*
27.02.1932, London, England, GB † 23.03.2011, Los Angeles, USA
Tochter amerikanischer Eltern * 1939 Übersiedlung nach Kalifornien * 1942
Filmdebüt * 1943 Vertrag bei MGM, wo sie zum Kinderstar aufgebaut wird
* 1949 erste "erwachsene" Rolle in Conspirator
* 1962-73 dreht mehrere Filme mit Richard Burton (ihrem damaligen Ehemann)
* Anfang der 80er erfolgreiche Theaterauftritte in USA und London * ab
1985 engagiert sich in der AIDS-Hilfe - Gründerin und Präsidentin der
American Foundation for AIDS Research * verheiratet mit Michael
Wilding (2. Ehemann, 1952-57), Michael Todd
(3. Ehemann, 1957-58), Eddie Fisher (4. Ehemann, 1959-64)
& Richard Burton (5. Ehemann, 1964-74
und 1975-76) * Genres: Drama
/ Komödie
FILMS
There's
One Born Every Minute (1942-USA * Harold Young / Gloria Twine)
Lassie Come Home (Heimweh, 1942/43-USA *
Fred M. Wilcox / Priscilla)
National Velvet (Kleines Mädchen, großes
Herz, 1944-USA * Clarence Brown / Velvet Brown)
Courage of Lassie (Lassie - Held auf vier
Pfoten, 1946-USA * Fred M. Wilcox / Kathie Merrick)
Cynthia (Cynthia, 1947-USA * Robert Z. Leonard
/ Cynthia Bishop)
Life with Father (Unser Leben mit Vater,
1947-USA * Michael Curtiz / Mary Skinner)
A Date with Judy (Wirbel um Judy, 1948-USA
* Richard Thorpe / Carol Pringle)
Julia Misbehaves (Die unvollkommene Dame,
1948-USA * Jack Conway / Susan Packett)
Little Women (Kleine
tapfere Jo, 1948-USA * Mervyn LeRoy / Amy March)
Conspirator (Verschwörer, 1949-GB * Victor
Saville / Melinda Greyton)
A Place in the Sun (Ein Platz an der Sonne,
1949-USA * George Stevens / Angela Vickers)
# The Big Hangover (Von Katzen und Katern,
1949-USA * Norman Krasna / Mary Belney) (08-09; 5005)
Father of the Bride
(Vater der Braut, 1950-USA * Vincente Minnelli / Kay Banks)
Father's Little Dividend (Ein Geschenk
des Himmels, 1950-USA * Vincente Minnelli / Kay Dunstan)
Callaway Went Thataway (Der Cowboy, den es zweimal gab, 1951-USA
* Norman Panama, Melvin Frank / cameo)
Love Is Better Than Ever (Die süße Falle,
1951-USA * Stanley Donen / Anastacia Macaboy)
Ivanhoe (Ivanhoe - Der
schwarze Ritter, 1951/52-USA * Richard Thorpe / Rebecca)
The Girl Who Had Everything
(Ein verwöhntes Biest, 1952-USA * Richard Thorpe / Jean Latimer)
Elephant Walk (Elefantenpfad, 1953-USA *
William Dieterle / Ruth Wiley)
Rhapsody (Symphonie
des Herzens, 1953-USA * Charles Vidor / Louise Durant)
Beau Brummell (Beau Brummell, 1954-USA
* Curtis Bernhardt / Lady Patricia)
The Last Time I Saw Paris (Damals
in Paris, 1954-USA * Richard Brooks / Helen Ellswirth)
Giant (Giganten, 1955-USA
* George Stevens / Leslie Benedict)
# Raintree County (Das Land des Regenbaums, 1956-USA * Edward Dmytryk ... Susanna Drake Shawnessy) (Roman von Ross Lockridge, Jr) (04-05 + 07-10; 5710)
Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (Die Katze
auf dem heißen Blechdach, 1958-USA * Richard Brooks / Maggie Pollitt)
# Suddenly, Last Summer (Plötzlich im letzten Sommer, 1959-GB * Joseph L. Mankiewicz ... Catherine Holly) (Bühnenstück von Tennessee Williams) (5912-USA)
Butterfield 8 (Telefon
Butterfield 8, 1960-USA * Daniel Mann / Gloria Wandrous)
Cleopatra (Cleopatra,
1961/62-USA * Joseph L. Mankiewicz /
Kleopatra)
The V.I.P.s (Hotel International, 1962/63-GB
* Anthony Asquith / Frances Andros)
The Sandpiper (...die alles begehren,
1964-USA * R: Vincente Minnelli, B: Dalton Trumbo, Michael
Wilson; Irene Kamp, Louis Kamp, K: Milton Krasner, M: Johnny Mandel, D:
ET-Laura Reynolds, Richard Burton, Eva Marie Saint) 116m-Melodram
Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf ?
