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When you think about Elizabeth Taylor, a few things instantly come to mind, one of which being her legendary acting career while starring in films like Cleopatra and Father of the Bride. But there’s another thing people instantly think of with Taylor: her bombshell, whirlwind love life that was full of heartbreak, passion, and eight marriages.
With New York Times bestselling author Kate Andersen Brower’s newly released. authorized biography on Taylor called Elizabeth Taylor: The Grit & Glamour of an Icon, everyone wants to know more about the details of her life — including her loves. With access to over 7,000 personal letters and over 250 interviews, Brower is giving fans a glimpse into Taylor’s life that no one has had before.
As many people know, Taylor had eight marriages throughout her life with seven different men, along with several engagements and high-profile (yet brief) relationships. While many rumors swirled around the stratosphere (including one involving a former US President), we’re focusing on the confirmed romances, and great loves, she had throughout her eventful life.
And ever since Nanette Burstein’s documentary Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes came out; everyone wants to know the details.
Check out Taylor’s complete dating history below!
A version of this article was originally published on Dec 2022.
Mickey Rooney (1944-1946)
According to The Life and Times of Mickey Rooney,Mickey Rooney had an affair with Elizabeth Taylor when she was 14, and he 25. In the book, a pal and caregiver to Rooney’s second wife, Betty Jane, named Pam McClenathan said, “Betty Jane . . . told me she went to visit Mickey at [an LA film studio] around June 1946. She had [the couple’s first son] Mickey Jr. in tow and was pregnant with [second son] Timmy . . . When she opened the door to the dressing room, Elizabeth Taylor was on her knees giving Mickey a bl*w job.”
They continued this throughout the filming of the 1944 film National Velvet and broke up sometime in the late 1940s.
Glenn Davis (1948-1949)
Not much is known about the relationship between football player Glenn Davis and Elizabeth Taylor, but all we know is that it was short-lived. They dated for four months, getting engaged in Mar 1949 but later separated in April 1949.
Bill Pawley Jr. (1949)
Elizabeth Taylor and US Army pilot turned billionaire William “Bill” Pawley Jr. had a whirlwind and rather inappropriate romance. When he was 28, he proposed to the then-17-year-old actress. They got engaged three months after meeting one another in 1949 after months of writing letters to one another. Taylor spoke about the long-distance love affair, per Closer Weekly, saying, “I’ve never known this kind of love before — it’s so perfect and complete — and mature.”
According to a lifelong friend of Pawley, per Daily Mail, Taylor decided to call off the engagement to further pursue acting.
Conrad Hilton Jr. (1950-1951)
Elizabeth Taylor and Conrad “Nicky” Hilton, the son of hotelier Conrad Hilton, met back in Oct 1949 at Mocambo nightclub in Los Angeles. They wed less than a year later on May 6, 1950, which was known as the Hollywood event of the year, with 600 guests in attendance and 3,000 fans outside. For the wedding, per Biography, she wore a $3,500 gown at the ceremony that was paid for by MGM studios as a gift for her film Father of the Bride, coming out around the same time.
However, in Nanette Burstein’s documentary Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes, Taylor was recorded telling a different account of how that wedding was. “I was not prepared to be an adult,” she said. “I’d been sheltered and protected — the repercussions were that I made horrendous mistakes.”
She also revealed she was so scared to consummate that she went ot the bathroom, and locked herself in there on her wedding night.
They honeymooned in Paris, with Taylor saying in her 1965 memoir, “The honeymoon in Europe lasted two weeks. I should say the marriage lasted for two weeks. Then came, yours sincerely, disillusionment rude and brutal.”
They divorced eight months later after his abusive behavior got out of hand. In fact, in the upcoming documentary Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes, Taylor was recorded saying he abused her while she was pregnant, per People.
Michael Wilding (1952-1957)
Barely a year after her divorce, Elizabeth Taylor and Michael Wilding wed in 1952 after meeting on the set on Ivanhoe. Despite their 20-year age gap, the two were madly in love and later welcomed two sons named Michael Jr. and Christopher.
“He was a wonderful father,” Taylor told PEOPLE in 2006. However, her career was taking off, and it ended up eroding their marriage. They divorced five years later, in 1957.
