Liz and Dick at their Best & Worst!

I've been watching my latest Netflix rental, "Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf?" starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton (who, as everyone knows, were married to each other back in the 1960s).  Also starring George Segal and Sandy Dennis.  It's based on the Edward Albee play of the same name.  It came out in 1966.  It was a hit and was responsible for the creation of the movie ratings code.  There's a lot of trivia about this movie that even astonished me.  Robert Redford turned down the role of Nick, George Segal's part, for starters.

Impressive performances from the whole cast of four.  I wonder why I have never seen this movie before.  It's very adult.   The plot is a case study in human behavior to the extreme.  A lot of raw emotions explode out of Liz and Dick in a whirling frenzy for more than two hours.  What a ride!

I wasn't very familiar with their work when Liz and Dick (who had been divorced for many years) came to Boston in the spring of 1983 to do Noel Coward's "Private Lives."  A lot of my teachers were excited that they were in town.  I wasn't interested in seeing them at all.  They even did the play in Washington, DC, my hometown, later that summer.  That was the last time they worked to together because on August 5, 1984, Richard Burton passed away.  That was sad news.

When I saw Richard Burton in the movie, "1984", which came out several months after his death, I really enjoyed his work as O'Brien.  I really regret not going to see him and his ex-wife, Liz Taylor, when they were in Boston.

When I went to my first AANE Conference in October 2002, Dr. Ami Klin of the Yale Development Disabilities Clinic was the guest speaker.  He talked about his recent research with volunteers who were diagnosed with autism.  He had them watch a movie while hooked up to a head gear device to track their eye movements.  He pointed out that the volunteers with autism liked to look at the actors' mouths instead of their eyes while watching them.  He also mentioned that they liked to look at the objects in the room.

What was the film the volunteers were watching?  It was "Who's Afraid of Virginia  Woolf?"  Dr. Klin also mentioned that he had the chance to meet Liz Taylor who learned that he was using her film for his research study.  He really enjoyed meeting her!