(Wer hat Angst vor Virginia Woolf ?, 1965-USA * Mike
Nichols / Martha)
# The Taming of the Shrew / La bisbetica domata (Der Widerspenstigen Zähmung, 1966-USA/I * Franco Zeffirelli ... Caterina) (03-08; 6703)
Doctor Faustus (Doktor Faustus, 1966-GB
* Richard Burton, Nevill Coghill / Helena)
# Reflections in a Golden Eye (Spiegelbild im goldenen Auge, 1966-USA * John Huston ... Leonora Penderton) (Roman von Carson McCullers) (10-12; 6710)
The Comedians (Die Stunde
der Komödianten, 1967-USA * Peter Glenville / Martha
Pineda)
Boom ! (Brandung, 1967-GB
* Joseph Losey / Flora Goforth)
Secret Ceremony (Die Frau aus dem Nichts,
1968-GB * Joseph Losey / Leonora)
The Only Game in Town (Das einzige
Spiel in der Stadt, 1968/69-USA * George
Stevens / Fran Walker)
Zee and Co. (X, Y und Zee, 1970-GB * Brian
G. Hutton / Zee Blakeley)
Under Milk Wood (1971-GB * Andrew Sinclair
/ Rosie Probert)
Hammersmith Is Out (Hammersmith Is Out,
1971-USA * Peter Ustinov / Jimmie Jean Jackson)
Night Watch (Die Nacht der tausend Augen,
1972-GB * Brian G. Hutton / Ellen Wheeler)
Ash Wednesday (Die Rivalin, 1973-USA * Larry
Peerce / Barbara Sawyer)
Identikit (1973-I * Giuseppe
Patroni Griffi / Lise)
The Blue Bird (Der blaue Vogel, 1975/76-USA/SU
* George Cukor / Mutter/Mütterliche Liebe/Licht/Hexe)
Victory at Entebbe (Unternehmen Entebbe,
1976-USA * Marvin J. Chomsky / Edna Vilnofsky) TVM
# A Little Night Music (Das Lächeln einer Sommernacht, 1976-A/D/USA * Harold Prince ... Désirée Armfeldt) (09-10; 7712, LA)
The Mirror Crack'd
(Mord im Spiegel, 1980-GB * Guy Hamilton / Marina Rudd)
Il giovane Toscanini (1988-I * Franco Zeffirelli
/ Nadina)
The Flintstones (Flintstones - Die Familie
Feuerstein, 1993-USA * Brian Levant / Pearl Slaghoople)
AWARDS
Golden
Globe für Suddenly, Last Summer (beste Darstellerin
– Kategorie Drama, 1960)
Academy Award (Oscar) für Butterfield 8 (beste
Hauptdarstellerin, 1961)
New York Film Critics Circle Award für Who's Afraid
of Virginia Woolf ? (beste Darstellerin, 1966)
National Board of Review Award für Who's Afraid
of Virginia Woolf ? (beste Darstellerin, 1966)
Academy Award (Oscar) für Who's Afraid of Virginia
Woolf ? (beste Hauptdarstellerin, 1967)
British Academy [BAFTA] Award für Who's Afraid of
Virginia Woolf ? (beste britische Darstellerin, 1967)
Silberner Bär für Hammersmith Is Out (beste
Darstellerin) [Berlinale 1972]
Cecil B. DeMille Award [Golden Globes 1985]
Life Achievement Award [American Film Institute - 1993]
Life Achievement Award [Screen Actors Guild - 1998]
Academy Fellowship (Auszeichnung für ihr Lebenswerk) [BAFTA Awards 1999]
BOOKS
Elizabeth
Taylor: Elizabeth Taylor: An Informal Memoir. New York:
Harper & Row, 1964
Elizabeth Taylor: Elizabeth Takes Off. [?]:
Macmillan, 1988
Andrea Thain, Michael O. Huebner: Elizabeth Taylor: Hollywoods letzte
Diva. Reinbek: Rowohlt, 1992
James Christopher: Elizabeth Taylor. A Biography. Bath/Waterville: Chivers Press/Thorndike Press, 2000 > 189 Seiten
Larissa Branin: Liz. Philadephia: Courage Books, 2000
Bertrand Meyer-Stabley: La véritable Elizabeth Taylor. Paris: Pygmalion, 2004
J. Randy Taraborrelli: Elizabeth. New York: Warner Books, 2006
Ellis Amburn: Elizabeth Taylor: The Obsessions, Passions, and Courage of a Hollywood Legend. London: Anova Books, 2007 > 352 Seiten
Katy Sprinkel: Elizabeth Taylor: The Life of a Hollywood Legend. [?]: Triumph Books, 2011 > 128 Seiten
Susan Kelly: Elizabeth Taylor: Her Life In Style. London: A&C Black, 2011 > 128 Seiten
M. G. Lord: The Accidental Feminist: How Elizabeth Taylor Raised Our Consciousness and We Were Too Distracted by Her Beauty to Notice. New York: Walker Publishing Company, 2012 > 212 Seiten
