Hollywood legend and violet-eyed beauty Elizabeth Taylor, famed as much for her glamorous but stormy love life as her five-decade long Oscar-winning film career, died Wednesday aged 79. Taylor, arguably the last great star of Hollywood's golden era, died six weeks after being admitted to Los Angeles' Cedars-Sinai hospital with congestive heart failure, a condition she had struggled with for years.
"My mother was an extraordinary woman who lived life to the fullest, with great passion, humour, and love," said her son Michael Wilding, adding she was surrounded by her children when she died. Taylor won two Academy Awards for best actress, including in the 1966 classic "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" one of many films she played opposite Richard Burton.
The Welsh-born actor was one of the great loves of Taylor's life - she married and divorced him twice - but her stormy relationships off-screen and eight marriages often overshadowed her glittering film career. In her later years she became known for her activism to raise funds to fight AIDS/HIV: no celebrity, except perhaps Princess Diana, has been so involved in raising funds for research into a cure, or working to dispel the stigma surrounding the illness. Taylor "leaves a monumental legacy that has improved and extended millions of lives and will enrich countless more for generations to come," said the American Foundation for AIDS Research (amfAR). Taylor was the group's founding international chairwoman.