Liza Minnelli dedicates song to Jackson

LOS ANGELES — Over the weekend, Liza Minnelli dedicated “I Can’t Give You Anything But Love” during her Hollywood Bowl performance to her late friend, Michael Jackson, and she told Access Hollywood’s Shaun Robinson why she chose to pay her respects at that particular show.

“Well, it was his birthday,” Minnelli said Sunday’s party in L.A. for Lifetime’s “Drop Dead Diva,” which she guest stars on in an episode airing Sept. 20. “He would’ve been 51 years old if things had been different.”

Minnelli continues to mourn her friend, who will finally be laid to rest on Thursday in L.A., over two months after his death on June 25 due to acute Propofol intoxication.

“He was a wonderful guy. He was a good man and for those of us who really knew him, we knew all that and (we knew) what that kid had to go through between his family and everybody else just using him so much,” Minnelli continued. “And he tried to do so much for everybody. He was always at hospitals.”

The star said she would continue to feel the loss of Jackson in the days ahead.

“I loved him, I respected him and I’ll miss him for the rest of my life,” she said.

Minnelli added that Jackson would have enjoyed her “Drop Dead Diva” role, which sees the real-life diva starring as Lilly Wells, a book-smart psychic, who engages in a legal war with her sister, played by Delta Burke. Rosie O’Donnell also appears in Minnelli’s episode with series star, Brooke Elliott.

“He would love it. I’m serious,” Minnelli said. “He would laugh. He had the best sense of humor ever.”