Donald Spoto: Elizabeth Taylor. New York: Little/Brown, 1995Over half a century after her movie debut at the age of ten, Elizabeth Taylor is the only star from Hollywood's Golden Age who continues to hit the headlines. After nine marriages, numerous affairs, 30 operations, two Academy Awards and frequent sojourns in drug and alcohol rehabilitation clinics, she has now reinvented herself as businesswoman, AIDS campaigner and diamond collector, while extending her career into television and the theatre. But, until now, this most public of lives has always maintained a certain element of mystery. The sheer volume of coverage she has attracted over the years has inevitably led to a degree of inconsistency, and Taylor herself as been reticent about many aspects of her life. For years Elizabeth Taylor's life fluctuated between disaster and triumph, and - not at all conincidentally - along the way she became one of America's finest screen actresses. Outspoken, lusty, mercurial, she is quicksilver incarnate; generous and compassionate, also totally self-absorbed and egocentric. This biography is based on a great cache of material, including studio diaries, letters and personal journals. > 401p. [32]plates. bibliog. filmog. index
Alexander Walker: Elizabeth: The Life of Elizabeth Taylor. New York: Grove Press, 2001Elizabeth Taylor is perhaps the most “public” of the great stars: an Oscar-winning actress who has lived her entire life in the glare of the spotlights. Much has been written about her; now, for the first time, Elizabeth offers a serious, in-depth look at one of the great legends of Hollywood. With the readability, sensitivity, and thoroughness that have made his previous biographies best-sellers, Alexander Walker explores the roots of Taylor’s extraordinary personality and reveals the secret not only of her success, but of her survival. Here is a life to rival the very movies she played in, told with immense candor, wit, and sympathy: from her privileged London childhood, the enormous influence of her strong-willed mother, and her swift rise to stardom in such films as National Velvet, A Place in the Sun, and the catastrophe-ridden Cleopatra; to her six husbands, her desperate need to love and be loved, her obsession with jewelry, and the amazing resilience that helped her weather not only condemnation for “the most public adultery in history,” but also dramatic illnesses that have brought her to the verge of death—and, according to her, beyond. Using scores of unpublished documents and interviews with those who know Taylor best, as well as his own meetings with her over the past thirty years, Alexander Walker recreates the comedies and tragedies in the life of a woman whose rewards and scandals have become the stuff of legend. Elizabeth has raged through life, ever the hungry explorer, never quite the victim, and Elizabeth provides a fascinating inside look at this perpetually alluring star, a story of contradictions and extremes seldom matched in fact or fiction. > Paperback, 448 pages
William J. Mann: How to Be a Movie Star: Elizabeth Taylor in Hollywood. [Boston]: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt, 2009Elizabeth Taylor has never been short on star power, but in this unprecedented biography, the spotlight is entirely on her—a spirited beauty full of magic, professional daring, and wit. Acclaimed biographer William Mann follows Elizabeth Taylor publicly as she makes her ascent at MGM, falls into (and out of) marriages, wins Oscars, fights studio feuds, and combats America's conservative values with her decidedly modern love affairs. But he also shines a light on Elizabeth's rich private life, revealing a love for her craft and a loyalty to the underdog that fueled her lifelong battle against the studio system. Swathed in mink, disposing of husbands but keeping the diamonds—this is Elizabeth Taylor as she lived and loved, breaking and making the rules in the game of supreme celebrity. > 484 p., [32] p. of plates : ill. ; includes bibliographical references and index.
