Elizabeth Taylor measured 1.57 m and experienced documented weight fluctuations noted by her own doctors. These physical data, rarely compared to her romantic trajectory, shed light on a part of her life that typical portraits overlook. How many marriages, what age gaps with her husbands, what lengths of union? The numbers outline a journey as tumultuous as it is methodical.
Biometric data and weight variations of Elizabeth Taylor
Born on February 27, 1932, in Hampstead Garden Suburb (London), Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor grew up under contract with MGM from childhood. Her adult height, confirmed by Biography.com, was approximately 1.57 m.
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Her weight variations, however, marked several decades of her career. Her longtime doctor described weight gain linked to corticosteroids and painkillers prescribed after several back surgeries, starting in the 1960s. These heavy treatments, associated with recurrent pneumonia and heart problems, permanently altered her figure over the decades.
To find details about Elizabeth Taylor’s height and weight, the medical dimension remains the most reliable thread, far from the fanciful estimates found in tabloid press.
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Eight marriages of Elizabeth Taylor: comparative table of unions
Taylor was married eight times to seven different men. The table below gathers documented data on each union.
| Husband | Period | Approximate Duration | Profile |
|---|---|---|---|
| Conrad “Nicky” Hilton | May 1950 – January 1951 | About 8 months | Hotel heir |
| Michael Wilding | 1952 – 1957 | About 5 years | British actor |
| Mike Todd | 1957 – 1958 | About 1 year (deceased) | Producer |
| Eddie Fisher | 1959 – 1964 | About 5 years | Singer |
| Richard Burton (1st marriage) | 1964 – 1974 | About 10 years | Welsh actor |
| Richard Burton (2nd marriage) | 1975 – 1976 | Less than a year | Welsh actor |
| John Warner | 1976 – 1982 | About 6 years | Politician |
| Larry Fortensky | 1991 – 1996 | About 5 years | Construction worker |
Two facts stand out. The first: only Richard Burton was married twice. The second: the average duration of her marriages hovers around four to five years, with two notable exceptions (Hilton, less than a year, and the first Burton marriage, a decade).
Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton: what the numbers reveal
Their relationship began on the set of Cleopatra in the early 1960s. Both actors were married at the time. The scandal that followed their affair made headlines in the international press for months.
Together, Taylor and Burton accumulated about eleven years of marriage over two unions. Burton remains the only man she married twice, which says something about the intensity of the bond, but also about the impossibility of making it last.
In terms of jewelry, Burton gifted Taylor legendary pieces. The Taylor-Burton diamond, a pear-shaped diamond of about 69 carats, acquired in the late 1960s, remains one of the most famous jewels in jewelry history. Taylor later sold this stone after their final separation.
Addiction and hospitalizations: a documented factor in breakups
The BBC documentary “Elizabeth Taylor: A Life in Ten Pictures” (2021) gathered testimonies from close friends confirming that her repeated hospitalizations weighed on the stability of her later marriages. Taylor herself linked some of her divorces to her addiction to painkillers and alcohol.
This medical dimension directly concerns her unions with John Warner and Larry Fortensky. With Warner, a Virginia senator, Taylor gained significant weight, which she attributed to the boredom of Washington political life. With Fortensky, whom she met in a rehabilitation center, the relationship was built on a fragile sobriety.
Profiles of Elizabeth Taylor’s husbands: social diversity and recurring patterns
The list of her husbands is striking for its heterogeneity of backgrounds:
- Two actors (Wilding, Burton), one singer (Fisher), one producer (Todd): the entertainment world dominates the first half of her romantic life
- An heir (Hilton), a senator (Warner): unions marked more by social status than artistic complicity
- A construction worker (Fortensky): a late choice that starkly contrasted with the previous ones, often interpreted as a desire for normalcy
The first marriage, to Nicky Hilton, was financed by MGM. Taylor was only 18 years old. She would later write that the marriage “sprung a leak even before the end of the honeymoon,” referring to Hilton’s moral and physical abuses and alcoholism.
In contrast, the marriage to Mike Todd, a flamboyant producer, seems to have been the happiest according to contemporary accounts. His death in a plane crash in 1958, after just one year of marriage, deeply affected Taylor.
Health, jewelry, and public image: three intertwined threads
Taylor built a public image where illness, glamour, and passionate love mutually nourished each other. Her jewelry collections, valued at several tens of millions of dollars, served as markers of each relationship: each husband gifted, each divorce redistributed.
Her spinal problems, which appeared as early as her teenage years, conditioned a dependence on painkillers that lasted through nearly all her marriages. This cycle of physical pain, medication treatment, and marital turbulence forms a pattern that recent biographies document more precisely than classic narratives centered on glamour.
Taylor passed away on March 23, 2011, in Los Angeles, at the age of 79, after decades of heart problems. Her dual British and American nationality, her two Oscars, and her eight marriages compose a portrait where each numerical data tells a fragment of her journey rather than a simple tabloid anecdote.