When Bob Willoughby Photographed Elizabeth Taylor on the Set of “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”

Feature Image: Bob Willoughby via MPTV

Photographer Bob Willoughby first met Elizabeth Taylor in the mid-1950s, on the set of Raintree County, where he'd been hired to shoot behind-the-scenes stories for magazines like Life and Look. The two became fast friends, and in an industry where loyalties shifted by the picture, their friendship — along with a mutual respect for each other's craft — was rare enough to last. Elizabeth tapped Bob to photograph her wedding to Eddie Fisher in 1959.

When they worked together again in 1965, on the Warner Brothers set of Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?, their friendship was as strong as ever. The film starred Elizabeth as Martha alongside her then-husband Richard Burton as George — a role that would win her a second Academy Award. "Elizabeth was very much the same as ever: a professional, hardworking, and serious actress," Bob wrote of his experience on set in his book, Liz: An Intimate Collection.

A sheet of negatives from Willoughby’s archive

Though Elizabeth was exactly what he expected, the set was not.  "It was a very hard set to work on," Bob recalled. "The actors were keyed up and there was nervous tension everywhere." Bob hadn't read the Edward Albee play that the film was based on going in to this photography project, and like others on set, the rough, aggressive dialogue caught him off guard: "It was like a slap in the face when the ugly onslaught of the dialogue first hit me," he recalled. Some crew members even left the film entirely after the first week, unable to withstand the intensity of the material. Watching Elizabeth and Burton work, Bob noted, "It was marvelously intense, and as I said before, they were so good in these roles it was hard to believe that they were acting…There is no doubt that Burton was a really superb actor, but he gnashed his teeth more than once as Elizabeth's presence took over scene after scene.”

Image: Bob Willoughby via MPTV

Production was demanding on everyone involved. On-camera, Elizabeth and Richard let it all out, embodying the unpredictable vitriol of Martha and George. But off camera, Elizabeth wasn't interested in performing the same distress. Bob recalls that Elizabeth "didn't have time for being the drama queen," preparing for difficult scenes instead by quietly withdrawing into herself — a discipline that "made everyone else's job that much more pleasant." 

Image: Bob Willoughby via MPTV

Virginia Woolf marked Mike Nichols’ directorial debut — and though he proved up to the task, it was not an easy one at first. Surely the first-time director was intimidated by his stars — they were established actors and as a result his input was not always well-received. However, Nichols took his time to go over everything with Elizabeth, usually away from the set, which seemed to help. “As the film wore on it seemed to me that she was accepting ideas more readily,” Bob noted. And while Mike leaned on his background in the New York comedy scene to lighten the mood when he could, Bob credited Elizabeth just as much — she was, in his words, "marvelous at breaking down the doom-ridden atmosphere."

Shooting schedules, correspondence, and press from Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?

Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? was released in 1966 and went on to win five Oscars, including Elizabeth’s award for Best Actress in a Leading Role, Best Actress in a Supporting Role, Best Cinematography, Best Art Direction, and Best Costume Design. Bob's photographs from the set ran on the covers of Life and Look, and in a gatefold in the Saturday Evening Post. Decades later, in 2004, Bob collected his photographs of Elizabeth — spanning everything from their meeting at Raintree County to Virginia Woolf  and beyond — in Liz: An Intimate Collection, giving us a retrospective of their special friendship.

To this day, his photography shows us who Elizabeth actually was under pressure: focused, funny when it counted, innately talented, and above all, always a friend. Bob Willoughby’s work is represented by MPTV Images — for licensing and print inquiries please visit their website.