Debbie Reynolds on losing husband Eddie Fisher to Elizabeth Taylor | Daily Mail Online comments When Debbie Reynolds, actress, singer and all-American girl next door, married crooner Eddie Fisher, who was then rivalling Frank Sinatra in popularity, it was the show business wedding of the year. He would proudly introduce her on stage as 'my princess'. She would look up at him adoringly and call him 'my handsome prince'. It was the stuff of fairytale romance. But two years later, the dream was shattered. Lonely at home, while Eddie was away on tour, she telephoned her best friend Elizabeth Taylor at her hotel for a chat. To her great shock, Fisher answered. Betrayed: Singin' In The Rain star Debbie Reynolds lost first husband Eddie Fisher to Liz Taylor 'Suddenly, a lot of things clicked into place,' she recalls. 'I could hear her voice asking him who was calling - they were obviously in bed together. I yelled at him, "Roll over, darling and let me speak to Elizabeth". Fisher slammed the receiver down and rushed home for a face-to-face confrontation. 'I'm sorry,' he told her.

'Elizabeth and I are in love and I want a divorce.' Debbie replied: 'If you marry her, she will throw you out within 18 months'. 'And Elizabeth did get rid of him, just as I had warned, when she met Richard Burton on the set of Cleopatra,' Debbie says now. Debbie - currently touring Britain with her one-woman show, which opens in London's West End next week - recalls her first marriage without bitterness. 'Elizabeth had been recently widowed when her husband Mike Todd had died in a plane crash. We had all been good friends. Good friends: Eddie Fisher, centre, split from Debbie Reynolds, right, for Elizabeth Taylor, left. But Debbie said she remains good friends with her rival Oscars 1960: Elizabeth Taylor with her fourth husband Eddie Fisher, with her award for best actress for her role in Butterfield 8 'Eddie had been best man at their wedding and I had been a bridesmaid. We saw a lot of each other and I never suspected that she was going to entice my husband away. 'I might not have been as surprised were it anyone else. But how it all happened was rather scandalous in that they didn't take more care to avoid hurting me.

I understand when I look back on it. Who would pass by Elizabeth? No woman living was as beautiful as her. And Eddie had even tried to act like Mike Todd, smoking big cigars. 'I was the last to find out about the affair. There had been hints in the papers and I had noticed that when I turned up at functions or parties on my own my friends were whispering. 'Although I didn't want to find out the truth, I had to face up to it. Even so, it was a great shock to find them together. It left me shattered.' The shock of discovering the affair, she says, was the day she lost her innocence. 'I was a virgin when I married Eddie, but Elizabeth had been married three times. I was devastated because I had two children. 'I was very religious so I didn't believe in divorce, but they laid guilt on me that I was keeping them and true love apart. So, I finally let Eddie off the hook. I told him to go.' For seven years, the two women avoided contact - until Debbie boarded the Queen Elizabeth with her second husband, Harry Karl, a wealthy shoe manufacturer, and found that Miss Taylor was on the ship.

Foursome: Mike Todd, left, with Liz Taylor, Eddie Fisher and Debbie Reynolds She recalls: 'Liz was with Richard Burton and her whole family, all the children and the nannies. I sent a little note to her, saying: "Let's get together to have dinner. It's silly to carry on this fight now that we've both remarried and it's all just sort of ridiculous, isn't it?" 'It turned out she'd sent one to me at the same time, so they criss-crossed. We had dinner that night in the main dining room. Heads turned. Cameras were everywhere. People were hiding behind plants taking pictures.' To this day, she remains in touch with Elizabeth, the past forgotten and forgiven. 'I call her, I don't visit. She's not very well and everyone should pray for her. She has great courage and a great verve for living. I have to give her A for effort. I mean, she went deep sea diving last year.' Her biggest regret was being unable to help her friend Marilyn Monroe. Evangelist Dr Billy Graham warned her Monroe was in danger and said to pass the message on. But Debbie had just had a miscarriage and couldn't contact her.

Monroe died, of a drugs overdose, the next day. Debbie Reynolds: She is performing a one-woman show in London Debbie believes she was murdered because of her affairs with President Kennedy and his brother Bobby, which threatened their political careers. 'For all her fame and beauty, men took advantage of her,' Debbie says. And while Debbie was blessed with fame and fortune, becoming a star in Hollywood's golden era, she has suffered from terrible knocks three disastrous marriages and bankruptcy twice. ‘Some people think I’m tough,’ she says. ‘But you have to be in order to make a living in show business for more than 60 years. ‘Besides, I don’t care about what people say about me any more. I am thicker skinned than when I started out.’ Debbie admits that when it came to men she made some bad choices. She only slept with four men and three of them were her husbands. She says: ‘I happen to have married idiots. I made terrible mistakes. I believed men who said: “I love you, you’re fabulous, you’re wonderful, I want to spend my life with you”. I was a gullible fool.’ But she long ago gave up on men.

‘I’ve had enough,’ she says. ‘How long would you want me to go on? I don’t think one wants to walk into a thrashing machine and be beaten up all the time. ‘Three dreadful marriages is quite enough. I was too trusting with men, but I always thought that you should be. I mean, love is like that.’ When she fell in love with Eddie Fisher, Frank Sinatra privately tried to put her off marrying him. He warned her it was ‘a difficult life’ to be married to a singer. Fisher was at his peak with hit records, his own TV show, major tours and was a huge Las Vegas attraction. ‘But my heart was ruling my head and I didn’t want to listen,’ she says. She married the crooner in 1955 in what was described as the ‘show business wedding of the year’. Everyone, especially Debbie, who married him on her 24th birthday, thought they were the ideal couple. But, as Sinatra had warned, the marriage had problems from the start.

'By the time our daughter Carrie was six months old Eddie was not at home or not talking to me when he was.' And there was even more tension when her record Tammy went to number one. After all, Eddie felt he had always been the recording star of the family. Her toughest job was filming with Gene Kelly, in Singin’ In The Rain. ‘I didn’t like him because he would make me dance a scene 40 times. My feet would be bleeding.’ She was 26 when she realised Fisher had been beguiled by Elizabeth Taylor, who at just a month older, had already been divorced twice and widowed once. By the time she reached her forties, Debbie was facing bankruptcy, despite having earned a fortune in her own right and being married for a second time to multi-millionaire Harry Karl, who was 27 years older. This marriage lasted 13 years between 1960 and 1973. 'I discovered he had gambled all our money away - $50million of his and $100million of mine. I lost my five houses and all my cars - everything I had made from my movies and my records.

It took me 14 years to pay off his debts.' Her third marriage to Richard Hamlett, a property developer, also led to disaster . Married between 1984 and 1996, they invested in a hotel and casino in Las Vegas, where Debbie had been a main attraction. But eventually he was responsible for losing her money and she was declared bankrupt in 1997, with the entire business venture crumbling. Perhaps her life would have taken a different course if she had married her first love, the actor Robert Wagner. Singin' In The Rain: Debbie Reynolds with Gene Kelly in the iconic film 'Oh, what might have been. I was 16 and he was a couple of years older. I had a crush on him and the studios fixed up our dates,' she says. 'All we did was kiss, though. He was adorable and so good looking. If I'd married him, I' m sure I would have been happy.' She recently bumped into Wagner, who at 80 remains married to his third wife, Jill St John, and she reminded him of when they used to sit and cuddle.

