Elizabeth Taylor
People that inspire me | Queen of Hollywood
She was born on February 27, 1932, at Heathwood, northwest London to American parents. When she was seven years old her parents decided to move back to America and ended up in Beverly Hills. Het mother a stage actress had screen ambitious for her daughter. At 11 Elizabeth was signed up with MGM and her big break came a year later when she starred wit Micky Rooney in National Velvet.
The studio had a lot of influence on her live and strongly encouraged a marriage with hotel chain heir Nicky Hilton when she was 17. It only lasted less than a year as Nicky was violent and unfaithful.
Five years later she married to the British actor Michael Wilding with which she had two sons. Taylor wrote: "We had a lovely, easy life, very simple, very quiet. Two babies were born. We had friends. We didn't do much."
That changed when she met Mike Todd. A dynamic producer of Broadway girlie shows, promoting the big-screen Cinema and an all-star film "Around the World in 80 days". He swept Taylor off her feet and out of her marriage to Wilding. The around the world promotion tour was their honeymoon and her fame attracted a lot of attention. She wore a tiara that she got from Todd to the oscars and was one of the few woman at that time that could get away with it.
March 1958 Todd's private plane crashed in the New Mexico mountains. There were no survivors. Taylor had staid at home with their 7 months old daughter. Heartbroken she finished the movie "Cat on a hot tin roof" and gave one of the best performances of her live.
Among those who consoled the widow was singer Eddie Fisher, the best friend of Mike Todd. Their romance caused the biggest Hollywood scandal of the time. Taylor was branded "the slut of all time" for allegedly breaking up Fisher's marriage to American sweetheart Debbie Reynolds. MGM pushed Taylors contract and made her play in movies that associated her with the public image. Like when she played a high-class call girl in BUtterfield 8. Her last film for the industry her contract was up and she could do what se liked.
When she got asked for the film Cleopatra, she demanded and got a million dollar. But the filming didn't start well, she got sick and was hospitalised. Once she had recovered the public seemed to have forgiven her and she received an Oscar for her rol in BUtterfield 8. Then she flew to Rome to shoot Cleopatra.
Newly married to Eddy Fisher she fell in love with her co-star of the movie Richard Burton. Both were married but they started an affair. Richard could challenge the beauty and glamour of Elizabeth, Eddy Fisher could not. Richard and Elizabeth later starred together in a movie the V.I.Ps about a couple that was captured in a love triangle.
It was a wild and passionate relationship they had with each other but there granite personalities couldn't be as gentle as must of us think when we think about love. When the divorce of Eddy Fisher came through, she married Richard. Elizabeth was not promiscuous in any way. She was loyal in marriage, loyal in friends but as soon as she was in love there had to be a marriage and that was the end of it.
They lived in the public eye and travelled with a huge entourage and her three children. She did not like the feeling that she had been owned in her childhood, that she had lived in golden handcuffs. And resented the producer, together with Richard she knew what they were worth and asked for it. The movie "Who is afraid of Virginia Woolf" was a hit and she won an oscar for her role. She invested her money also in a fashion house: Vickey Tial in Paris. In one documentary a friend said that they wore flooty kaftans with belts to lay around with in the hotels. I had to smile when she told that. Also they produced there own movies and earned with that over 10 million dollars. In the 70s she did not make movies anymore that mattered, but the conspicuous consumption. Publicly the pair was amazing, privately the drinking got worse and the fights more intense. They divorced but married again. But the second marriage didn't last a year and they divorced again. The she met John Warner a politician which she marries, she put on weight and then divorced him again. After that she went into rehab in the Betty Ford clinic. Where she came out fighting. She started to campaign against Aids a new disease that killed many of her friends. When she went into rehab for a second time she met construction worker Larry Fortensky which she married on the estate of Michel Jackson. Five years later she divorced him, but had setup a line of perfume. One of them 'White diamonds'. She earned more from her perfume then from all here movie earnings put together.
Using her fame she could realy be a brand and did whatever she liked. She died March 2011 age 78. Her drama's, her passionate love affairs must have been hard but fabulous.