First published 2022
Elizabeth Taylor dominated Hollywood like no other actor of her era. Kate Andersen Brower draws from Taylor's private letters, diary entries, and off-the-record interviews to tell her complete story. The biography follows Taylor from her breakthrough role in National Velvet at age twelve through her rise to become the first actor to command a million-dollar film salary. Brower chronicles Taylor's eight marriages, including her passionate relationship with Richard Burton, her struggles with addiction, and her later activism in the AIDS crisis. The author interviewed 250 of Taylor's friends and family members to create this portrait of a woman who was intelligent, empathetic, tenacious, volatile, and complex. Using previously unseen photographs and unread personal writings, Brower reveals the full story behind Taylor's glamorous beauty, tumultuous personal life, and magnetic screen presence that made her the most famous film star of the twentieth century.
Genres: biography, 20th-century, biography-memoir, 21st-century
Vibes: intimate, thought-provoking
Tropes: celebrity-biography
Setting: Hollywood
Period: 20th-century, 21st-century
512 pages · Hardcover · HarperCollins
Content warnings: addiction, mental-illness