'He said: "It's too bad you didn't give me more." I told him: "Well, that's just how it was at the time. A pity, maybe. But you are always going to be my first love."' Now, at the age of 78, she is at last enjoying a good relationship with her actress daughter Carrie Fisher (who played Princess Leia in Star Wars), although it wasn't always easy. 'For a long time, as a little girl, she was jealous of having to share me with so many other people. Why couldn't I be like other girls' mothers and bake cookies in the kitchen all day, instead of going out making movies? There was a definite resentment. 'Then, when she went into acting, she realised that I'd taken the hard option, not the easier one of staying home. 'It's good that we are such friends now that I haven't got a lot of time left.' Debbie is planning on staging an exhibition of her collection of Hollywood movie memorabilia in London's Royal Albert Hall next year.

She has some 5,000 items, from Judy Garland's ruby slippers in The Wizard Of Oz to Audrey Hepburn's Ascot dress from My Fair Lady and some of John Wayne's many guns. 'All the items come from a time when stars had real glamour. For me, it's not just a hobby, it's a fantastic investment. 'I have put all my savings into my private museum - I don't waste money on men any more.' Debbie Reynolds Alive And Fabulous is at the Apollo Theatre, London, from April 28th to May 9th. For tickets, call 0844 4124658 or visit ticketmaster.co.uk Debbie Reynolds Opens Up About Time Elizabeth Taylor Stole Her Husband - ABC News ABC News Debbie Reynolds Opens Up About Time Elizabeth Taylor Stole Her Husband By Michael Rothman Jan 20, 2015, 11:17 AM ET 0 Shares WATCH Debbie Reynolds Reveals She Settled Feud With Major Star 0 Shares Email Debbie Reynolds was married to her first husband Eddie Fisher until their divorce in 1959.

But it wasn't the cleanest of splits as the singer left Reynolds for his next wife, Elizabeth Taylor , that same year. Reynolds, who had two children -- Carrie and Todd Fisher -- with her late ex, opened up about her relationship with Taylor before and after she stole Eddie more than five decades ago. Eddie died at the age of 82 in 2010. "We were friends for years and years," Reynolds told People magazine. "but we had a lapse of time when she took Eddie to live with her because she liked him, too. She liked him well enough to take him without an invitation!" Watch: Debbie Reynolds Reveals She Settled Feud With Major Star Reynolds said before that time period in the early 1960s, she and Taylor were close and their relationship as friends began when the two went to school together at MGM. "I went to MGM when I was around 17, and Liz was there too, but she was already a star," the "Susan Slept Here" star, 82, added. "We went to school together on the lot, when she was in between films.

I was just a beginner, and she and I were not in any manner alike, but we got along very well because I was in awe of going to school with Elizabeth Taylor." Reynolds and Taylor eventually got over the scandal before the icon died in 2011. "Elizabeth and I went on a cruise ship and we were on the same boat ... she sent a note to me and I sent a note to her to say 'Let's just forget about it,'" Reynolds told Access Hollywood in 2013 of when they finally buried the ax, sometime in the late 1960's or early 1970's. "She was married to Richard Burton [at the time after she left Eddie in 1964] and I was married to Harry Karl [whom she was married to from 1960 to 1973], who was in the shoe business. We just spent the whole cruise ship -- on the Queen Elizabeth -- so we had to have a get together." Reynolds will be honored this Sunday at SAG with a lifetime achievement award.

0 Shares Debbie Reynolds, Elizabeth Taylor: Friends After Eddie Fisher Feud | The Huffington Post Debbie Reynolds, Elizabeth Taylor: Friends After Eddie Fisher Feud 12/01/2011 05:48 pm ET | Updated Dec 01, 2011 Sara Wilson Senior Editor, HuffPost Weddings & HuffPost Divorce Debbie Reynolds has endured a notoriously difficult personal life. The actress' first marriage to Eddie Fisher ended in 1959 -- after four years and two children -- when Fisher left her for a widowed Elizabeth Taylor, despite the fact that the two women were close friends. While Reynolds was understandably livid -- for a while, at least -- she later welcomed Taylor back into her life, and the two remained lifelong friends. So we wondered: how the heck does a friendship bounce back from a betrayal as significant as that?

HuffPost Divorce had a chance to ask the iconic entertainer just that question Thursday at the Paley Center for Media in Beverly Hills, following a tour she hosted of never-before-displayed treasures from her massive collection of film memorabilia , set to go up for auction Saturday (Reynolds was in attendance as part of the day-long TedxWomen conference organized in conjunction with the Paley). Below, her candid comments: Elizabeth Taylor ran off with your husband. You later became friends with her. You even have memorabilia from her films in your collection. How did you move past her betrayal? Elizabeth and I were good friends when we were young -- 17. And then when we got older and Eddie [Fisher] left with Elizabeth, things changed, of course. But we wound up to be very good friends again, and laughed about it. Elizabeth was a very strong, powerful woman. When she saw something that she wanted, she got it. And that just happened to be my husband. How do you get to that positive point with a friend after a situation like that? Did it have anything to do with the fact that you married and divorced twice more after splitting from Fisher?

You have to look at what life is all about, and is it worth it? And, is he worth it? The friendship was perhaps worth more. Divorce and marriage are very close. You read about it every day. Somebody splits up and they stay friends. Someone else splits up and they're terrible enemies and they kill each other. Well, that didn't happen in my life -- it was just a split -- and I was bright enough to know that I respected my friendship with Liz, and I felt that we both had something more to do with it other than being angry with each other. Was there one moment you remember where you said, 'OK, we're over this?' Yes. We got on the same boat to go to Europe -- the Queen Elizabeth. I sent a note to her and she sent a note to me in passing, and then we had dinner together. She was married to Richard Burton by then. I had been remarried at that point. And we just said, 'let's call it a day.' And we got smashed. And we had a great evening, and stayed friends since then. So what did you learn from all of this? I don't marry well. I make very bad choices!

Debbie Reynolds - Biography - IMDb Debbie Reynolds Biography Showing all 64 items Jump to: Overview (5) | Mini Bio (1) | Spouse (3) | Trade Mark (3) | Trivia (41) | Personal Quotes (10) | Salary (1) Overview (5) 5' 2" (1.57 m) Mini Bio (1) Debbie Reynolds was born Mary Frances Reynolds in El Paso, Texas, the second child of Maxine N. (Harmon) and Raymond Francis Reynolds, a carpenter for the Southern Pacific Railroad. Her film career began at MGM after she won a beauty contest at age 16 impersonating Betty Hutton . Reynolds wasn't a dancer until she was selected to be Gene Kelly 's partner in Singin' in the Rain (1952). Not yet twenty, she was a quick study. Twelve years later, it seemed like she had been around forever. Most of her early film work was in MGM musicals, as perky, wholesome young women. She continues to use her dancing skills with stage work.

