The news of actress Dame Elizabeth Taylor’s death last week has prompted a flurry of tribute messages on our TellYouGov site, with British panellists commemorating her life as a ‘Hollywood legend’, extraordinary beauty and successful acting career.
The majority of comments focussed on her iconic status, with some lamenting the absence of such stars in current times.
'Great passion, humour and love'
Dame Elizabeth Taylor was 72 when she died in hospital from congestive heart failure last week, after suffering from the condition since November 2004. She starred in numerous classic movies including Cleopatra (1960), Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? (1966), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) and Butterfield 8 (1960) and won two Academy Awards for Best Actress in a career which spanned over 65 years.
She was also renowned for her tempestuous personal life. She married 8 times to seven different men and had four children, and the man she married twice, actor Richard Burton, was arguably the love of her life. Although they later divorced, she said of him in a 2006 interview, 'I loved Richard through two marriages and until the day he died.'
Her decades of activism for AIDs awareness and research benefited the cause in excess of $100 million and she was awarded a humanitarian Academy Award in 1993 (pictured, above). Dame Elizabeth’s son, Michael Wilding, paid tribute to her after her death. 'We will always be inspired by her enduring contribution to our world. My mother was an extraordinary woman who lived life to the fullest, with great passion, humour, and love.’
