Elizabeth Taylor Won Her First Oscar for a Movie She Hated

Share on Facebook Share on X Google Preferred Share to Flipboard Show additional share options Share on LinkedIn Share on Pinterest Share on Reddit Share on Tumblr Share on Whats App Send an Email Print the Article Post a Comment There was nothing smooth about the making of Butterfield 8 , which earned Elizabeth Taylor her first Academy Award. After starting as a child actress, Taylor landed an MGM contract and, in her 20s, began a stretch in which she was Oscar-nominated for Raintree County (1957), Cat on a Hot Tin Roof (1958) and Suddenly, Last Summer (1959). At that time, 20th Century Fox offered Taylor a record $1 million salary to star in Cleopatra , but she needed to end her MGM deal. As her final MGM project, she committed to the adaptation of author John O’Hara’s 1935 novel Butterfield 8 . With the title referring to NYC’s telephone exchange system, Daniel Mann’s movie starred Taylor as Gloria Wandrous, a model who enjoys flings until falling for a married man. The cast included Laurence Harvey and Taylor’s then husband, Eddie Fisher. Related Stories Movies Box Office: Neon Touts 'Sentimental Value,' 'Secret Agent' and a Myriad of Other Milestones on Eve of Oscars News Fortress Hollywood: Inside the Oscars Security Machine In late 1959, THR reported that the studio agreed to rewrites after Taylor deemed her role “too unsavory.” But she remained unhappy with her character and dialogue. “I did it with a pistol at my head,” Taylor said of making the movie, in archival audio from the 2024 documentary Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes . “The lines were so diabolical. It was such a piece of shit. And it made me angry. And out of the anger, it gave me an incentive.” A memorable scene involved Taylor’s character writing “no sale” on a mirror in lipstick after believing that she was mistaken for a sex worker. Kate Andersen Brower, who penned 2022’s authorized Taylor biography, tells THR that the star referenced this moment during an early screening: “When Elizabeth sa...