She was 31 when she gave an Academy Award-nominated performance in The Unsinkable Molly Brown (1964). She survived losing first husband Eddie Fisher to Elizabeth Taylor following the tragic death of Michael Todd . Her second husband, shoe magnate Harry Karl , gambled away his fortune as well as hers. With her children as well as Karl's, she had to keep working and turned to the stage. She had her own casino in Las Vegas with a home for her collection of Hollywood memorabilia until its closure in 1997. She took the time to personally write a long letter that is on display in the Judy Garland museum in Grand Rapids, Minnesota and to provide that museum with replicas of Garland's costumes. The originals are in her newly-opened museum in Hollywood. Nearly all the money she makes is spent toward her goal of creating a Hollywood museum. Her collection numbers more than 3000 costumes and 46,000 square-feet worth of props and equipment. With musician/actor Eddie Fisher , she was the mother of filmmaker Todd Fisher and actress Carrie Fisher . Debbie died of a stroke on December 28, 2016, one day after the death of her daughter Carrie.

She was survived by her son and granddaughter, up-and-coming actress Billie Lourd . Mother of Carrie Fisher and Todd Fisher . She appeared as Dan's mother, fresh out of the mental ward, during an episode of the sitcom Roseanne (1988). When she later appeared on Roseanne Barr 's talk show, she revealed that during the filming of that episode, while she and Roseanne were wrestling in the back yard, Roseanne, quite unknowingly, accidentally broke one of her ribs. In 1984, with friends like Shelley Winters and Terry Moore , she made a rather restrained exercise video for "women of a certain age". Won the 1948 Miss Burbank contest and was offered a screen test by Warner Bros. the day after her win. She initially entered the contest because everyone who entered received a silk scarf, blouse and free lunch. Ex-mother-in-law of Paul Simon . She made her first appearance at the Hollywood Collectors & Celebrities Show on April 6th and 7th, 2002, at Beverly Garland 's Holiday Inn in North Hollywood, California. In 1975 she sold the Beverly Hills mansion she had lived in with Harry Karl .

The house was reputed to be worth over $1,000,000. The buyer was Jim Randall , an industrialist who made aircraft rivets. When he married Marisa Berenson , the wedding was held in the redecorated home and his best man was his friend George Hamilton . Considers herself a "movie-oholic" and has an extensive collection of memorabilia, with over 4,000 costumes from the silent screen period to the 1970s. She has been known to gather posters from her collection of 3,000 and drive to homes of actor pals for autographs. In the 1990s she turned her collection into a Las Vegas movie museum, but had to shut it down in 1997 because of financial problems. Recently she has looked into the possibility of opening up a hall of fame museum in Hollywood near Grauman's Chinese Theatre. At one particularly low point in her career, she confessed to literally living in her car, a Cadillac. Opened the Hollywood Motion Picture Collection near the Kodak Theatre.

The collection, which was collected and preserved primarily by Reynolds herself, features over 3,000 costumes including Carmen Miranda 's turbans, a pair of Judy Garland 's ruby slippers from The Wizard of Oz (1939), John Wayne 's guns and Marilyn Monroe 's windswept dress from The Seven Year Itch (1955). [April 2002] Made her Broadway debut in 1973 in the revival of "Irene". Although the reviews for the show itself were mixed, hers were all raves and she wound up with a Tony Award nomination the following year for Best Actress in a Musical. The production ultimately ran some 20 months. In 1976, she appeared in a one-woman, short-run (10 days - 14 performances) review named "Debbie!" at the Minskoff Theatre. Her only other Broadway appearance to date came when she succeeded Lauren Bacall in "Woman of the Year" in 1983.

In one of her guest appearances on Will & Grace (1998), she enters a room humming a bit of "Good Morning", which was a song she sang in her most famous musical, Singin' in the Rain (1952). Was a member of the International Order of Job's Daughters. Is a past honored Queen of Bethel No. 97, Burbank, California. Had planned to go into the education field (teaching physical education) before she won the Miss Burbank contest. She was awarded a Star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6654 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood, California on January 13, 1997. Is a Majority Member in California. In 1969 she followed Doris Day and some of her contemporaries in launching a sitcom bearing her name. When the debut episode included an advertisement for cigarettes, a direct violation of one of her contractual stipulations, she made such a fuss about it that NBC ended up canceling the series. Is portrayed by Judith Jones in Liz: The Elizabeth Taylor Story (1995). President of The Thalians, an organization for the treatment of mental health at Cedars Sinai in Los Angeles.

Ruta Lee is the chairman. Both have been actively involved in building this celebrity run organization for over 30 years. Her first appearance on Will & Grace (1998) was in the episode entitled "The Unsinkable Mommy Adler", a play on the title of the movie The Unsinkable Molly Brown (1964). She played both title roles. Although she wanted to be in show business, the Reynolds' family church, the Nazarene, forbade acting. However, Reynolds' father saw her talent and gave his support, seeing it as a means of paying her college costs. Her mother then gave her support knowing that there would be no "evil" going on in her movies. She mother knew her daughter had talent, but didn't understand why it was happening to her own daughter. Close friends with Hugh O'Brian . Serenaded O'Brien and his bride, Virginia, at their wedding on June 25, 2006. Her father entered her in a beauty pageant once when she was very young. She wore a bathing suit that her mother had mended that morning and a pair of her sister's high heels.

In 1964 she went into the hospital business, purchasing Oceanside Hospital in Oceanside, CA, for $1,000,000 with plans to turn it into a profitable business venture. She dedicated the Holland-America Line cruise ship the MS Veendam. [January 1996] Campaigned for the role of Doris Mann in Postcards from the Edge (1990), but Shirley MacLaine was cast instead. One of the few actresses to have danced with both Fred Astaire and Gene Kelly on screen. Other actresses who have done this include: Judy Garland , Cyd Charisse , Vera-Ellen , Rita Hayworth and Leslie Caron . Played the French horn in high school and was a member of the Burbank Youth Symphony. Secondary school studies in Burbank. Friends with Jane Powell ; they share the same birthday. Was a Girl Scout. In the process of relocating her museum to Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. A new Hollywood Motion Picture Museum is being constructed there by Debbie and her children Carrie Fisher and Todd Fisher . It opened in April 2005.

[July 2004] She reconciled with old nemesis Elizabeth Taylor to work on the made-for-TV movie These Old Broads (2001), written by Debbie's daughter, Carrie Fisher , with Taylor, Shirley MacLaine and Joan Collins . Debbie and Taylor were friends until the late 1950s when Debbie's then-husband, Eddie Fisher , began having an affair with Liz, then left Debbie and married Taylor. When they began working on "These Old Broads" together, Taylor told Debbie, "I owe you a lot". Debbie said, "I just got a lump in my throat when she said that". She had English, some Scottish, Scots-Irish (Northern Irish), and German, and distant French, ancestry. Her singing of "I Want To Be Loved By You", in the film Three Little Words (1950), was dubbed by Helen Kane . Mother-in-law of Catherine Hickland . She died only one day after the death of her daughter Carrie Fisher . Became pregnant by her 2nd husband Harry Karl in 1961 and 1963; on both occasions she suffered stillbirths.

