The Hollywood Archive - Celebrity, Entertainment and Historical Stock Photos

By Joseph Martinez -

Fans gathered on Hollywood Boulevard Wednesday morning to mourn the passing of one of the world's most beloved Hollywood Icons, Elizabeth Taylor, and making her star on the Walk of Fame a makeshift shrine to the Actress.

The child actor who became a Hollywood icon, known for her radiant beauty and turbulent off-screen personal life and star of such films as 'Giant,' 'Cleopatra,' 'Butterfield 8' and 'Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?' died at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles Wednesday morning March 30, 2011 from congestive heart failure. She had been plagued by ill-health for many years and had been in the hospital recently with heart problems - she was 79.

Taylor lived almost her entire life in the glare of the media spotlight, not only for her Hollywood stardom but also for her soap opera personal life which overshadowed her great acting career from age 50 on. Nevertheless, she managed to overcome even the tabloids by becoming the torch bearer and high profile activist for AIDS research as friends like Rock Hudson and Roddy McDowall succumbed to the disease.

The two-time Oscar winner married eight times, twice to the Welsh actor Richard Burton, and for many years battled with substance abuse. One of the original Hollywood couples, Taylor once said Richard Burton was the only man she would ever marry. "If Richard and I divorce, I swear I will never marry anyone again. I love him insanely." Though she did marry again the pair remained close until Burton’s death in 1984.

Speaking on Wednesday, her son Michael Wilding, said his mother lived life to the fullest and her legacy would never fade. Taylor had four children: Michael and Christopher Wilding (whose father was Taylor's second husband, actor Michael Wilding), Liza Todd (daughter of Taylor and third husband, the showman Mike Todd) and Maria Burton (adopted by Taylor and actor Richard Burton, husband number five and six).

Elizabeth Taylor, who converted to Judaism for her marriages to Mike Todd and Eddie Fisher, followed the dictates of the religion by being buried soon after her death Wednesday. She was laid to rest on Thursday (March 24) at Forest Lawn Cemetery in Glendale, Calif. According to USA Today, she was buried in the Great Mausoleum beneath a "soaring marble Michelangelo" and that while she is not buried right next to longtime friend Micheal Jackson, he's close by.

Taylor a colorful life. Here are a few highlights according to the Daily Mail.

• 1932: Born Elizabeth Rosemond Taylor to American parents in London.
• 1939: The Taylors move back to America with young Elizabeth at the onset of World War II.
• 1942: 9-year-old Taylor makes her screen debut in "There's One Born Every Minute."
• 1944: Taylor gets her first big break, starring alongside Mickey Rooney in "National Velvet."
• 1950: Taylor marries hotel magnate Conrad Hilton Jr., the first of her eight marriages. The two divorced less than eight months later.
• 1951: Transitions from child star to member of Hollywood's elite for her role in "A Place in the Sun" co-starring Montgomery Clift.
• 1952: Marries actor Michael Wilding. The couple has two children together.
• 1957: Taylor is nominated for her first Academy Award for her supporting role in "Raintree County," but does not win the Oscar.
• 1958: Stars in "Cat on a Hot Tine Roof" with Paul Newman.
• 1961: Taylor wins her first Oscar for her role in "Butterfield 8" co-starring her then-husband, Eddie Fisher.
• 1963: Becomes Hollywood's best paid actress, signing a $1 million contract for the lead role in "Cleopatra."
• 1964: Marries "Cleopatra" co-star Richard Burton.
• 1966: Stars in one of her most famous films, "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" with husband Richard Burton, who she divorced and re-married ten years later.
• 1976: Marries John Warner, a Republican elected senator of Virginia in 1979.
• 1981: Makes her Broadway debut in "The Little Foxes."
• 1983: Checks into the Betty Ford Clinic to recover from alcoholism and an addiction to painkillers.
• 1985: Close friend Rock Hudson dies of AIDS. Taylor becomes co-founder of the American Foundation for AIDS Research,
• 1987: Releases her first perfume, "Passion."
• 1991: Marries Larry Fortensky at Michael Jackson's Neverland Ranch.
• 1999: Queen Elizabeth II names Taylor a Dame of the British Empire.
• 2003: Announces her retirement from acting to focus on AIDS advocacy.
• 2004: Diagnosed with congestive heart failure, which leads to her death at the age of 79.

(Photo courtesy of The Hollywood Archive)

By Joseph Martinez -

Actress Jane Russell, the voluptuous pin-up girl who set a million male hearts to pounding during World War II, died Monday at her home in the central coast city of Santa Maria, CA. She was 89 years old.

Her death from respiratory failure came 70 years after eccentric billionaire and film Mogul Howard Hughes set her course for stardom by signing her to a seven-year contract.  she made her motion picture debut in The Outlaw (1943), a story about Billy the Kid that went to great lengths to showcase her voluptuous figure. Although the movie was completed in 1941, it was released for a limited showing two years later. There were problems with the censorship of the production code over the way her ample cleavage was displayed. When the movie was finally passed, it had a general release in 1946. During that time, she was kept busy doing publicity and became known nationally. Contrary to countless incorrect reports in the media since the release of The Outlaw, Russell did not wear the specially designed "cantilever" under wire bra (the first of its kind) that Howard Hughes constructed for the film. According to Jane's 1988 autobiography, she was given the bra, decided it had a mediocre fit, and wore her own bra on the film set with the straps pulled down.

