelli.

He ordered a double vodka.

As dinner wrapped, Liza suggested they all go to "Sammies." McCarthy thought it was a club. They caravanned up into the hills, the door swung open, and Sammy Davis Jr. greeted them with, "Cats, come on in."

McCarthy said they hung with Sammy the rest of the night. Sammy was long sober at that point. McCarthy was not. He and Sammy traded cigarettes. Sammy kept telling the young actors, "I got my eye on you young cats. I love what you're doing." McCarthy remembers thinking to himself, "Which eye?"

Then the night took another turn. Liza offered to drive him home in her Rolls. McCarthy was drunk enough that he was worried he might throw up. He tried to put the window down. It wouldn't open. He needed a distraction.

So he started singing.

He picked "Somewhere Over the Rainbow", a song famously associated with Judy Garland, Liza's mother. McCarthy said Liza slowly turned and stared at him. Then she joined in. "Way up high," she sang. The two of them, in her Rolls, sat at a red light in West Hollywood and sang the whole thing together.

Rich asked if he ever saw Liza again after that. McCarthy said no. One and done. Same with Sammy.

The whole thing played out like a lost page from an old Hollywood scrapbook, a young actor, a legend, a chauffeured Rolls, and a red light on Sunset. McCarthy delivered it flat and matter-of-fact, which made it land harder. No embellishment. Just a guy remembering a night that shouldn't have happened to him and did.

He called it one of the great moments of his early life. That tracks.