Oscar winner, Elizabeth Taylor dies of heart failure at 79
[HMG Celebrity News] – With the sad inevitability of a fade out from one of their films we have to report another Hollywood legend has slipped from our grasp; Dame Elizabeth Taylor died this morning from congestive heart failure. She was 79.
Born in London on February 27, 1932 to American parents, Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor was relocated from London to LA in 1939 to avoid the oncoming war. Once there, the striking young girl with violet-blue eyes soon caught the attention of studio scouts and won her first movie role at just ten years old.
Her next appearance was in 1943 in ‘Lassie Come Home,’ which won her an MGM contract. Then she made ‘National Velvet’ – and that made her a star. It grossed over $4m – a fortune by 1944 standards, and her screen cache and box-office appeal grew into sixty-six other movies
By 1954 Elizabeth was regarded as one of the most strikingly beautiful women in Hollywood. She was a celebrity in the true sense of the word, and she could act. This was proved with her first Academy Award nomination two years later at just 26.
Another nomination followed in 1957 for ‘Raintree County, then for ‘Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,’ and a fourth for ‘Suddenly Last Summer’ in 1959. But even the Academy couldn’t resist her bravura performance in ‘Butterfield 8′ and in 1960 they finally gave her the little gold man.
In 1963 she made ‘Cleopatra,’ for which she was paid the record-setting salary of $1-million. It was while filming this movie she met Richard Burton, who became her fifth husband. To call their union ‘unsettled’ would be kind – it was the marital equal of an open gas tank and a match. Despite making twelve movies together they broke up countless times, divorced in ’74, remarried in ’75, then split for good in 1976.
But Elizabeth’s health slowly became an unwelcome co-star. She almost died of pneumonia in 1961, and also suffered addictions to painkillers and drink. The ’90′s brought two hip replacements and a benign brain tumor, and in 2004 she was diagnosed with congestive heart failure.
This left her short of breath and also twisted her spine, yet she continued to raise money for research into AIDS which killed her best friend, Rock Hudson in 1991. But the heart disease took its toll and she was admitted to Cedars-Sinai hospital in LA six weeks ago where her condition declined.
Elizabeth finally reached fade-out at 6.15am PT this morning, surrounded by her four children – Michael and Christopher Wilding, Maria Burton and Liza Todd. Her legacy also survives in ten grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.
In a statement, Michael called his remarkable mother, “an extraordinary woman who lived life to the fullest.”
“We know, quite simply, that the world is a better place for Mom having lived in it,” he says in the release. “Her legacy will never fade, her spirit will always be with us, and her love will live forever in our hearts.”
A private family funeral is planned for later this week. The family have requested that fans make donations to ‘The Elizabeth Taylor Aids Foundation’ instead of sending flowers.
Source: NPR