Personal Quotes (10) Singin' in the Rain (1952) and childbirth were the two hardest things I ever had to do in my life. I stopped making movies because I don't like taking my clothes off. Maybe it's realism but, in my opinion, it's utter filth. [asked what her favorite film is] I think one of my favorite films is Dark Victory (1939) with Bette Davis . Why? She was so wonderful in that film. And . . . maybe I just want a good cry once in a while without having to go through a divorce. Daddy had got us rooms in a motel until he could find us a house. There were not a lot of places available for a young family on our budget. Daddy went around to dozens of places. Nobody wanted kids. Finally, he found one in the hills south of Glendale. As usual, the landlady asked if he had kids. "Yep,' he replied. "A boy and a girl". "Well, whatta you going to do about them?" she wanted to know, implying that she didn't allow children. "I'm gonna take 'em out and drown them in the Los Angeles River, and come back tomorrow".

That was my father--ask a silly question and just wait. She must have had the same sense of humor--we moved in the next day. I do 20 minutes every time the refrigerator door opens and the light comes on. [on the death of Tony Curtis ] Nobody had a better time than Tony. He loved the ladies. He loved art. He loved this business more than anything. He was a great looking guy, handsome. We were all very close friends when we were young, a long, long time ago. But he had a wonderful life. He had a full life. He was a great, marvellous actor. I only had radio growing up, so I loved going to the movies. I always had a thing for a fairy-tale ending. [on Carrie Fisher ] People used to call her "Debbie Reynolds' daughter," now they call me "Princess Leia's mother!" [on the announcement that daughter Carrie Fisher is in Star Wars: The Force Awakens (2015)] She's very excited about it . . . she's been on a diet ever since, because you know they have to be up to par, so she looks terrific, she's lost 40 pounds.

Upon the death of her daughter Carrie Fisher one day earlier while planning her funeral at her son's Todd house Debbie Reynolds said to her son, "I miss her so much, I want to be with Carrie." Salary (1) Eddie Fisher dies; 5 marriages included Debbie Reynolds, Liz Taylor | The Seattle Times Eddie Fisher dies; 5 marriages included Debbie Reynolds, Liz Taylor Originally published September 23, 2010 at 10:45 pm Updated January 3, 2017 at 10:05 am In this 1959 photo, actress Elizabeth Taylor is seen with singer Eddie Fisher before their marriage. Eddie Fisher, whose huge fame as a pop singer was overshadowed by scandals ending his marriages to Debbie Reynolds and Elizabeth ... Share story RAQUEL MARIA DILLON Associated Press Editor’s note: Eddie Fisher died Sept. 22, 2010. His daughter Carrie Fisher died Dec. 27, 2016. You can read her obituary here. On Dec. 28, 2016, Debbie Reynolds, Carrie’s mother and Eddie’s ex-wife, died. You can read Reynolds’ obituary here.

LOS ANGELES — Eddie Fisher, whose huge fame as a pop singer was overshadowed by scandals ending his marriages to Debbie Reynolds and Elizabeth Taylor, has died. He was 82. His daughter, Tricia Leigh Fisher, of Los Angeles, told The Associated Press that Mr. Fisher died Wednesday night (Sept. 22, 2010) at his home in Berkeley of complications from hip surgery. “Late last evening the world lost a true America icon,” Mr. Fisher’s family said in a statement released by publicist British Reece. “One of the greatest voices of the century passed away. He was an extraordinary talent and a true mensch.” Most Read Stories Unlimited Digital Access. $1 for 4 weeks. The death was first reported by Hollywood website deadline.com . Mr. Fisher’s clear dramatic singing voice brought him a devoted following of teenage girls in the early 1950s.

He sold millions of records with 32 hit songs including “Thinking of You,” “Any Time,” “Oh, My Pa-pa,” “I’m Yours,” “Wish You Were Here,” “Lady of Spain” and “Count Your Blessings.” His fame was enhanced by his 1955 marriage to movie darling Debbie Reynolds — they were touted as “America’s favorite couple” — and the birth of two children. Their daughter Carrie Fisher became a film star herself in the first three “Star Wars” films as Princess Leia, and later as a best-selling author of “Postcards From the Edge” and other books. Carrie Fisher spent most of 2008 on the road with her autobiographical show “Wishful Drinking.” In an interview with The Associated Press, she told of singing with her father on stage in San Jose, Calif. Eddie Fisher was by then in a wheelchair and living in San Francisco. When Eddie Fisher’s best friend, producer Mike Todd, was killed in a 1958 plane crash, Mr. Fisher comforted the widow, Elizabeth Taylor. Amid sensationalist headlines, Mr. Fisher divorced Reynolds and married Taylor in 1959.

The Fisher-Taylor marriage lasted only five years. She fell in love with co-star Richard Burton during the Rome filming of “Cleopatra,” divorced Mr. Fisher and married Burton in one of the great entertainment-world scandals of the 20th century. Mr. Fisher’s career never recovered from the notoriety. He married actress Connie Stevens, and they had two daughters. Another divorce followed. He married twice more. Edwin Jack Fisher was born Aug. 10, 1928, in Philadelphia, one of seven children of a Jewish grocer. At 15, he was singing on Philadelphia radio. After moving to New York, Mr. Fisher was adopted as a protègè by comedian Eddie Cantor, who helped the young singer become a star in radio, television and records. After getting out of the Army in 1953 after a two-year hitch, hit records, his own TV show and the headlined marriage to Reynolds made Mr. Fisher a top star.

The couple costarred in a 1956 romantic comedy, “Bundle of Joy.” In 1960 he played a role in “Butterfield 8,” for which Taylor won an Academy Award. But that film marked the end of his movie career. After being discarded by Taylor, Mr. Fisher became the butt of comedians’ jokes. He began relying on drugs to get through performances, and his bookings dwindled. He later said he had made and spent $20 million during his heyday, and much of it went to gambling and drugs. In 1983, Mr. Fisher attempted a full-scale comeback. But his old fans had been turned off by the scandals, and the younger generation had been turned on by rock. The tour was unsuccessful.

He had added to his notoriety that year with an autobiography, “Eddie: My Life, My Loves.” Of his first three marriages, he wrote he had been bullied into marriage with Reynolds, whom he didn’t know well; became nursemaid as well as husband to Taylor, and was reluctant to marry Connie Stevens but she was pregnant and he “did the proper thing.” Another autobiography, “Been There, Done That,” published in 1999, was even more searing. He called Reynolds “self-centered, totally driven, insecure, untruthful, phony.” He claimed he abandoned his career during the Taylor marriage because he was too busy taking her to emergency rooms and cleaning up after her pets and children. Both ex-wives were furious, and Carrie Fisher threatened to change her name to Reynolds. At 47, Mr. Fisher married a 21-year-old beauty queen, Terry Richard. The marriage ended after 10 months. His fifth marriage, to Betty Lin, a Chinese-born businesswoman, lasted longer than any of the others. Mr. Fisher had two children with Reynolds: Carrie and Todd; and two girls with Stevens: Joely and Tricia.

