I will miss you Elizabeth
and will always
remember your smile,
your beauty, your passion!!
May you shine eternally among the brightest
stars that fill the sky illustrious sky at night!
Elizabeth's Glamorous Life
Elizabeth Taylor was born in England
to parents, Francis and Sara Taylor.
She began making screen movies at a
very early age for MGM Studios.
A dual citizen of the United Kingdom
and the United States, she was
born a British subject through
her birth on British soil and an
American citizen through her parents.
Soon after settling in Los Angeles, SaraTayor
Shortly before the beginning
of World War II, her parents
decided to return to the
United States to avoid hostilities.
Her mother took the children first,
arriving in New York in April 1939,
while her father remained in London
to wrap up matters in his art business,
arriving in November.
They settled in Los Angeles, California,
whereher father established a
new art gallery, which included many
paintings he shipped from England.
The gallery would soon attract numerous
Hollywood celebrities who appreciated
its modern European paintings.
The gallery opened many doors
for the Taylors, leading them directly
into the society of money and prestige
within Hollywood's movie colony.
Sara Taylor discovered that
Hollywood people
"habitually saw a movie future
for every pretty face."
MGM, was considered a
"glamorous studio,"
boasting that it had
"more stars than there are in heaven."
Before Sara would sign the contract,
she sought certainty that Elizabeth
actually had a "God-given talent"
to become an actress.
Incidently....
Sara Taylor was a former actress
whose stage name was "Sara Sothern".
Miss "Sothern" retired from the stage
in 1926 when she married
Francis Taylor in New York City.
Sara Taylor wanted a final sign of revelation...
Was there a divine plan for her?
Mrs. Taylor took her old script
for The Fool, in which she had played
the scene of the girlwhose faith is
answered by a miracle cure.
She asked Elizabeth to read
her own part, while she read the
lines of the leading man.
She confessed to weeping openly.
She later remarked...
"There sat my daughter playing
perfectly the part of the child as I,
a grown woman, had tried to do it.
It seemed that she must have been in
my head all those years I was acting".
Elizabeth Taylor appeared in her first
motion picture at the age of nine in
There's One Born Every Minute (1942).
This film was the only one
she was to make for Universal.
After less than a year,
the studio fired Taylor for unknown reasons.
Sara Taylor intuition told her that Elizabeth
" wasn't really welcome at Universal."
She learned, for instance, that her
casting director complained,
"The kid has nothing," after a test.
Even her beautiful eyes, a deep blue
that appeared violet with a mutation
that gave her double eyelashes,
and stunned those who met her in person,
did not impress the casting director
who would later remark,
"Her eyes are too old,
she doesn't have the face of a child."
"Some of my best leading men
have been dogs and horses."
Some that knew Elizabeth as a child have said,
"There was something slightly odd
about Elizabeth's looks, even at this age -
an expression that sometimes made people
think she was older than she was."
She already had her mother's air of concentration.
Later on, it would prove an invaluable asset.
Sara Taylor, when she was a child in England,
remembered adults describing
her as having an "old soul," because,
as she says,
"I was totally direct."
She also recognized similar traits
in her baby daughter:
"I saw my daughter as a baby, before she
was a year old, look at people, steadily,
with those eyes of hers,
and see people start to fidget,
and drop things out of their pockets
and finally, unable to stand the heat,
get out of the room."
By the time she had reached young adulthood,
she had becme one of the most popular
screen actresses of Hollywood's Golden Age,
and one of the most famous film stars in the world.
"Liz" was most recognized for her glamorous
lifestyle, beauty and distinctive violet eyes.
Unlike other child actors, Taylor made an
easy transition to adult roles.
"I think I'm finally growing up - and about time."
TIME Magazine called her a
"a jewel of great price, a true star sapphire".
"So much to do, so little done, such things to be."
Elizabeth has been called the
"greatest movie star of all,"
starring in a string of successful films,
many of which are today considered "classics."
Her resulting celebrity made her into a
Hollywood icon, as she set the "gold standard"
for Hollywood fame, creating the
perfect model for stardom.
And yet, with such a successful movie career
and glamorous lifestyle, her life was not
without it's heartache and personal woes.
She suffered from many physical and
mental ailments throughout her life but didn't
allow them to conflict with her stubborn
conviction to become the great actress
she believed she could be.
She was hospitalized more than 70 times
and had at least 20 major operations.
Many times newspaper headlines erroneously
announced that Taylor was close to death but she
claimed only to have almost died on four occasions.
"I feel very adventurous.
There are so many doors to be opened,
and I'm not afraid to look behind them. "
Elizabeth broke her back five times,
had both of her hips replaced,
had a hysterectomy,
suffered from dysentery and phlebitis,
punctured her esophagus.
survived a benign brain tumor,
survived skin cancer,
She faced life-threatening bouts
with pneumonia twice, one in 1961
requiring an emergency tracheotomy.
The mutation that gave Elizabeth her
striking double eyelashes may also have
contributed to her history of heart trouble.
"I have a woman's body and a child's emotions."
She was to learn in her early adulthood that
great success was to come at an even greater price.
She faced each struggle in her life with diginity,
patience, and endurance that earned a special place
for her in many hearts around the world.
"It's not the having, it's the getting."
It was no great coincidence that during some of
the biggest roles she played, she would also
struggle through some of her worst physical
ailments to triumphantly win an award for her
outstanding acting abilties while making of those films.
"Everything makes me nervous - except making films."
Elizabeth would not ever give up...
not on love...not on life!
She lost the true love of her life,
Mike Todd, to a terrible airplane crash.
She later called Todd one of the three loves
of her life, with Richard Burton and jewelry.
"I loved Michael with all my soul and
I can't imagine life without him.
We had so much in common and
we had such loving fun together."
She would love again...
finding a another true love in her life!
"I really don't remember much about Cleopatra.
There were a lot of other things going on."