One of Hollywood's leading sex symbols in the 1940s and 1950s, she co-starred in the hit film 'Gentlemen Prefer Blondes' (1953) opposite Marilyn Monroe for 20th Century Fox.

She is survived by three children, six grandchildren and 10 great-grandchildren.

Jane Russell Trivia Per IMDB:

• Discovered by Howard Hughes working as a receptionist for his dentist.
• Went to Van Nuys High School in Los Angeles
• Bob Hope once introduced her as "the two and only Jane Russell".
• Went to high school with James Dougherty, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953) co-star Marilyn Monroe's first husband.
• Leonardo DiCaprio visited Jane while filming The Aviator (2004) in order to find up close and personal what Howard Hughes was really like.

( Photo: Hurrell / The Hollywood Archive )

By Joe Martinez -

Actress Anne Francis, who starred in such big-screen adventures as Forbidden Planet and small-screen shows as Honey West, passed away at 80 years of age due to complications from pancreatic cancer in her Santa Barbara nursing home.

Over her career, Francis appeared in scores of TV shows and movies. She made her film debut in This Time for Keeps (1947). In her early film career, she played supporting roles in films such as: Susan Slept Here, So Young So Bad, and Bad Day at Black Rock. Her first leading role was in Blackboard Jungle (1955). She is perhaps best-known on film for her role as Altaira in the science fiction movie Forbidden Planet. "Anne Francis stars in Forbidden Planet" is a line in the song "Science Fiction/Double Feature" from the Rocky Horror Picture Show, large numbers of whose audience sing the line without ever having seen Forbidden Planet. In the Film she co-starred alongside Walter Pidgeon and Leslie Nielsen.




Anne Francis Trivia Per IMDB:

• Diagnosed with lung cancer in 2007, despite having quit smoking nearly twenty years earlier. She immediately underwent chemotherapy and had surgery to remove the upper lobe of her right lung.
• A longtime rodeo fan, she wrote and directed the short subject film Gemini Rising (1968).
• Long involved with the International New Thought Alliance, a metaphysical religious organization.
• Anne has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 1615 Vine Street
• Anne was nominated for an Emmy and received the Golden Globe for Best Actress for her role in the Honey West television series.

John Lennon would have been 70 on Saturday October 9, 2010 along with my son Erik (turning 15 - not 70).

Over the next two months, Lennon's birthday will be commemorated with tribute concerts, reissues of his music, a new documentary, the annual lighting of Ono's Imagine Peace light tower, even an Ono-Lady Gaga summit. Why all this now? "The reason has to do with the social climate, with wanting some of John's energy, power and conviction," says Ono according to CNN Entertainment.

Born and raised in Liverpool, Lennon became involved in the skiffle craze as a teenager, his first band, The Quarrymen, evolving into The Beatles in 1960. As the group began to undergo the disintegration that led to their break-up towards the end of that decade, Lennon launched a solo career that would span the next, punctuated by critically acclaimed albums, including John Lennon/Plastic Ono Band and Imagine, and iconic songs such as "Give Peace a Chance" and "Imagine".

Lennon's solo album sales in the United States alone stand at 14 million units, and as performer, writer, or co-writer he is responsible for 27 number one singles on the US Hot 100 chart. In 2002, a BBC poll on the 100 Greatest Britons voted him eighth, and in 2008, Rolling Stone ranked him the fifth greatest singer of all time. He was posthumously inducted into the Songwriters Hall of Fame in 1987 and into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame in 1994. On his birthday on October 09, 2010, Google, in the form of a google doodle, changed its logo to a movie version, to commemorate his achievements.


John Lennon Trivia per IMDB:

When "Rolling Stone" magazine was launched in November 1967, Lennon made the first cover, in a photo from How I Won the War (1967).

The first instrument he learned to play was the harmonica.

He used a number of pseudonyms in his musical work. These include Dr. Winston O'Boogie, Booker Table, Dwarf McDougal, Rev. Fred Ghurkin, Mel Torment, Dr. Dream, The Honorable John St. John Johnson, John O'Cean, Joel Nohnn, Kaptain Kundalini, Dad and Winston Leg-Thigh.

Assassinated as he returned from the recording studio Monday, December 8, 1980, outside the Dakota, his apartment building, by 'Mark David Chapman', a crazed fan.

Was photographed for the cover of "Rolling Stone" magazine by Annie Leibovitz on the day he was murdered.

His neighbors at the Dakota included singer Roberta Flack, and actors Peter Boyle, Gloria Swanson, and Lauren Bacall.

Yoko Ono signed over the royalties of his song "Imagine", in perpetuity, to Amnesty International, a world-wide organization devoted to political prisoners.

(Photo: The Hollywood Archive)

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