Elizabeth Taylor’s infamous affair with Cleopatra co-star Richard Burton has been controversial for a century! Among those who scrutinized their relationship was Elizabeth’s father, Francis Taylor. In her recently unearthed old interviews featured in Nanette Burstein’s documentary Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes, the actress revealed her dislike of her father.
“My father used to call me ‘hey,'” she said in a taped conversation recorded from 1964 to 1965. When she decided to leave her fourth husband, Eddie Fisher, because she had fallen in love with Burton, people immediately attacked her. “I had a lot of resistance from everybody,” she said in the tape.
The two met while working on Cleopatra, where she played the title role, and he played Mark Antony, while they were both in separate marriages – she with Elizabeth Fisher and Burton with Sybil Christopher. In 1962, press coverage first emerged about their affair, and unprecedented public criticism followed.
“The Vatican newspaper published an article saying I was disgusting,” Elizabeth said on the tape. “My own children should be taken away from me, an attack that really – well, it made me feel nauseous.” The actress also revealed she received threats of violence and recalled it as a “horrific week.”
When asked if he felt guilty about leaving Fisher to go to Burton and causing mayhem, he answered in the affirmative. “Yes, yes. Especially about Richard’s kids. We both feel that way, because we caused them such terrible pain,” he said.
Burton had two daughters, Kate and Jessica, with his former wife Christopher. Elizabeth also gave birth to sons, Michael Howard and Christopher Edward, with her second husband Michael Wilding, and a daughter, Lisa Frances, with her third husband Mike Todd. Together, Elizabeth and Burton adopted Maria McCain.
When journalist Richard Meryman asked him if he was concerned about divine punishment for his actions, he said he would atone on Earth as the universe decreed.
Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes premiered at the Cannes Film Festival and is now streaming on Max and HBO.