The double Oscar winner, Dame Elizebath Taylor, has died this morning in Los Angeles of congestive heart failure. She was 79.
Born in London in 1932 to American Parents, the legendry Hollywood actress moved to Los Angeles at the age of 9 and within three years she became a star, taking lead roles in the biggest films in Hollywood. She remained a star for more than half a century.
Her golden days came in the 50’s and 60’s, amassing 4 Oscar nominations for Raintree County, Cat on a hot Tin Roof and Suddenly, Summer, and wining an Oscar for Butterfield 8 and a second one for Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf.
But she is mostly known for playing Cleopatra in the 1963 historical epic, Cleopatra, which was notorious as one of the most expensive films of all times, bringing Hollywood studio Fox to its knees. The film also sparked the biggest romance in Taylor’s life, with co star Richard Burton, whom she married, divorced and then remarried in 1975.
Taylor lead a controversial life, marrying 7 men, some she snatched from the embraces of their wives, and spending lavishly on diamonds and other luxuries.
Immense wealth and super stardom didn’t save her from persisting health problems, which began with a deadly strain of Pneumonia following the shooting of Cleopatra in the early sixties. In 1990, she endured two hip replacement operations and in 1997 she survived a brain tumour surgery. She also battled alcohol and painkiller addiction for many years. And in 2004, it was revealed that she suffered from Congestive heart failure and scoliosis.
She was last seen in public two years ago at the funeral of her close friend Michael Jackson.