Farewell to an Icon: Elizabeth Taylor, 1932-2011
Dearests, let us pause to reflect upon the loss of an icon: Elizabeth Taylor, one of the youngest contract players in the once shining history of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, and eternally notorious for being married eight times, twice to Richard Burton, died this morning at Cedars-Sinai in Los Angeles. She was 79. Cause of death: congestive heart failure. Needless to say the afternoon will be jam-packed with tributes on MSNBC.com, CNN.com, Time.com, People.com, EW.com, Variety.com, THR.com, the Huffington Post --- all over the Multiverse.
But your Dragonmaster, too, must join in the reflections; hence, mine own two cents:
I have long ascertained the notion that one does not mess around with a Legend. And Elizabeth Taylor was beyond Legend. Hers was the adventure you simply don't chronicle anymore in this day and age. She wielded the power and the magic only true movie stars can hold. The present generation can only drown in their ignorance and failure to appreciate motion picture history. Elizabeth Taylor, dear children, WAS motion picture history. Tales will be forever told of the battle that was Burton-Taylor. Theirs was the ultimate screen romance, the last of a dying breed. She, not Greta Garbo, was the last of the original movie stars of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, having been signed to Culver City at the tender age of 12.
Then, over the course of 60 films, she made us feel her magic, taking us to places we could never hope to escape to.
No, my dearests, there shall never be another like her. To put her passing into an appropriately humorous perspective, ol' Blackwolf would be the first to say: Being married eight times, I imagine ol' Tudor Thunderbutt (a/k/a His Majesty, King Henry VIII) might have a little competition coming at him, as it were.
But mine is not to tease, even in humor. Mine is to pay solemn tribute. And so I do. Farewell, Elizabeth dearest. Today's so-called celebrities shall never know what it meant to be you. And should at any time they dare pretend to be you, let them be cursed to walk the streets of Hollywood in obscurity.
Such is the wisdom of Blackwolf the Dragonmaster, Duke of Talisker.
But your Dragonmaster, too, must join in the reflections; hence, mine own two cents:
I have long ascertained the notion that one does not mess around with a Legend. And Elizabeth Taylor was beyond Legend. Hers was the adventure you simply don't chronicle anymore in this day and age. She wielded the power and the magic only true movie stars can hold. The present generation can only drown in their ignorance and failure to appreciate motion picture history. Elizabeth Taylor, dear children, WAS motion picture history. Tales will be forever told of the battle that was Burton-Taylor. Theirs was the ultimate screen romance, the last of a dying breed. She, not Greta Garbo, was the last of the original movie stars of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, having been signed to Culver City at the tender age of 12.
Then, over the course of 60 films, she made us feel her magic, taking us to places we could never hope to escape to.
No, my dearests, there shall never be another like her. To put her passing into an appropriately humorous perspective, ol' Blackwolf would be the first to say: Being married eight times, I imagine ol' Tudor Thunderbutt (a/k/a His Majesty, King Henry VIII) might have a little competition coming at him, as it were.
But mine is not to tease, even in humor. Mine is to pay solemn tribute. And so I do. Farewell, Elizabeth dearest. Today's so-called celebrities shall never know what it meant to be you. And should at any time they dare pretend to be you, let them be cursed to walk the streets of Hollywood in obscurity.
Such is the wisdom of Blackwolf the Dragonmaster, Duke of Talisker.
posted by Master Blackwolf | 7:21 AM
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