Elizabeth Taylor

An actress since early childhood, the dark haired, violet-eyed Elizabeth Taylor has won two Best Actress Oscars (for Butterfield 8 in 1960 and Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? in 1966) but is perhaps best known for her rare beauty--and her epic love life. She has been married a total of eight times--twice to the same man, the actor Richard Burton, whom she has called "one of the two great loves of my life." The first was the film producer Mike Todd, who died in a plane crash in 1958. Taylor and Burton met on the set of Cleopatra, when both were married to other people; their affair soon made headlines around the world and earned a public rebuke from no lesser authority than the Vatican. Their own married life together was a study in extremes, soaked in alcohol and characterized by a passion that was no less intense when they were fighting than when they were getting along. After divorcing in 1973, they found it impossible to stay apart and remarried in 1975, only to break up four months later. Barred from Burton's funeral in 1984 by his last wife, Taylor still received legions of condolences, honoring her and Burton's place in the pantheon of history's most celebrated love stories.