April 5, 2000
A Look at... Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? - THE COMMENTARY
By Joseph Planta
VANCOUVER -- Dick and Liz were the swinging duo of the 1960’s. Forget Jackie and Ari, John and Yoko and the rest of them, because Mr. and Mrs. Richard Burton were perhaps the love affair of the century. Elizabeth Taylor was happily married (or so they let us to believe) to Eddie Fisher, whom she stole away from America’s sweetheart Debbie Reynolds. Jack Warner (of Warner Bros.) decided to cast her in the Titanic of the 1960’s, an adaptation of Cleopatra. That production was shot in Europe and co-stared TV’s future Archie Bunker, Carroll O’Connor in a bit part. I digress.
The role of Anthony would be played by a Welsh-born thespian by the name of Richard Burton. So there we have it. 1962 or 63, I think, The Fisher’s fly off to Rome or wherever the hell they shot the picture and Elizabeth and Richard met. Sparks flew between the two of them and the marriage with Fisher burned out. Dick and Liz went jet-setting around Europe conducting a love affair worthy of Tony and Cleo. They were the talk of the world in tabloids and newsreels (the precursor to entertainment programs) and caused a riot. The Vatican went on to call Liz a slut and Debbie Reynolds had a nice chuckle.
So there it was. Elizabeth Taylor had a new beau, the man she would later call the love of her life. They were married and Cleopatra, the Titanic of the 1960’s turned out to be the decade’s Isthar. (That’s my favourite joke. But Cleopatra did become a legend, Isthar is a what?) Dick and Liz were then approached to star in the film version of Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? It’s a remarkable play that doesn’t push the envelope for swearing and violence, but it rips the damned thing open for the world to see. It starred the legendary stage doyenne Uta Hagen on Broadway, so filling her shoes was a task not easy for film.
Ernest Lehman, the scribe who wrote the screenplay’s to Hitchcock’s North By Northwest and The Sound of Music, set to adapt the Albee play for the screen. He also produced the film and set the directorial chores to a 33-year old kid, the yet-to-be legendary Mike Nichols. Nichols had only directed theatre, but his chops were already noticeable. The movie is about a middle aged couple (Burton and Taylor). He’s a professor of mathematics at some university and she’s his wife. She also happens to be the dean’s daughter, so there’s a little play on the fact he married the one wearing the pants. They go to a party and get high drunk and as they head home, she remembers inviting a young professor and his wife over for drinks (George Segal and Sandy Dennis.) They arrive and then the fun begins, plus the booze flows. They argue, bitch, yell, open wounds thought to have been closed and evoke a harrowing journey of self-realisation and horror.
In this month’s edition of Talk, the high-brow mag edited by the versatile Tina Brown, Ernest Lehman’s personal diaries are published. They are his observations on the five or so month period in 1965 when the picture was shot. It is as dramatic as the movie itself. It shows a younger Elizabeth Taylor and the older Richard Burton struggle with making the film and the self-doubt and anxiety that comes with making a picture, let alone one that is Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? It evokes the struggle of the young Liz, mid 30’s, turning into the harrowing middle aged, Martha. The entries in Mr. Lehman’s diary are incredible. They are an insight into the lives of the legends associated with the picture and they’re a hoot.
7/1/65 - “I had more damned trouble, figuring what to send the Burtons at their house for their arrival... when I spoke to Jack Warner, he told me that he had sent the Burtons a huge floral arrangement, six bottles of champagne, a case of scotch and a case of gin. If anyone gets loaded during the making of this picture, at least we’ll know whom to blame.” And they did get loaded.
Taylor’s explosive behaviour is seen in this entry, perhaps it was booze and pills, but Lehman describes her reaction to reading a review of the Burtons last picture, The Sandpiper: 7/9/65 - “She said she was going to sue him (the reviewer) for libel. She said that she was astonished to find people of established intelligence found hidden meaning in The Sandpiper, whereas she and Richard thought it was a pile of crap, and that they had only done it for the money.”
9/27/65 has perhaps the most revealingly creative entry of all. Lehman recalls a call he had received from Mike Nichols: “He said, “I’m very depressed right now. I’ve been listening to the Broadway-cast recording of the play. They’re all so great, and the play absolutely soars, and we don’t.” He then said, “Richard is absolutely going to walk away with the picture, and everyone is going to say there never was a George like Richard Burton, but I just don’t think Elizabeth is going to make it.”
Elizabeth did. She made Lehman break down and sob when he screened the picture for the first time and Taylor did win a second Academy Award for her performance.
Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is a remarkable film. It is not for the faint of heart or of spirit, because it’s tragic and explosive as hell. It grabs you by the shirt collars and shakes you. It makes you think and it makes you feel. Dick and Liz were the couple of the 60’s and this was their best picture.
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An archive of Joseph Planta's previous columns can be found by clicking HERE .