Elizabeth Taylor's Obituary -- Outtakes From a Work in Progress

Photograph by George R. Fry Jr./Los Angeles Times   Nov. 27, 1957: Michael Todd and Elizabeth Taylor.

Elaine Woo has a nice post about writing the obituary on Elizabeth Taylor, including some items cut from the final piece: Elizabeth Taylor's death Wednesday moved me in an odd way. Although I never met or spoke to her, I had a "relationship" with her that spanned a dozen years: Hers was the first advance obituary I ever wrote for The Times. The assignment, which I received in 1999, probably was precipitated by one of Taylor's nearly annual brushes with death. I read a mountain of articles and books over a three-month period before writing a lengthy piece. And nearly every year since then I updated the article, adding a worthwhile quote or details about her latest illness. I felt I had come to know her and, unlike many of my subjects, I liked her.

Comments

[Eve]

I am insanely jealous of Elaine Woo--I write and lay out obits for a photo house, to send out to the media, and I have to boil them down to one paragraph. An interesting challenge, but very frustrating sometimes . . .