2. Richard Burton
Richard Burton was The Voice of the Valleys, an actor of gigantic talents and capabilities, characterised most eminently by his deep vocal delivery that was tailor made for the stage. He was twice married to the recently deceased Elizabeth Taylor who, like Burton, was a real character both on and off screen, and their tempestuous relationship is crystallised in legend, the subject of many books that investigate the private lives of Hollywood superstars. Burton was born in Pontrhyden, Wales, the son of a miner and the descendent of a mining family which was steeped in traditional working class roots. Although the actor was spared from the mines after moving in with his more financially stable sister, Cissie, at an early age, Burton never forgot about his bloodline, and his respect for the mining community was apparent in various television interviews that he gave. Allied to this, Burton also retained some traits that he developed during his days as a street rascal: chain smoking, binge drinking, and a boisterous swagger that inflated his personality to the heights imperiousness. Alcohol would prove to be Burtons Achilles Heel, to such an effect that it dominated most of his adult life until his premature death, aged 59. It has been said that Burton would drink up to three bottles of vodka a day, arising in the evening after a day of sleep, drinking until the early hours of the morning, perpetuating the cycle after the next inebriated slumber. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4lnwYaKUbL8 In 1980, in a US TV interview with Dick Cavett, he candidly spoke about his habitual self-infliction, describing himself as a boxer who had to bob and weave in order to evade the impending knock-out blow that alcohol would eventually land. When pressed as to whether he considered himself to be an alcoholic, he responded; Im not quite sure I am one, but if not, very near. I certainly cant say Ive beaten it. Its a dreadful disease and anyone with it has my deepest sympathies...No-one really knows which drink it is that will take them over the edge from a hearty, social drinker into a morose, hung-over wretched creature who creaks and sweats through nightmares where its always November, always raining, and always three in the morning.. Astonishingly, in Robert Sellers book,
Hellraisers: The Life and Inebriated Times of Burton, Harris, and OToole, the writer describes a time in which Burton paid a visit to the doctor, who discovered to his horror, that the actors spinal column was coated with crystallized alcohol. Burtons sexual vagrancy would also be produced as gossip fodder regularly, and his tendency to bed-hop was infamous throughout the film industry, yet he rarely failed to wet his appetite. On the set of
Sea Wife, Joan Collins, his co-star, remarked that he would go so far as to sleep with a poisonous snake, to which he replied; Only if it wore a skirt, darling. He summed up his life as thus: I rather like my reputation: that of a spoiled genius from the Welsh gutter, a drunk, a womaniser. Its rather an attractive image.