1932–2011
Latest News: Elizabeth Taylor Inspires New Taylor Swift Song
Legendary screen actor Elizabeth Taylor lived nearly her whole life in the spotlight. More than a decade after her death, her name is back at the forefront after pop star Taylor Swift announced the track list of her upcoming album, The Life of a Showgirl, on August 13. The record’s second song is titled “Elizabeth Taylor.”
Taylor’s decades-long acting career began at age 10 and included the movies Cleopatra, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, A Place in the Sun, and many more. Her performances mesmerized moviegoers and critics as she won two Oscars, both for Best Actress, and a Golden Globe.
But the actor’s fame wasn’t only due to her work. Taylor, who has been called one of the most beautiful women in the world, had a tumultuous, headline-grabbing love life that consisted of eight marriages to seven men, even more engagements, and a high-profile love triangle.
“Elizabeth Taylor” isn’t the first of Swift’s song titles to reference a Hollywood star. The singer name-dropped Clara Bow, a 1920s silent film actor and the original “It Girl,” in a track from her 2024 album The Tortured Poets Department. That song contemplated the fleeting nature of celebrity.
Like Elizabeth Taylor, Swift has similarly enjoyed a blockbuster career dating back to a young age. She signed her first record deal at age 15 and has since recorded 12 No. 1 songs and 14 Grammy Awards. Swift, too, fuels regular news coverage about her dating life. But whether “Elizabeth Taylor” teases out the parallels between the two celebrities remains to be seen.
Who Was Elizabeth Taylor?
One of film’s most celebrated stars, actor Elizabeth Taylor won two Academy Awards for her work in Butterfield 8 and Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? The British-born American star made her movie debut at age 10 in 1942’s One Born Every Minute and achieved stardom two years later with National Velvet. Her career was white-hot in the 1950s and ’60s as she appeared in Giant; Cat on a Hot Tin Roof; Suddenly, Last Summer; and Cleopatra. Offscreen, Taylor was just as famous for her many marriages, extensive jewelry collection, and stunning violet eyes. She died in 2011 at age 79.
Quick Facts
FULL NAME: Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor
BORN: February 27, 1932
DIED: March 23, 2011
BIRTHPLACE: London, United Kingdom
SPOUSES: Conrad Hilton (1950–1951), Michael Wilding (1952–1957), Mike Todd (1957–1958), Eddie Fisher (1959–1964), Richard Burton (1964–1974 and 1975–1976), John Warner (1976–1982), and Larry Fortensky (1991–1996)
CHILDREN: Michael Jr., Christopher, Liza, and Maria
ASTROLOGICAL SIGN: Pisces
Early Life
Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor was born on February 27, 1932, in London. Her American parents, both art dealers, were residing in the British capital city when she was born. Soon after the outbreak of World War II, the Taylors returned to the United States and settled into their new life in Los Angeles.
Performing was in Taylor’s blood. Her mother had worked as an actor until she married. At the age of 3, the young Taylor started dancing and eventually gave a recital for Princesses Elizabeth and Margaret. Not long after relocating to California, a family friend suggested the Taylors’ daughter take a screen test.
Movies
Taylor soon signed a contract with Universal Studios and booked her first movie role. Her acting career stretched across more than six decades, during which time Taylor accepted roles that not only showcased her beauty, but also her ability to take on emotionally charged characters.
Child Star
Soon after her screen test, Taylor signed a contract with Universal Studios and made her screen debut at age 10 in There’s One Born Every Minute (1942). She followed that up with a bigger role in Lassie Come Home (1943) and later The White Cliffs of Dover (1944).
Her breakout role, however, came in 1944 with National Velvet in a role Taylor spent four months working to get. The movie subsequently turned out to be a huge hit that pulled in more than $4 million and made the 12-year-old actor a huge star.
In the glare of the Hollywood spotlight, the young star showed she was more than adept at handling celebrity’s tricky terrain. Even more impressive was the fact that, unlike so many child stars before and after her, Taylor proved she could make a seamless transition to more adult roles. Her stunning looks helped.
Mainstream Success
At just 18, Taylor played opposite Spencer Tracy in Father of the Bride (1950). She then delivered a riveting performance in the 1951 drama A Place in the Sun. Her acting talents were on full display in 1954 with three films: The Last Time I Saw Paris, Rhapsody, and Elephant Walk, the latter of which saw Taylor take on the role of a plantation owner’s wife who is in love with the farm’s manager.
Meanwhile, her personal life only boosted the success of her movies. Taylor was romantically entangled with many high-profile men, including millionaire movie producer Howard Hughes, football player Glenn Davis, as well as billionaire and U.S. Army pilot Bill Pawley. She married eight times during her life, twice to actor Richard Burton, and was only 18 at her first wedding in May 1950.
While her love life continued to make international headlines, Taylor continued to shine as an actor. She co-starred in the 1956 film adaptation of the Edna Ferber novel Giant with James Dean. The next year began a string of acclaimed performances that earned Taylor three consecutive Academy Award nominations for Best Actress. The first arrived for 1957’s Raintree Country. Then she sizzled on the big screen in the movie adaptation of Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958). The following year, she starred in another Williams classic Suddenly, Last Summer, for which she earned the Golden Globe for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama.
Oscar-Winning Roles and Cleopatra
Reaching new professional heights in the 1960s, Taylor won her first Oscar in 1961. She captured the coveted Best Actress award at last with her performance as a call girl in Butterfield 8 (1960). The newly minted Oscar winner took a brief break from acting only to return with a bang.
Cleopatra (1963) saw Taylor in the leading role of the legendary Egyptian ruler opposite Richard Burton’s Mark Antony. The stars were lovers on- and offscreen, and they soon married. Meanwhile, Cleopatra not only heightened Taylor’s clout and fame, but also proved to be a staggering investment, clocking in at a then-unprecedented $37 million to make.
