Bette Midler "Isn't She Great" and "Drowning Mona". In Andrew Bergman's "Isn't She Great", a highly fictionalized account of the life and career of author Jacqueline Susann, she played alongside Nathan Lane and Stockard Channing, portraying Susann with her early struggles as an aspiring actress relentlessly hungry for fame, her relationship with press agent Irving Mansfield, her success as the author of "Valley of the Dolls", and her battle with and subsequent death from breast cancer. The dramedy garnered largely negative reviews by critics, who dismissed it as "bland material [that] produces entirely forgettable comic performances." For her performance in the film,
Valley of the Dolls (film) Gaille Heidemann for Patty Duke. Heidemann and Wilson are uncredited on the soundtrack label. The original version of "I'll Plant My Own Tree" (recorded by Judy Garland before she was fired from the film) was finally released in 1976 on a compilation LP, "Cut! Out-takes from Hollywood's Greatest Musicals". "Lovely Me: The Life of Jacqueline Susann" (1987) by Barbara Seaman states that Ruth Batchelor, who wrote lyrics for Elvis Presley, wrote the lyrics for a title song for the movie. Batchelor's song was rejected by the studio as the Previns had already written the soundtrack. It was recorded by The