Per People, for the upcoming documentary about her life, she said he wasn’t dominant enough, saying, “I need someone to dominate me.”
Mike Todd (1957-1958)
A month after her divorce from Michael Wilding, Elizabeth Taylor ended up marrying Oscar-winning producer Mike Todd, whom she met at a sailing party soon before. Soon after they wed, they welcomed a daughter named Elizabeth Frances (Liza) Todd.
“I was the happiest with Mike Todd,” Taylor said years later. She also said in Elizabeth Takes Off, “God, I loved him. My self-esteem, my image, everything soared under his exuberant, loving care.”
According to Biography, he would shower her with gifts and huge romantic gestures like setting up an entire display of Van Cleef & Arpels jewelry.
However, tragedy struck when Todd was killed in a plane crash in 1958, a flight which Taylor was actually supposed to join him on. He crashed in New Mexico aboard his plane named “the Liz.”
Taylor later recalled that all she could do was scream, “No, no, no. No, not Mike, not Mike. Dear God, please not Mike.”
Per People, in the documentary Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes, she reportedly was recorded saying, “I was attracted to him but not overly.”
Eddie Fisher (1959-1964)
Elizabeth Taylor and Eddie Fisher’s affair started back in the 1950s, when Fisher left his first wife, Debbie Reynolds (who was Taylor’s best friend) for Taylor. Many believed Taylor was drawn to Fisher as a way for her to grieve the loss of Mike Todd. They married in 1959, and their marriage eroded quite quickly after Taylor started working with her future husband Richard Burton.
He was said to be so abusive that he allegedly held a gun to her head, and said, “Don’t worry, you’re too beautiful to kill.”
The two divorced in 1964, and she married Burton 10 days later.
Per People, in the upcoming documentary Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes, she was recorded saying a lot about Fisher and their marriage.
She reportedly “never loved” Fisher, and their marriage was “one big awful frigging mistake.”
“Eddie was a great friend of Mike’s. That was the only thing we had in common. I never loved Eddie. I felt sorry for him. And I liked talking to him about Mike,” Taylor said in the documentary. “I don’t remember much about the marriage apart from that it was one big awful frigging mistake — and I knew that before I got married. But I didn’t know how to get out of it.”
Richard Burton (1964-1974)
No mention of Elizabeth Taylor’s life is complete without mentioning Richard Burton, whom many said was the love of her life. They met back in the 1950s at a party, but later reconnected with Burton on the Cleopatra set in 1962 and Taylor fell instantly in love with him. “When I saw him on the set of Cleopatra, I fell in love and I have loved him ever since, practically my whole adult life,” she wrote in People.
In Nanette Burstein’s documentary Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes, Taylor was heard saying in a tape conversation that everyone disapproved of this romance. “My father called me a whore,” she said. “I met such opposition from everyone.”
However, they pushed through and were together for around a decade, having a marriage so passionate that it often led to fights. “I’ve always admitted that I’m ruled by my passions, and I can’t pretend I didn’t know what I was doing when I became involved with Richard,” Taylor wrote in her memoir.
Known as the “Battling Burtons,” the two divorced in 1974.
Peter O’Toole (~1970s)
So this isn’t 100 percent confirmed, but it’s confirmed through friends that Peter O’Toole and Elizabeth Taylor had an affair. Per Daily Mail, it’s alleged that O’Toole once told his former best friend and Taylor’s future husband Richard Burton, “She tells me I’m much better in the sack, at least more reliable, than you are.”
Richard Burton (1975-1976)
Less than a year after their divorce, Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton fell for each other again. According to Marie Claire UK, they met up to discuss financial affairs, but ended up crying in each other’s arms. After this, they secretly wed Oct 1975 at Chobe National Park in Botswana.
They were so happy together, with Taylor saying in a letter: “Dearest Hubs, How about that! You really are my husband again, and I have news for thee; there bloody will be no more marriages — or divorces, either. Yours truly, Wife.”
This was short-lived and they divorced less than a year later. However, Taylor would still talk highly of him, saying, “Even when we could no longer live together, we continued to love each other,” she continued in 1988. “To this day, my feelings for him are so strong I cannot speak about him without being overcome with emotion.”
