Elizabeth Taylor

She was my first and most enduring image of an ideal of feminine beauty I could never hope to equal. Nothing about me except the fact of being female ever seemed the equal of the perfection I saw in all those fan magazines I perused during my teenage years.

Then I read about the romances, the marriages and divorces, the furs and diamonds -- all of it was from a world I knew existed in some stratosphere far beyond the earthly world I inhabited. Eventually I gained enough education and experience to understand that sometimes she had an opportunity to truely follow her art, to act and act very, very well, so well that sometimes one could stop looking at that face, those eyes, those eyebrows and get lost in the booze addled Martha, or in other roles. But the magazines made me ache for her romances with the brilliant and impossible Richard and her several serious illnesses. Despite it all, she lived a relatively long life -- certainly a rich life, by which I do not mean financially although it was that too. Like millions of other life-long fans, I'm saddened by her death and will forever be glad she will live on in her films.

Taming of the Shrew

I was a very young teenager when I discovered Elizabeth Taylor. She was also very young, though a bit older than I, but already a star and the most beautiful woman who could ever be. I have never stopped believing that. I have not watched a movie with her in it for a very long time.

Today I saw most of the Taylor/Burton/Zeferelli Taming of the Shrew. She was breathtaking as always. Burton looked so young an vital, not the picture of the alcohol sodden man I carry in my mind. The play itself is over the top, the movie, especially with Zeferelli's sets and costumes, was over the top. Who cares? This was a total visual treat and Shakespeare be damned.

The coordinator of the course in which this was shown [last week we saw the Pickford/Fairbanks version] asked what obligation does a movie maker have to Shakespeare. I didn't speak up -- many others did, complaining that neither movie was true to the Bard. I don't think movie makers have, or even should have, an obligation to the original source -- they butcher living writers' work; should we expect any greater fidelity to a long dead writer even if he was the greatest dramatist in the English language? Of course not. It's entertainment, pure and simple. If Hollywood ever attempts Shakespeare [very rare!] we should rejoice. A few of the "rabble" will become acquainted in some way with the great man. This movie was a money maker after the flop of the ridiculously expensive Cleopatra. Hurrah! People saw it, some people realized they could enjoy Shakespeare, maybe a few even went to see other Shakespeare production, even on stage. Who knows? I know young people discovered Shakespeare because of Zeferelli's overwrought [but beautifully photographed] Romeo and Juliet. Meanwhile I"m just as amazed by, and painfully jealous of, Liz's perfect face and incredible eyes as I was when I was 15. Many women are very beautiful but Taylor had a special perfection, and she actually could act.