RAQUEL MARIA DILLON Debbie Reynolds Husbands Feud Settled Elizabeth Taylor, Star Reveals in Memoir Video - ABC News ABC News Actress and singer discusses her relationship with Elizabeth Taylor in her new memoir. 6:15 | 04/02/13 Coming up in the next {{countdown}} {{countdownlbl}} Coming up next: More information on this video Enhanced full screen Video Transcript Transcript for Debbie Reynolds Reveals She Settled Feud With Major Star through &#9834; &#9834; good morning good morning to you &#9834; debbie reynolds danced her way into the hearts of america at the tender age of 19 starring with gene kelly in one of hollywood's most iconic hits "singing in the rain." &#9834; We're singing singing in the rain &#9834; that ship may be down but not me, I'm unsinkable. Reporter: But it was her role as the boisterous "titanic" heroine molly brown that nabbed her an oscar nomination and made her a household name in 1964. Movieland's big night.

Reporter: For america's sweetheart, life seemed perfect. A big career, two beautiful kids, carrie and todd and the bright lights hid the pain of a scandalous divorce from singing sensation eddie fisher. It was the biggest headline of the time when he left her and wed her best friend, bombshell beauty elizabeth taylor. Debbie would marry two more times and manage to overcome a grand scale of financial woes by auctioning off her prized possessions, a collection 45 years in the making of hollywood memorabilia. Proving for this hollywood icon the show must always go on. For debbie reynoldss is truly unsinkable. "Unsed. We're so pleased to have debbie reynolds with us to talk about her brand-new memoir. Welcome to "good morning america." I can't standing the morning. Good morning. Even more -- we have to get up at 3:00 so went to bed at 2:00. Hi. Good morning, good morning. We love that voice. We'll all drop dead you'll see, good morning. Well, I'm delighted to be here with my new little book.

I want to ask you because i know you wrote "my life." So why did you feel like you needed to come back and tell -- I had lived 20, 30 years. I thought since I lived another 20, 30 years and so shocking i can't believe it that I'm still alive. But you -- I'm still alive, right? You are alive. A little early. I know. It is early. But you know what -- I just did a movie besides that. You've written this book. I was just bragging about that. You're starring with michael douglas, matt damon in the liberace biopic called "behind the candle lab bra." "Behind the candle lab bra." Lib watch chi was so sweet, a very special guy and a friend of mine and I play his mother whom I knew in real life and she was polish so she was talking like this all the time so I was get to talk to like this and all white hair, very -- remarkable, though. 81 years old you celebrated yesterday. Yes. Do you see yourself ever slowing down because writing the book, starring in big pictures. I see myself -- I should go backwards now.

Because I just -- I wake up and I look in the mirror and everything has moved someplace else and I've lost control of my body. I don't know where it's gone. I want to talk to you about some of the things you're so candid about. You little level. What do you want to know. We all know the story about elizabeth taylor and eddie fisher but the fact that you guys came back together and that you figured it out. We came back together to dance. No, elizabeth, you know, life goes on and we just decided that the boys are gone and richard burton was elizabeth's love of her life and eddie she just had for a little while and tossed him out. It was such fun. But that's a big thing to be able to move on from this because for her it may have been that but for you it was clearly -- no, no, that was an incident that happens in your life that is unhappy time and you grow up a lot. But it's just something you have to live through and I have lived through a lot of things like that once I put in my book. In the book there's some wonderful stories. A lot of stories.

I love hearing about being miss burbank and your early days on the mgm lot. Brings you back and reminds you of that wonderful era in hollywood. The golden era. The golden age. It is true. Wonderful time and I just am had a lot of fun and people got together and it was -- it's entirely different. It's much tougher for the younger people. In those days they had studios and the heads of studios and took care of us and picked us up and let us wear their fancy clothes. Wonderful stories, all about that and your incredible career. Your highs and lows with great advice and will you please tell carrie we send her our best. That's sweet, my "star wars" princess. Always your princess. Yes, she is. She's a great talent. She's been a little sick but now she's great. Just writing away doing another book. That's great. She's the star of writing. Unbelievable. Unsinkable indeed, miss debbie reynolds. Life has been unsinkable. I loved seeing you. How pretty. Right back at you. Happy birthday and best of luck with this and the movie on hbo.

I put it on -- it's on -- I'm that thing now, you know -- that thing, the internet. Yeah. I'm on the internet and I cannot work it because my mouse keeps running away. And I'm on that now with all my memorabilia for sale. You know, it's a special thing. Very interesting all this. All right. Debbie, we need to go and go outside to sam. Good-bye. Thank you very much. This transcript has been automatically generated and may not be 100% accurate. Elizabeth Taylor: Married 8 times but only Richard Burton truly defined her | Daily Mail Online comments Even at his peak, Richard Burton seemed an unlikely object of desire. Despite his musical voice, he was just 5ft 9in, with pock-marked skin and a tendency towards belligerence. When he was drunk — which was often — he was capable of great cruelty even to his closest friends. When he was sober, he was often maudlin. Yet he managed to seduce one actress after another — from Claire Bloom to Zsa Zsa Gabor.

And he made little effort to hide these short‑lived and grubby affairs from his wife Sibyl, by whom he had two daughters. Besotted: Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton's tumultuous romance seemed doomed to failure right from the outset. She said of Burton: 'I knew what I was doing, loving Richard, was wrong, but I couldn't help it. It was a fact I couldn't evade' By contrast, Eddie Fisher, the husband of Elizabeth Taylor — who died last week — was a clean-cut pop singer whose foxy features and easy smile had already helped shift eight million records. A man of genuine sweetness, he adored his young wife, spending days and nights at Elizabeth’s side when she was hospitalised with pneumonia. RELATED ARTICLES Share this article Share Sadly, his devotion was not reciprocated. Indeed, Elizabeth had known within months that her fourth marriage had been a catastrophic mistake. Fisher’s great failing? For all his popularity as a teen idol, he lacked the swaggering machismo of her third husband, Mike Todd, who’d died in a plane crash and left her half-crazed with grief.

In public, the couple kept up the pretence that they were happy by putting on passionate displays of affection; but in private, Elizabeth often treated Fisher with withering scorn. As with all her other husbands — and there were to be seven in total before she gave up on matrimony — she wanted, above all, to get a rise out of him. It wasn’t enough that he clearly worshipped her; he needed to prove to her satisfaction that he was a ‘real’ man. Rocks and frocks: Elizabeth Taylor flaunts the gigantic diamonds the utterly besotted Burton lavished on her But instead of engaging in battle, Fisher was unfailingly mild and gentle, which infuriated Elizabeth all the more. Sometimes, when she’d been particularly vicious, the poor man — who’d left his previous wife, the actress Debbie Reynolds, for her — would retire to his bed and draw the blankets over his head. ‘Wimp!’ she’d yell. For all her aggressive displays of anger, though, Elizabeth was in emotional tumult. Her most recent movie, Butterfield 8, had been a stinker — despite winning her an Oscar — and she felt adrift without a strong guiding hand.

