Bette Midler partly blames Lindsay Lohan for show's cancellation

Bette Midler has blamed Lindsay Lohan, in part, for their TV show's cancellation.

The actress described their short-lived sitcom as one of her greatest career regrets.

The show, titled Bette, aired for just one season from 2000 to 2001, with Bette, 78, now confessing she believes Lindsay's behaviour was partly to blame for the show's failure.

Bette revealed Lindsay, now 37, had refused to return to set after the pilot aired.

"After the pilot, Lindsay Lohan decided she didn't want to do it, or she had other fish to fry," Bette told David Duchovny on his Fail Better podcast.

"So Lindsay Lohan left the building and I said, 'Well, now what do you do?' And the studio didn't help me. It was extremely chaotic."

Bette also believed the series could have succeeded had she had more support.

"I believe it would have worked if I'd had a team that was on my side," she said.

She added at the time she hadn't been fully aware of her rights and obligations as a show creator.

"If I had been in my right mind, or if I had known that my part of my duties were to stand up and say, 'This absolutely will not do, I'm going to sue,' then I would have done that," Bette said.

"But I seem to have been cosseted in some way that I couldn't get to the writer's room. I couldn't speak to the showrunner. I couldn't make myself clear."