31 replies to this topic

[papeetepatrick]

She was a wonderful actress  in 'Reflections in a Golden Eye', in 'Cat on a Hot Tin Roof' (and I thought marvelous in 'Butterfield 8' esp., even though she repudiated it), and quite starry in a number of others. Had a wonderful sense of humour, was kind and generous, while also extravagant--this doesn't always go together, but in this case it does.  She was a great woman.

[cubanmiamiboy]

[dirac]

Burton is so fine in "Virginia Woolf," and it's all the more remarkable when you can see he's doing everything he can to help out Taylor and make her look good.  One of his best performances.

[Bonnette]

dirac, on 25 March 2011 - 05:05 AM, said:

Burton is so fine in "Virginia Woolf," and it's all the more remarkable when you can see he's doing everything he can to help out Taylor and make her look good.  One of his best performances.

Yes, indeed. Burton's performance is simply brilliant. The fact that Taylor gave a better performance in "Virginia Woolf" than anyone expected was sufficient to ensure her an Oscar, perhaps as much out of surprise as anything else; Burton didn't win that year, owing (I suspect) to the simultaneous fascination and antipathy of the public - reflected by the Academy - toward the Burtons as a couple. One of them had to lose. Taylor's improvement - sparked by the sheer novelty of seeing her in that role - was singled out for accolades, while Burton was punished for the sacrifice such a feat required. Burton's passion for Taylor effectively put the kibosh on his own light.

It always seemed to me that Taylor's cosseted early life prevented her from learning first-hand the sorts of life lessons that sparked Burton's performances; one could see her struggling for genuine moments, wrung from experiences she hadn't had. Her life was stamped by wealth, privilege, illness and tragedy, extremes on every hand: the middle steps were missing. In later years, after her movie career had ended, she was able to fashion a renewed path, weaving from her own substance a remarkable tapestry of public service.

I certainly will miss her. I admired her activism and enjoyed her sparkle and the sheer force of her presence, at every age. One senses Zsa Zsa in the wings, and a few others who remember or embody the glory days of Hollywood. The passing of an era, a mindset, a dream, is a weighty thing.

[cubanmiamiboy]

More that Taylor/Clift I'd go for Taylor/Newman for the "Most Gorgeous Couple" title. HOT,HOT!!!  



Still...hard to decide...
http://2.bp.blogspot...l+Newman+10.jpg

http://img.listal.co...omery-clift.jpg

[papeetepatrick]

Bonnette, on 25 March 2011 - 07:48 AM, said:

One senses Zsa Zsa in the wings

as well you might, since the LATimes (which I now have to read the main stories on, as well as WaPo, so as to save idiosyncratic articles in the NYT since they're 'cracking down') reported yesterday that she had had to be hospitalized once she started watching news reports about Liz.  She's got some of the same outlandishness and zaniness of Liz, which is probably why they were friends (or so the article said), but the cottage industry of selling princeling titles to mafia is a bit much--Prince Anhalt is a fake, and so it won't matter that much in certain kinds of dens in Las Vegas and Los Angeles, although they've sold these titles for millions.

NYTimes also had an interesting article about Liz's frequenting of gay bars in West Hollywood, with the Abbey as her hangout.  There was an 'Elizabeth Taylor Room' there, and she came often in her wheelchair.  

The extremes you note are definitely in evidence; perhaps even the weird closeness with Michael Jackson was something she was uniquely suited for--both children, in somewhat different ways, but few have the time to take with someone as far gone into fantasy as Jackson.  Other articles pointed out that she was buried in the same mausoleum at Forest Lawn as Jackson, not far from him.  That's a place I've never managed to make myself go to, although I have been in the Hollywood Forever Cemetery in 2008, where Valentino and many other stars are buried.  I'll see if I can find these articles now...

Here's the Zsa Zsa one:  http://www.latimes.c...295.story  This is pretty sad, since it's all happened (even for her age) since July.  She does look like a very old woman, although the face still has some of the prettiness.

Here's the other.  This is very touching, and obviously Liz felt comfortable with this kind of thing:

http://www.nytimes.c...ollywood&st=cse

[dirac]

"Reflections in a Golden Eye" has a remarkable performance by Brando.  In "Cat on a Hot Tin Roof" Taylor and Newman are more evenly matched - both of them are really pretty and not up to the larger challenges of their roles.  But they certainly look gorgeous together.

[miliosr]

dirac, on 24 March 2011 - 09:32 AM, said:

Quote

I also think her performance in Cleopatra has merit (although I recognize I'm in the minority on that one.)

