Happy Birthday Dear Elizabeth....And Get Well Soon!!!!

photo from ET Online

Elizabeth Taylor, as I am sure you know, has been hospitalised "for treatment of congestive heart failure, a condition she disclosed she had back in November 2004...She was admitted to the Cedars-Sinai Medical Center more than a week ago and will remain in the hospital under observation "for the time being," declared Taylor's publicist, Jamie Cadwell, this past Friday, Feb. 18, 2011.
According to her spokeswoman, Sally Morrison, Taylor, "has continued to show great improvement, and her family and friends are very pleased with her progress" from CBS News.  I wish her a speedy recovery and would like to honor her upcoming birthday (February 27th) with a blog post dedicated to her as part of my celebration of the Oscars.

photo from Yahoo! Images

Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor was born in Hampstead, a wealthy district of North West London, on February 27, 1932.  Shortly before WWII, her family decided to move to California to avoid war hostilities in Europe.  The Taylors were shortly introduced to " Andrea Berens, a wealthy English socialite and also fiancée of Cheever Cowden, chairman and major stockholder of Universal Pictures in Hollywood. Berens insisted that Sara bring Elizabeth to see Cowden who, she was adamant, would be dazzled by Elizabeth's breathtaking dark beauty; she was born with a mutation that caused double rows of eyelashes, which enhanced her appearance on camera. Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer soon took interest in the British youngster as well but she failed to secure a contract with them after an informal audition with producer John Considine had shown that she couldn't sing. However, on 18 September 1941, Universal Pictures signed Elizabeth to a six-month renewable contract at $100 a week" from Wikepedia.

Her first motion picture, at the age of nine, was There's One Born Every Minute. And although she was released from her contract with Universal because some thought "She can't sing, she can't dance, she can't perform. What's more, her mother has to be one of the most unbearable women it has been my displeasure to meet" Liz:An Intimate Biography of Elizabeth Taylor, by C. David Heymann. This did not slow her career down as her agent,  Myron Selznick (brother of David), quickly secured a contract for her at Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer for a three month contract to appear as "Priscilla" in the film Lassie Come Home. Elizabeth  was in many films durring her childhood but it was her film National Velvet that launched Taylor to stardom at the tender age of 12.

After the success of National Velvet and a few more films Elizabeth was able to demand a contract earning her $750 per week, her mother $250, as well as a $1,500 bonus.  Through the years, her salary and contract grew with her film success and she went on to star in many many box office hits.  So many in fact that if I highlighted every one of them....this blog would only be about Elizabeth Taylor and could become a FULL TIME hobby.  She also married a few men during her career.  Both of these, I will leave you to explore on your own with a quick Google or Yahoo! search.  Instead I am going to do a few blog posts in the next few days about MY favorite Elizabeth Taylor movies.  I hope you stay tuned and help honor her Birthday with me by reading about these films and hopefully I can inspire you to watch or re-watch a few. 

So in honor of the great Dame Elizabeth Taylor ( DBE ) and to wish her a speedy recovery, very happy birthday and to just show everyone how beautiful and wonderful she is...I leave you with a few of my favorite Liz images...

Still beautiful in her golden years.

Tiffany