‘There was something deeply desperate inside me,’ she revealed later. ‘My despair became so black that [sometimes] I just couldn’t face waking up any more.’ Into this cauldron of powerful emotions stepped Burton, then aged 36. When they were both cast in the epic film Cleopatra, Elizabeth was fully aware of the Welsh actor’s reputation and had no intention of becoming, as she put it, ‘another notch on his belt’. Burton, for his part, was equally determined that she should. Even before arriving on set in Rome, he’d confirmed his reputation as a cad by boasting to colleagues that he was going to have sex with the 29-year-old English-born star. ‘I just need two days with her,’ he said. ‘It’s guaranteed.’ As it turned out, he was wrong; it took five. Afterwards, Burton announced to everyone in the Cleopatra make-up van: ‘Gentlemen, last night I screwed Miss Elizabeth Taylor in the back seat of my Cadillac.’ As news of the affair spread around the globe, he turned on Elizabeth’s cuckolded husband with equal crudeness. 'I just need two days with her,' boasted Burton.

As it turned out, he was wrong; it took five One night, Burton showed up unexpectedly at a dinner party at Elizabeth’s villa. ‘Why don’t you just go home to your own wife?’ shouted Eddie Fisher. ‘Elizabeth is mine.’ Burton, who’d been drinking and could barely stand, spouted back: ‘Oh yeah? Well, guess what? They’re both my women.’ Then he confronted Elizabeth with the words: ‘Are you my woman? Well, are you? If so, then come over here and stick your tongue down my throat and prove it.’ Happier times: For a couple of years, Elizabeth was blissfully happy. Friends also remarked that the couple shared a ribald sense of humour that was rare in Hollywood circles Elizabeth stood motionless for a moment, her eyes locked on Burton. Then she moved slowly towards him, and shocked all the guests by pressing her lips firmly against his. Feeling utterly humiliated, Fisher stepped outside. ‘Keep her warm for me, won’t you?’ Burton said to him casually as he left. To Elizabeth, her lover’s callousness was merely further evidence of his irresistible manliness.

Yet, in Rome, people took a dim view of the love affair, yelling out ‘homewrecker’, ‘whore’ and ‘unfit mother’ whenever she appeared in public. For a star more used to adulation, this was extremely hard to take. Far worse, however, was Burton’s sudden decision — fuelled by self-loathing — to return to his long-suffering wife. The next day, Elizabeth dramatically took an overdose of sleeping pills and had to have her stomach pumped. Even her friends were stunned that she’d been prepared to leave her four children — including a recently adopted little girl — without a mother for the sake of a man she’d known for only six weeks. 'Good Lord, I left a good woman to be with a lunatic'. As she reached for her bottle of pills, he swatted the container from her hand and then started pummelling her ‘I knew what I was doing, loving Richard, was wrong,’ said Elizabeth. ‘But I couldn’t help it. It was a fact I couldn’t evade.’ Burton seemed to feel the same: soon enough, they were back together.

But, a few months later, during an Easter break at Porto Santo Stefano in 1962, Elizabeth learned about a side of her lover that she hadn’t suspected: like her first husband Nicky Hilton, he, too, could be brutally violent under the influence of alcohol. According to Burton, they’d retreated to their rented room to drink and have wild sex. Somehow — he could not remember exactly how or why — they began talking about love and death, and Elizabeth announced that she was prepared to kill herself for him. ‘Here and now,’ she said, slurring her words, ‘I’ll do it, Richard. That’s how deeply I love you.’ Together again? There had been speculation Taylor, pictured in 1983, would be buried with her ex-husband Richard Burton in Switzerland Richard laughed. ‘Good Lord,’ he said, ‘I left a perfectly good woman to be with a lunatic!’ As she reached for her bottle of pills, he swatted the container from her hand and then started pummelling her. He recalled nothing else. The next morning, when he came to, he was unable to wake Elizabeth. Once again, she was rushed to hospital to have her stomach pumped.

Her face was swollen beyond recognition and it took three weeks for the bruises to fade sufficiently for filming to resume. The final humiliation was that Cleopatra, which opened 632 days after the first scenes were shot, was a critical dud — despite being the most expensive movie ever made. Even the scenes between the lovers were strangely lacklustre and flat. When Elizabeth was forced to sit through a screening, she only just made it to a lavatory before vomiting. With filming over, the spell that Burton had cast over her began to weaken. Soon afterwards, following a huge row, she left a note on his pillow telling him that the affair was over because they were ‘destroying too many lives’. He didn’t argue; he just quietly slipped out of her life. As the days turned into weeks, Elizabeth — now holed up at a chalet she owned in Switzerland — became morbidly sad. ‘I’d never seen her like that,’ said a woman who knew her very well at this time. Then, one day, Richard called out of the blue, and they arranged to have lunch. For once, Elizabeth realised when they met, he was stone-cold sober.

‘I love you, but what scares me about you is that I think you’re too selfish to be in a real marriage,’ he told her. ‘I’m a selfish b******. I’ve always been my own greatest concern, and I’ve never been able to abandon that notion, and neither can you, dear.’ Elizabeth was stung. ‘But I would do it for you, Richard,’ she said. And, almost incredibly, that is exactly what she did. She vowed to make herself available whenever he wanted, to have sex whenever he chose and not to object if he wanted to be with his wife. So when the Burton/Taylor show moved to England, where they were starring together in a film called The V.I.P.s, he spent weekends with his wife Sybil and their daughters, and returned to Elizabeth at the Dorchester Hotel for the weekdays. He even told more than one reporter that he had no intention of leaving his wife. It was a lunatic arrangement, and it couldn’t last. Finally, in the spring of 1963, Burton decided his marriage was over. Over the next couple of years, Elizabeth was blissfully content.

And, according to his brother Graham Jenkins, Burton ‘began to fall for her in a way that he hadn’t before’. Friends also remarked that the couple shared a ribald sense of humour that was rare in Hollywood circles. Goddess of the silver screen: Taylor playing the title role in one of her most famous films, Cleopatra Still, by the time they married on March 15, 1964, most of their friends and family were exhausted by the continual ups and downs of their tempestuous romance. To begin with, Elizabeth all but gave up her career for Burton, though they went on to make several more films together, including the acclaimed Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, in which they starred as a warring husband and wife. Their roles in this movie, it must be said, were not far removed from reality. ‘Even our fights are fun — nothing placidly bovine about us,’ she recalled. ‘Richard loses his temper with true enjoyment. It’s beautiful to watch.

Our fights are delightful screaming matches, and Richard is rather like a small atom bomb going off — sparks fly, walls shake, floors vibrate.’ At Christmas that year, which they spent in Gstaad, Switzerland, Richard met a willowy blonde English divorcee called Suzy Hunt. She was only 27, but he callously informed his wife that he was going to pursue her Others recall their exchanges as rather more venomous. One woman who witnessed an off-set row saw Elizabeth hurl a vase at Burton in his dressing-room. When he ducked, she grabbed a jug and threw that, too, yelling: ‘You b******!’ Fifteen minutes later, the Burtons emerged holding hands. The rocket fuel for those incendiary rows was always alcohol. Burton would have cognac in the morning, vodka in the afternoon and Scotch and vodka at night — and Elizabeth wasn’t lagging far behind. In addition, she was increasingly dependent on painkillers because of back problems.

