How to Be a Movie Star: Elizabeth Taylor in Hollywood

I enjoyed the book very much. It gives a nice picture of Taylor's private life! She is definitely a legend. She knew how to handle fame, she is unique!

Great book because it really gives you great insight into stars lives and what it takes to make money and keep their fame going. Makes you see how spoiled a star can get and how hard it is to keep making big money to live the lifestyle you get used to - which you see isn't always that glamourous because everything you do gets in the press. Elizabeth is a true movie star but had a long career and got caught up in it all too. Money does drive you once you're famous and hard to get off the roller coaster once you get big in Hollywood. Very good book with alot of behind the scenes information.

"How to Be a Movie Star" is another in depth and delicious movie star biography by writer William Mann. This book focuses on the woman who rose higher and plummeted lower than any other star in Hollywood : Elizabeth Taylor. This book is a page turner that is written in Technicolor! One almost feels as if one were reading a supremely intelligent but also funny graduate thesis written by Pedro Almodovar. (Elizabeth Taylor directed by Pedro Almodovar, now wouldn't that have been something?) The Elizabeth Taylor we discover within these delicious pages---stunningly well lit by millions of paparazzi through the decades---is a talented actress with a voracious appetite. An appetite for fame, for men, for diamonds, for food, for booze, for privacy, for motherhood and finally for more men. What Elizabeth seems to have little appetite for is what first made her famous: her acting. Reading Mann's gorgeous book I got an inkling of why Elizabeth became such devoted friends with Michael Jackson. Both were thrust into the limelight against their will by bullying parents (her mother/his father) at an impossibly early age. Both tasted fame at that early age but then began to lose their fame as they aged. Both then became even more monstrously famous. In different decades, but very similarly, Elizabeth and Michael each were the most talked about person on planet earth. Ms. Taylor's lack of true love for acting and her insatiable need for baubles, bust-ups and booze caused her to make some truly, truly dreadful late-in-her-career films. But her fans must be thankful that she never followed other screen divas down the horror movie path. (Paging Trog!) And we fans can be truly thankful for the many good movies Ms. Taylor did grace the screen in. And Elizabeth's late-in-life AIDS philanthropy (not really dealt with in this book) in many ways outshines even her greatest screen performances. Thank you, William Mann, for hitting another home run out of the park. I can't wait to read your next beautifully-researched and delicious bio. Could I interest you in a book about 60's British Female Stars? I believe Vanessa, Glenda and Julie are awaiting your discerning eye and pen. Bravo!

I thought this book was a fantastic read. I grew up with Liz Taylor movies, and knew most of the media-generated stories about her; but I had no clue as to what she was really like and had no idea she is/was as gutsy and loyal a woman as you'll ever meet. These stories of her years in Hollywood really paint her in an admirable light, and it is easy to see how the stars of today really learned from her. The "birth of the papparazzi" chapter of Liz and Richard Burton in Rome is terrific, as are the many stories of her really heroic deeds while protecting her friends. I loved the author's biography of Kate, and this stands right alongside it as a sophisticated, literary star biography. Can't wait to give this to friends for the holidays!

Geez - the previous "review" must have been written by someone who is most comfortably bound inside the walls of the proverbial "box"! Derivative? Nothing interesting? The "husband" should spend less time doctoring and more time editing? Hum. "Jaded" comes immediately to mind. As a life-long admirer of the legendary Elizabeth, I "thought" I knew all the why's and wherefore's. "Thought"!! Each page of this compelling book painted a more complete picture of the events in Taylor's life than I thought I knew. The unique vantage point of this book notwithstanding, Mr. Mann has captured the unequaled glamor, and never since equaled level, of Taylor's star power more accurately than any other bio on this lady. For those who have yet to read this book, I will not go into particular situations, and the reality of them, for fear of spoiling the revelations. But, I will say the way certain events played out through the "spin" of the lead characters' publicists, as opposed to what was actually happening, rewrites much of the "history" Taylor fans have come to know - particularly the "Liz - Eddie - Debbie" situation, and the Hedda Hopper involvement throughout Taylor's life, too. Now, back to the "unique vantage point" - this book is about HOW Taylor constructed a level of stardom that had never, and will never, be seen again. It's all about the business behind the "life", and how cunning strategy, and plain old good luck, formed the public personality we've come to know as "Elizabeth Taylor". And, along the way, it gives us a more personal insight into the "private" Elizabeth Taylor than we've ever read before. "Derivative"? Uh..........I BEG to differ!!! Allan Trivette