Elizabeth Taylor’s life has traditionally been portrayed as a torrid soap opera. A tale of sex and scandal: eight marriages while dripping in diamonds and battling addiction. But a new documentary tells a different story – and Kim Kardashian is helping rewrite the script.
Elizabeth Taylor: Rebel Superstar, a three-part series that airs on BBC2 from Friday, reframes its subject not just as a double Oscar-winner but as a business mogul and trailblazing activist who rewrote the rules of fame.
Among the key contributors is her granddaughter Naomi Wilding, who believes a reappraisal is long overdue.
“I was hesitant to take part but the series tells my grandmother’s story from a more human angle,” said Wilding. “We’re going through a reckoning. Events of the last few years mean we’re ready to look at celebrity from a different perspective. They might have money and power but they’re still fallible people with feelings.
“We can use my grandmother’s life as a cautionary tale. An opportunity to think about how we portray women in the media.”
She thinks “rebel superstar” is an appropriate title. “I hope this series will change perceptions. She was bloody-minded about following her own path and making her own decisions. I’d love a new generation to appreciate that because her story is still so relevant today.”
Wilding believes Taylor was a forerunner of today’s reality stars and influencers: “She was the first celebrity to live her life entirely in public. It wasn’t her choice, initially at least. But eventually she made sense of it and used it as a force for good.
“She was decades ahead of her time in how her private life intertwined with her career. She and Richard [Burton] were the original power couple. The ‘Liz and Dick show’ spawned the paparazzi culture we know today, so she consciously took control of the narrative, hiring her own personal photographer [Gianni Bozzacchi, who appears in the docuseries].”
The documentary is executive-produced by Kardashian, who calls herself a protege of Taylor’s and conducted the last interview with her before she died in 2011, aged 79.
“She was unapologetically herself,” Kardashian said. “She was a fighter. Living proof that you can keep evolving and changing and have different chapters in your life. She paved the way for all of us who came after her. She’s the blueprint.”
“Kim was inspired by my grandmother, for sure,” said Wilding. “She became a mentor to younger women, taking them under her wing because she understood the trade-off of living in the public eye.”
Kardashian speaks from experience when she says of Taylor: “Opening yourself up to that scrutiny is hard on your soul.”
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Taylor rose to fame during different times. “Her life played out in headlines which were often misogynistic through today’s lens,” said Wilding.
“She was originally a product of the studio system, sure, but she was treated as a commodity for decades afterwards. Her first marriage was basically arranged by MGM. Aged 16, she was kissing middle-aged men on screen. I thought about her a lot when #MeToo happened, wondering what stories she would share.”
The documentary features previously unheard audio recordings of an unguarded Taylor reflecting on her life and first-hand testimony from her inner circle including goddaughter Paris Jackson, daughter of Michael.
Together with her siblings and cousins, Wilding is an ambassador for The Elizabeth Taylor Aids Foundation.
“Realising she could make a difference in the Aids and HIV community is where she finally made sense of fame and truly became an influencer. It’s important work – and it’s extra important to us because it was important to her.”