As the Sixties flew by, their lifestyle became increasingly extravagant, with butlers, maids and Rolls-Royces — not to mention the extraordinary jewels, such as the 33.19 carat Krupp diamond, that Burton regularly lavished on his wife. To pay the bills, they both made a series of mediocre films unworthy of their talent. However, many decades later, Elizabeth Taylor would look back on this time with nostalgia. ‘I’m glad that I knew the wildness, glamour and excitement when I was in my prime: the parties, the yachts, and the private jets and the jewellery. It was a great time to be young, alive and attractive and to have all those goodies.’ Iconic: Elizabeth Taylor with Richard Burton in Cleoptra. He was the love of her life and she was to marry him twice There were growing problems, nonetheless. Richard clearly hated the Hollywood ethos that Elizabeth represented as one of its biggest stars, yet was growing increasingly depressed at his failure to land an Oscar. He also had problems with fame, feeling that people were staring at them ‘as if we are prize animals’. Moreover, the couple’s drinking was now even more seriously out of control, leading to frequent temper tantrums.

Typically, one would demand something of the other, not get it and then throw a fit, maybe a fist, and, at the very least, a glass of liquor. Once, Burton even damaged his wife’s eardrum after punching her in the head. In truth, there were so many levels of psychological chaos at work within Burton that he would have needed to be married to a psychiatrist, not a movie star, to have been understood fully. Finally, on July 4, 1973, Elizabeth announced that they had decided to separate. ‘Maybe we loved each other too much — I never believed such a thing was possible,’ she said in an emotional statement that ended: ‘Pray for us.’ At the same time, Richard held a press conference in New York, while drinking from a bottle of vodka. ‘You know,’ he said, ‘when two very volatile people keep hacking constantly at each other with fierce oratory, and then occasionally engage in a go of it with physical force, well, it’s like I said: it’s bound to happen.’ Elizabeth defiantly found herself a new boyfriend — a handsome used-car salesman called Henry Wynberg — and flaunted their affair.

Not long after it started, though, she was taken to a Californian hospital with agonising stomach pains and told she might well have cancer. She immediately called Burton — then filming in Italy — to tell him tearfully: ‘I don’t want to die alone. Please, can I come home?’ Within days, Wynberg had been turfed out, Elizabeth had a new 38-carat heart-shaped diamond necklace and the Burton/Taylor melodrama was back on with a vengeance. But not for long: they spent their tenth anniversary fighting and drinking, and soon afterwards decided to divorce. Elizabeth went back to the long-suffering Wynberg, but still continued to talk to Burton on the phone at least two or three times a week. Then, when the ink was barely dry on the divorce papers, she saw him again at a dinner party in Switzerland. Elizabeth, never one to hide her feelings, rushed straight into Burton’s arms, her face awash with tears. The next day, Wynberg was on a plane back to the United States, clutching a ‘retirement’ present of $50,000 and a gold watch.

Scorching: Taylor smouldered on screen including in the 1958 classic Cat On A Hot Tin Roof Richard would later recall: ‘Then, for two days, [Elizabeth and I] circled each other — very wary, very polite. On the third day, we had a fight. Then we knew we were ourselves again.’ Two months later, on October 10, 1975, Elizabeth went through her sixth marriage — to her fifth husband. Burton was sober at the time, but his skin had turned a terrible shade of yellow and his health was clearly beginning to fail. ‘I didn’t think then that their second marriage would last ten minutes,’ recalled their personal bodyguard Brian Haynes. ‘But I could also see that they seemed to need each other. When he was there, she seemed to hate him. When he was away, she couldn’t bear to be without him.’ At Christmas that year, which they spent in Gstaad, Switzerland, Richard met a willowy blonde English divorcee called Suzy Hunt. She was only 27, but he callously informed his wife that he was going to pursue her. This decision, while unutterably cruel, may actually have saved his life.

Elizabeth was by then drinking enough for the two of them, while Suzy was determined to keep her new lover off the booze and nurse him back to health. Coming face-to-face one day with her rival, Elizabeth told her in a world-weary tone: ‘My dear, you’ll last only six months with Richard. That I can guarantee.’ It wasn’t so much a threat as a prediction based on years of experience. She was too exhausted to be mad at a mere girl who didn’t have a clue about what she was getting herself into with a man old enough to be her father. ‘Well, perhaps you’re right,’ said Suzy. ‘But, my, what a six months it shall be.’ Elizabeth forced a smile before responding: ‘Oh, certainly, dear — for all of us.’ Legends: Taylor with Richard Burton on their first wedding day in 1964. He was to be her fifth and sixth husband When Burton left Switzerland for New York to begin rehearsals for the play Equus, he asked Suzy Hunt to join him. He also told friends that now he was sober, he couldn’t imagine why he’d decided to remarry Elizabeth.

His wife, for her part, tried to exact revenge by seducing a 37-year-old advertising man called Peter Darmanin at a Swiss disco called The Cave. She’d sashayed over to him, swaying to the music, and apparently decided, ‘This one will do just fine.’ Then, without interrupting her dance of seduction, she’d kissed him, before taking him home to her lair. She obviously wasn’t over Burton, though, and still spoke to him constantly on the phone. Finally, he summoned her over to see him, and told her bluntly that the marriage was over. On July 29, 1976, less than ten months after they’d wed for a second time, Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton were granted their second divorce. ‘I love Richard with every fibre of my soul,’ she said, before delivering one of the great understatements of her life. ‘But we can’t be together. We’re too mutually self-destructive.’ Her obsession with the Welsh actor would continue, however, through two more marriages to other men. It would lead to heartbreak and personal humiliation.

But never once did she waver from the belief that ‘Dick & Liz’ had been — in her words — ‘the greatest goddamned couple of all time’. Extracted from Elizabeth by J. Randy Taraborrelli, published by Pan at £8.99. © 2006 J Randy Taraborrelli. To order a copy for £7.99 (p&p free) call 0845 155 0720. Elizabeth Taylor, 1932-2011: She Was an Actress and an Activist Elizabeth Taylor, 1932-2011: She Was an Actress and an Activist March 29, 2011 Richard Burton and Elizabeth Taylor in 1969 in Monaco Share Print BARBARA KLEIN: I’m Barbara Klein. STEVE EMBER: And I’m Steve Ember with PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English. Today we tell about the film star Elizabeth Taylor. She made over sixty films during her long career in Hollywood. She was famous for her striking beauty, violet eyes and shining black hair. Taylor was equally known for her complex private life and eight marriages.

Beginning in the nineteen eighties, she also raised millions of dollars to support AIDS research. CLEOPATRA: “Without you, Antony, this is not a world I want to live in, much less conquer. Because for me, there would be no love anywhere. Do you want me to die with you? I will. Or do you want me to live with you? Whatever you choose.” BARBARA KLEIN: That was Elizabeth Taylor playing the queen of Egypt in the nineteen sixty-three movie “Cleopatra.” She earned over one million dollars for her work in this movie. At the time, this was the most money ever paid to an actor for a single film. It was also one of the most costly movies ever made. “Cleopatra” was a larger-than-life movie for a larger-than-life actress. Elizabeth Taylor in 1946 STEVE EMBER: Elizabeth Rosemund Taylor was born in nineteen thirty-two to American parents living in London. Her father Francis was an art dealer. Her mother Sara had worked as a stage actress before her marriage. The Taylors left England in nineteen thirty-nine and moved to southern California. Elizabeth’s beauty soon caught the attention of movie studio officials.