They were friends until his death in 1984, and despite them marrying other people, it seemed they were still in love.
Days before his death, Burton wrote a final love letter to her, which arrived at Taylor’s house after his memorial service. It was postmarked a day before his death, and in Furious Love Elizabeth Taylor, Richard Burton, and the Marriage of the Century by Sam Kashner and Nancy Schoenberger said, “And in it he told her what he wanted. Home was where Elizabeth was, and he wanted to come home. She’s kept that letter by her bedside ever since.”
Frank Sinatra (1974-1976)
In a book called His Way: The Unauthorized Biography of Frank Sinatra, it’s alleged that not only did Frank Sinatra and Elizabeth Taylor have an affair towards the end of her marriage to Michael Wilding, but she reportedly fell pregnant. The book said, “Elizabeth Taylor…toward the end of her unhappy marriage to Michael Wilding…found herself pregnant by Frank [Sinatra] and wanted to marry him. He arranged an abortion for her instead.”
John Warner (1976-1982)
Elizabeth Taylor wed U.S. Secretary of the Navy John Warner in 1976, soon after meeting at a Washington, D.C. dinner for Queen Elizabeth II, where he escorted her.
They connected over many things, including their love of horses, “I found her very interesting, fascinating. She is a great conversationalist, and she is just a lot of fun,” he told People.
They divorced in 1982, with Taylor saying she didn’t enjoy being a senator’s wife. “I was told to wear tweeds. I couldn’t wear purple or Halston pantsuits,” she said to People back in 2006.
Despite their divorce, they remained friendly until her death.
Anthony Geary (1982-1984)
Elizabeth Taylor’s former General Hospital co-star Anthony Geary revealed all in an exclusive interview on The Wendy Williams Show. “She did an interview a few years ago for Talk magazine where she outed us as more than friends. So I don’t mind telling you that I was sort of her boy toy for a couple of years.” It appears they were together on and off from 1982 to 1984.
Victor Luna (1983-1984)
In 1983, Elizabeth Taylor was briefly engaged to successful Mexican lawyer Victor Luna, who gave her a 16-carat sapphire ring. They broke up in 1984, but stayed good friends throughout both of their lives, per UPI.
George Hamilton (1987-1988)
Back in 1987, Elizabeth Taylor and George Hamilton dated for around a year, but stayed good friends until she passed. “We were friends right up until she passed away,” Hamilton said per Daily Mail. “I probably have more personal memories from her than anyone. A year with her could fill a lifetime.”
Larry Fortensky (1991-1996)
Elizabeth Taylor’s final and eighth marriage was to a construction worker named Larry Fortensky. They met when she went to rehab at Betty Ford Clinic in 1988. They instantly fell for one another despite their 20-year age difference and wed at Michael Jackson’s Neverland Ranch in 1991.
Fortensky later recounted to People about meeting her, “I knew who she was, of course, but I can’t tell you that I remember watching any of her films. She was funny and sweet, and the more I got to know her, the sweeter she became…we had an instant physical attraction.”
They were together until 1996, with a few things eroding their marriage. One thing was that the spotlight was too much for him, him telling People, “Those cameras everywhere… Elizabeth was used to it. I never got used to it.” Along with that, Taylor said he stopped working. She told People, “He stopped working. You can’t have love without respect.”
However, they stayed friends until her death in 2011, with Fortensky saying to People, “I have wonderful memories of my time with Elizabeth, and I will treasure her memory forever… I love her. I always will. And I know she loved me too.” They also kept in touch for the remainder of her life.
Colin Farrell (2009-2011)
Back in 2013, Colin Farrell revealed on The Ellen DeGeneres Show, per HuffPost, that he and Elizabeth Taylor had a romantic relationship. He recounted the love story saying they met when his son Henry was born, and she was dealing with her heart issues at the same hospital. They exchanged flowers with one another, not being able to sop thinking about each other. After a week, he visited her and the two carried on a nearly two-year relationship before her death in 2011.
“It was kind of like the last; it feels like in my head, not hers,” Farrell said, “I’m projecting … But the last kind of romantic relationship I had. Which was never consummated.”
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