C. David Heymann: Liz: An Intimate Biography of Elizabeth Taylor. New York: Atria Books, 2011Elizabeth Taylor's own story was more dramatic than any part she ever played on the screen. C. David Heymann brings her magnificently to life in this acclaimed biography - updated with a new chapter covering her final years. She was an icon, one of the most watched, photographed, and gossiped-about personalities of our time. Child star, daughter of a controlling stage mother, Oscar-winning actress, seductress and eight-time wife, mother of four children and grandmother of ten, champion of funding for AIDS research, purveyor of perfumes and jewelry, close friend of celebrities and tycoons - Elizabeth Taylor, for almost eight decades, played most completely, beautifully, cunningly, flamboyantly, and scandalously her greatest role of all: herself. The basis of an Emmy Award-nominated miniseries, Liz portrays Taylor’s life and career in fascinating, revealing detail and includes an additional new chapter, bringing her beloved fans up to date on her final years. By way of more than a thousand interviews with stars, directors, producers, designers, friends, family, business associates, and employees and through extensive research among previously disclosed court, business, medical, and studio documents, bestselling author Heymann reminds readers of her very public escapades and unveils her most private moments. Here are the highs and lows of her film career and the intimate circumstances of her marriages to Nicky Hilton, Michael Wilding, Mike Todd, Eddie Fisher, Richard Burton, Senator John Warner, and Larry Fortensky. Here, too, is the truth about Taylor’s father and her friendships with leading men Montgomery Clift, James Dean, and Rock Hudson, as well as with the eccentric Malcolm Forbes and Michael Jackson. From her illnesses, injuries, weight issues, and battles against drug and alcohol, to her sexual exploits, diamond-studded adventures, and tumultuous love affairs, this is the enormously contradictory and glamorous life of Hollywood’s last great star. > Paperback, 544 pages
David Bret: Elizabeth Taylor: The Lady, The Lover, The Legend - 1932-2011. Edinburgh: Mainstream Publishing, 2011At 1.28 a.m. on Wednesday, 23 March 2011, just three weeks after celebrating her 79th birthday, the biggest star Hollywood has ever known died. The tributes and eulogies to Elizabeth Taylor were legion. A weeping Elton John said, 'We have just lost a Hollywood giant. More importantly, we have lost an incredible human being.' In Elizabeth Taylor: The Lady, The Lover, The Legend, 1932-2011, acclaimed biographer David Bret has written the revealing, incisive and definitive life story of the most controversial cinematic icon since Mae West. While never yielding in his admiration and respect, Bret has stripped away the veneer to portray the star as she really was: sometimes arrogant, attention-seeking, avaricious, reckless, monstrous towards her peers, generous, even foolish at times but, above all, through the tumultuous relationships and the personal mayhem, a survivor. Elizabeth Taylor was the very last of the Hollywood greats. As David Bret writes, 'Most of her contemporaries - Garbo, Streisand and Dietrich excepted - were compelled to walk in the shadow of her sun. Of today's stars, not one may be deemed worthy of stepping even within a mile of that shadow. > Paperback (2012), 304 pages
Joseph Papa: Elizabeth Taylor, A Passion for Life: The Wit and Wisdom of a Legend. New York: HarperCollins, 2011From the time she appeared in National Velvet, the film that skyrocketed her to international fame at age twelve in 1944, until her death, Elizabeth Taylor's beauty, allure, and personal strength captivated the world. In a career that spanned more than sixty years, she brought her raw talent and magnetism to bear in now classic films such as Father of the Bride, Suddenly, Last Summer, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, Giant, Cleopatra, and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?. Off screen, she lived just as passionately. That intensity brought her enormous joy and pain—and notoriety, whether it was from her vast collections of extraordinary fine jewelry and art to her battles with addiction and ill heath, from her internationally recognized humanitarian efforts on behalf of AIDS to her scandalous love affairs and seven highly scrutinized marriages. This anthology reveals the candor and honesty with which the actress led her extraordinary life. Here are Elizabeth's first-person reflections on her childhood, career, love and marriages, motherhood, beauty, aging, extravagances, charity, and sense of self. Whether witty or poignant, these words are always demonstrative of her generous, unapologetic, and fiercely determined nature, reflecting the essence of a great star and legendary modern woman. > Hardcover, 240 pages
Kitty Kelley: Elizabeth Taylor - The Last Star. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2011This biography of Elizabeth Taylor tells her story as no other can. Drawing on extensive reporting and interviews, Kitty Kelley’s classic portrait follows the rise, fall, and rebirth of the woman who was perhaps Hollywood’s brightest star. Now with a new Afterword, this is the definitive record of Elizabeth Taylor’s fascinating life. > Paperback, 448 pages