Taylor and Burton appeared onscreen together in the much-panned The V.I.P.s (1963) and then again two years later for the heralded Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? The latter movie earned Taylor her second Oscar for her role as the overweight, angry wife of an alcoholic professor, played by Burton. However, Taylor wasn’t at the Academy Awards ceremony to accept her second statuette, so Anne Bancroft accepted it on her behalf.
The subsequent years proved to be an up-and-down affair for Taylor. There were more marriages, more divorces, health obstacles, and a struggling film career, with movies that gained little traction with critics or the movie-going public. Still, Taylor continued to act. She found work on television, even making a guest appearance on General Hospital, and on stage.
Spouses and Children
Taylor’s captivating looks and celebrity proved to be irresistible for many man, and her love life was a constant topic of media coverage. Throughout her life, Taylor was married eight times to seven men. All but one marriage ended in divorce.
The actor made her first entrance into marriage at the age of 18 when she wed hotel heir Conrad “Nicky” Hilton in 1950. The union didn’t last long and, in 1952, Taylor was walking down the aisle again—this time to marry British actor Michael Wilding. The couple had two sons together, Michael Wilding Jr. and Christopher Wilding, before their divorce.
Just over a year after marrying her third husband, pioneering film producer Mike Todd, Taylor became a young widow after Todd was killed in a plane crash in 1958. The tragedy left Taylor to raise their infant daughter, Elizabeth “Liza” Todd, alone.
After his death, Taylor became embroiled in one of the greatest Hollywood love scandals of the era when she began an affair with Todd’s close friend Eddie Fisher. At the time, the hit singer was married to actor Debbie Reynolds, whom Fisher divorced in order to marry Taylor in 1959. Taylor and Fisher stayed married for five years until she left her fourth husband for actor Richard Burton.
The public’s obsession with Taylor’s love life hit new heights with her 1964 marriage to Burton. She had met and fallen in love with the actor during her work on Cleopatra. The Taylor-Burton union was a fiery and passionate one. He adopted her daughter, Liza, and together they adopted another daughter, Maria Burton. The Hollywood stars also appeared onscreen together in several films over the course of their relationship. That include the 1973 TV movie Divorce His, Divorce Hers that preceded their own divorce the next year. However, unable to stay away from each other, they wed again in 1975. The couple’s second union didn’t even last a full year.
As she had so often before, Taylor didn’t wait long to remarry after her second divorce from Burton. She found love with former U.S. Navy Secretary John Warner, and during their six-year marriage, which began in 1976, he was elected to the U.S. Senate for the first time. The Oscar-winning actor’s final marriage was to another man outside of the entertainment industry. Taylor and construction worker Larry Fortensky wed in 1991 and divorced five years later.
Later Years and Death
As her acting career waned, Taylor began focusing more attention on philanthropy. After her close friend Rock Hudson died in 1985 following his battle with HIV/AIDS, the actor started work to find a cure for the disease. In 1991, she launched the Elizabeth Taylor HIV/AIDS Foundation to support people living with the disease and to fund research for more advanced treatments.
Largely retired from the world of acting, Taylor received numerous awards for her body of work. In 1993, she received the American Film Institute’s Life Achievement Award and the Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award at the Oscars. In 2000, she was made Dame Commander of the Order of the British Empire (DBE). “Well, I’ve always been a ‘broad.’ Now it’s a great honor to be a dame!” Taylor said in a statement at the time.
Taylor overcame a litany of health problems throughout the 1990s, diabetes and congestive heart failure among them. She had both hips replaced and, in 1997, had a brain tumor removed. In October 2009, Taylor underwent successful heart surgery. In early 2011, the screen legend again experienced heart problems. She was admitted to Cedars-Sinai Hospital that February for congestive heart failure. This time there would be no recovery.
On March 23, 2011, Taylor died in Los Angeles from congestive heart failure. She was 79 years old. Shortly after her death, her son Michael Wilding Jr. released a statement, saying “My mother was an extraordinary woman who lived life to the fullest, with great passion, humor, and love... We will always be inspired by her enduring contribution to our world.”
Quotes
- I think I’m finally growing up—and about time.
- My mother says I didn’t open my eyes for eight days after I was born, but when I did, the first thing I saw was an engagement ring. I was hooked.
- I don’t pretend to be an ordinary housewife.
- Some of my best leading men have been dogs and horses.
- One problem with people who have no vices is that they’re pretty sure to have some annoying virtues.
- Success is a great deodorant. It takes away all your past smells.
- You find out who your real friends are when you’re involved in a scandal.
- If someone’s dumb enough to offer me a million dollars to make a picture, I’m certainly not dumb enough to turn it down.
- I, along with the critics, have never taken myself very seriously.
- I’m not taking anything away from Debbie [Reynolds] because she never really had it.
- [Michael Jackson] is one of the most normal people I know.
- I’m more of a man’s woman. With men, there’s a kind of twinkle that comes out. I sashay up to a man. I walk up to a woman.
- I don’t want to be a sex symbol. I would rather be a symbol of a woman who makes mistakes, perhaps, but a woman who loves.
- Jean Hersholt Humanitarian Award acceptance speech: I have been on this stage many times as a presenter, I have sat in the audience as a loser, and I have had the thrill and the honor of standing here as a winner. But I never ever thought I would come out here to receive this award. It is the highest possible accolade I could receive from my peers, and for doing something I just have to do, that my passion must do.
Warner Brothers Elizabeth Taylor Legacy Collection DVD
Posterazzi Cat on a Hot Tin Roof Elizabeth Taylor Poster
Harper Paperbacks Elizabeth Taylor: The Grit & Glamour of an Icon by Kate Andersen Brower
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