She made her first movie, “There’s One Born Every Minute,” at the age of ten. This was followed a year later by “Lassie Come Home.” But it was the nineteen forty-four film, “National Velvet” that made her a star. Twelve-year-old Elizabeth Taylor starred as Velvet Brown, a girl living in a village in England. She saves a horse and trains him for an important race, which she wins. BARBARA KLEIN: During the nineteen forties Elizabeth Taylor played many roles in movies about families. Not all child actors in Hollywood were successful later playing adult roles. But Taylor easily went from playing children to playing teenagers and adults. In nineteen fifty, she played the bride in the popular film “Father of the Bride.” That was also the year of her first marriage, to the wealthy businessman Conrad “Nicky” Hilton. But their marriage ended in divorce the next year. Speaking after her first divorce, Taylor reportedly said that she had been able to fit in the clothing of a sexy woman since she was fourteen years old. She said her troubles started because she had a woman’s body and a child’s emotions.

Elizabeth Taylor with her husband Mike Todd in 1957 STEVE EMBER: Elizabeth Taylor would quickly become as famous for her private life as she was for her acting career. The media often wrote about her many marriages and love affairs. In nineteen fifty-two she married the British actor Michael Wilding, with whom she had two sons. Five years later they divorced, and she married the film producer Mike Todd. The couple had one daughter, Liza. Mike Todd died in nineteen fifty-eight in a plane crash. One of his close friends was the singer Eddie Fisher. He was married to a good friend of Elizabeth Taylor, the popular actress Debbie Reynolds. Eddie Fisher left his wife in order to marry Elizabeth Taylor. Many people were shocked and angered by this behavior. (MUSIC) BARBARA KLEIN: Elizabeth Taylor once said that during the first part of her career, she did not make a huge effort as an actress. She said this changed in nineteen fifty-one with the movie “A Place in the Sun.” It tells a tragic story about a young man and his relationship with two women. Here is a famous scene with her co-star, Montgomery Clift.

GEORGE: “I am the happiest person in the world.” ANGELA: “The second happiest.” GEORGE: “Oh, Angela, if I could only tell you how much I love you, if I could only tell you all.” ANGELA: “Tell Mama, tell Mama all.” STEVE EMBER: Critics praised Elizabeth Taylor for the depth she brought to this movie. She expressed both innocence and intense sensuality. She began to receive wide praise for her fine and expressive acting. And, she began to receive richer, more interesting roles. One of these was in the movie “Giant” with Rock Hudson and James Dean. It tells the story of a wealthy cattle rancher in Texas and his family. JETT: “I guess you’re about the best looking gal we’ve seen around here in a long time, I think. Prettiest I think I’ve seen down here.” LESLIE: “Why thank you, Jett. That’s a very nice compliment. And I’m going to tell my husband I’ve met with your approval.” BARBARA KLEIN: The movie was a big success. James Dean did not live to see the movie completed.

He died in a car accident in nineteen fifty-five before the movie was released the next year. Elizabeth Taylor received Academy Award nominations for several films she made starting in the late nineteen fifties. The first was for the nineteen fifty-seven movie “Raintree County.” The next year she starred in a film version of the Tennessee Williams play, “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” She plays a beautiful wife who is having marriage troubles. Her alcoholic husband is played by Paul Newman. Many critics consider this one of her best movies. MAGGIE: “Oh Brick! How long does this have to go on, this punishment? Haven’t I served my term? Can’t I apply for a pardon?” BRICK: “Lately, that finishing school voice of yours sounds like you was running upstairs to tell someone the house is on fire.” MAGGIE: “Is it any wonder? You know what I feel like? I feel all the time like a cat on a hot tin roof.” BRICK: “Then jump off the roof, Maggie, jump off it. Now cats jump off roofs and they land uninjured. Do it. Jump.” MAGGIE: “Jump where!

Into what?” Elizabeth Taylor holds the Academy Award she won for her role in "Butterfield 8" STEVE EMBER: Taylor’s third Academy Award nomination was for another movie based on a Tennessee Williams play called “Suddenly Last Summer.” In nineteen sixty, it was her turn to win. She received her first Academy Award for her work in “Butterfield 8”. Her second Academy Award for acting came six years later for her role in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” She starred in this movie opposite her husband at the time, the Welsh actor Richard Burton. MARTHA: “In fact, he was sort of a flop. A great big, fat flop.” GEORGE: “Stop it, Martha.” MARTHA: “I hope that was an empty bottle, George. You can’t afford to waste good liquor. Not on your salary. Not on an associate professor’s salary.” BARBARA KLEIN: The movie was based on a play by Edward Albee. For this role, Elizabeth Taylor gained a great deal of weight in order to look the part of the aging wife of a college professor. “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” received great praise.

But it was Taylor’s first movie with Burton that had made history. “Cleopatra” received a great deal of attention for bringing together Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. Both stars were married to other people at the time. But they began a widely publicized love affair while filming the movie. Burton and Taylor would eventually marry and divorce each other twice. They made many movies together and led a life of extreme fame and wealth. Elizabeth Taylor as "Cleopatra" STEVE EMBER: Taylor later said she remained madly in love with Burton for his entire life. She said she would have married him a third time had he not died unexpectedly in nineteen eighty-four. Elizabeth Taylor’s last two marriages also ended in divorce. She was married to Senator John Warner of Virginia and, later, to a builder named Larry Fortensky. (MUSIC) BARBARA KLEIN: Throughout her life, Elizabeth Taylor faced many health problems. She nearly died twice of pneumonia. She had back, hip, heart and weight problems. In the nineteen eighties, she battled drug and alcohol abuse. She entered a medical center for treatment and was very open with the public about her struggles. She spent much of her time working on her charity and business projects.

She gave her name to several hugely successful perfumes. STEVE EMBER: In nineteen eighty-five, she helped create amFAR, the American Foundation for AIDS Research. She did this during a period when many people believed those infected with the disease were immoral and few recognized its danger. Reports say she helped raise over a hundred million dollars for AIDS research and patients. In nineteen ninety-one she started the Elizabeth Taylor AIDS Foundation. The organization helps people around the world who are living with AIDS. BARBARA KLEIN: Elizabeth Taylor died of heart failure in two thousand eleven at the age of seventy-nine. AIDS researcher Mathilde Krim told USA Today that the actress was always known for her beauty, success and jewelry. But she said Elizabeth Taylor was also a woman of extreme intelligence, independence, courage and a deep concern for others. STEVE EMBER: This program was written and produced by Dana Demange. I’m Steve Ember. BARBARA KLEIN: And I’m Barbara Klein. Our programs are online with transcripts and MP3 files at voaspecialenglish.com. And you can find us on Facebook and YouTube at VOA Learning English. Join us again next week for PEOPLE IN AMERICA in VOA Special English.

Question: Whom did both Debbie Reynolds and Elizabeth Taylor marry?
Answer: Eddie Fisher