You sure are. I think she does improve as the movie goes along, dropping a bit of weight, toning down the screeching, and managing some quiet dignity at the end, but that’s about all I can say.

That's interesting because I prefer the screechier first half of Cleopatra to the more subdued second half.  When Taylor/Cleopatra tells Rex Harrison/Julius Caesar about her ambitions for Egypt and Rome to create a global empire to dwarf even that of Alexander, you really believe her!

[cubanmiamiboy]

Let's keep this rolling for Miss Taylor...!!

As a Youtube poster wrote..."And THAT, ladies and gentlemen..is how one makes an ENTRANCE!!! ;D"  

[papeetepatrick]

Cristian, thanks for putting up this clip.  I saw 'Cleopatra' when it first came out, in one of those old big theaters that still had splashy openings with 'souvenir books'. I liked it briefly then, but was upset that, at about 10 years old, I couldn't keep the battles straight (my father cleared that part up.)  Later, I remembered her in this film much less favorably than I did in many (or even most others).  Watching it after nearly 50 years, I see that the closed face when one first sees her that is fantastically effective.  In this, she is well beyond what Colbert had done (which I saw some 20 years after this later version), and all aspects of majesty are conveyed for awhile.  However, once she and the boy are moving, that sense of 'state power' is gone (it's not even done perfectly, and there's almost a sense of being off-balance), and I couldn't believe the wink--it's awful, hokey and absurd by any period's standards, and takes all the 'Egyptianism' out of it, returning it squarely to Famous Lasky Players lot, which had even disappeared long before that. I thought Harrison and Burton both rather poor in the scene, just sort of stagey, wondering how much leer to do.

I was interested to see that the styles of spectacle had not changed that much from D.W. Griffith ('Intolerance' is more effective for the most part than this, though, more exciting and much more beautifully detailed for this kind of big thing) and early and later DeMille (parts of the silent 'Ten Commandments'), all of which I saw much later. There is some particularly campy dancing which looks almost like break-dancing in the procession.  I wouldn't say that the 'parade entertainers' were substantively different from what you see in the Colbert version.  

However, that inscrutable face she has at first glance does make it all worthwhile; with a big Hollywood property like that (no matter where it was filmed), you can't expect them never to fall for the cheap shot, and I hadn't remembered the face in this scene.

I wonder if Cleopatra has ever been well-played. I've read that the Cleopatra of the Shakespeare play is extremely difficult, and that it's usually a near-miss or worse.  The Caesar and Cleopatra with Vivien Leigh is comedic and light, this is not bad at all, except I don't think most people think of Cleopatra as light and girlish that way.  This is her first meeting with Caesar here (I think), and Taylor conveys the sensuality and hyper-seductiveness a good deal more than Leigh ever would, had she even intended to--until that wink.  Before that, the face conveys something essential about what the word and concept 'idol' mean.

[dirac]

Quote

That's interesting because I prefer the screechier first half of Cleopatra to the more subdued second half.  When Taylor/Cleopatra tells Rex Harrison/Julius Caesar about her ambitions for Egypt and Rome to create a global empire to dwarf even that of Alexander, you really believe her!

I didn't. I thought her midcentury American whine put the kibosh on any attempt to evoke an ancient time and place. Her chubby figure, extremely heavy eye makeup, and rather ugly Irene Sharaff ensembles actually make her look unappealing. In the second half of the movie all of these problems are somewhat ameliorated, at least as far as her performance is concerned - although it does seem a bit odd that Cleopatra looks younger and fresher with the years.

(I agree that the first half of the movie is better, but for different reasons.)

[miliosr]

For everyone who ran home from school to watch Luke and Laura on General Hospital . . .

Helena Cassadine (Elizabeth Taylor) curses the marriage of Luke and Laura Spencer (Anthony Geary and Genie Francis) at the height of General Hospital-mania in 1981:



And, arguably, Helena's curse continues to plague the Spencer family (Luke, Laura and their children Lucky and Lulu) on General Hospital, lo these 30 years later.

The money shot starts at 5:45 . . .

[dirac]

Thanks for this, miliosr. I had forgotten about her General Hospital gig.

[rg]

scan of not necessarily rare photocard of Elizabeth Taylor, captioned M.G.M. ELIZABETH TAIJLOR (Dutch? produced and with plain back) presumably from the 1952 movie: LOVE IS BETTER THAN EVER, in which Taylor plays dancing teacher, Anastacia (Stacie) Macaboy (acc'd to imbd).

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[dirac]

Thank you, rg. Nice picture of a lovely girl.