I remember from when I was a kid that there were few people as famous or revered as the actor Richard Burton was during his life, but does it feel like his star is falling piece by piece to the Earth as those who watched him act live die off? The fame and infamy mean little now, the marriages and the drinking and the off-stage drama, and his performances, as least those on stage, are known directly by fewer an fewer. His famous name is recalled but without full knowledge of his talent. Here he sits down for a long-form interview with Michael Parkinson in 1974, having just completed a stint in rehab for his titanic problem with alcohol.
Merv Griffin leaves the studio to interview Richard Burton in 1974. I was frightened of Burton when I was a child. He just seemed so out of control. But the one that really terrified me was George C. Scott. Oh my god, that man! All that rage.
From Burton’s scary personal diary, which cataloged his demons and destruction, a passage from right around the time of the Merv interview:
“Tuesday 21st: Drank enormously and cheated when E wasn’t looking. Don’t remember much except falling a lot and suggesting divorce. Can’t control my hands, so cannot write any more. Very silly. Booze!
Wednesday 22nd: Having been so drunk yesterday, felt terrible in morning and was desperately ill. Went quietly at 9.30 to find a double brandy. Bar closed until 10. Asked for Fritz (manager). Reluctantly, he opened bar for me and suggested vodka as it wouldn’t be so smelly when E had morning kiss.
Drank it with very shaking hands. Have become a ‘falling-down’ [drunk]. My hand-writing indicative of the shakes. Painful knee, bottom, right elbow, back of head, right ear.
E an angel, and looked like one. How does she do it? Look so well, I mean, for she had a lot to drink, too.
Thursday 23rd: Two weeks married. Still faintly dizzy if I make any sudden movement. Had to have helping hand to walk first few steps in any direction. Very disappointed in myself, but periodically, no doubt, will fall into the trap.
Friday 24th: Made superb love to E in the afternoon. Gets better all the time, if that’s possible. Thought about death too much.
Monday 27th: Drank a lot. Don’t remember anything, if at all.
In 1969, Hunter S. Thompson published “It Ain’t Hardly That Way No More,” an account of gentrification washing over the bohemian California enclave of Big Sur, where he had lived at the beginning of his journalism career. The article’s opening:
“Will Liz Taylor change Big Sur?”
That was the question the San Francisco Examiner‘s society columnist asked the world recently, after she had scrambled, along with other minions of the West Coast press, to report the doings of Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton in California’s most famous “Bohemia,” a mountainous and sparsely populated stretch of coastline some 150 miles below San Francisco.
The occasion was the filming of a few scenes for a movie called The Sandpiper, starring Liz as a lady painter with a yen for rocky beaches and Dick as an offbeat beachcomber with a yen for lady painters. The scenes were shot here because Big Sur has some of the most spectacular scenery in America: booming surf, rocky beaches, and pine-topped mountains slanting straight to the sea.
In the years after World War II this rugged South Coast, as the oldtimers call it, got a valid reputation as a hideaway for artists, writers, and other creative types. Local history abounds with famous names. Henry Miller, author of Tropic of Cancer and Tropic of Capricorn, lived here for 19 years. The late Robinson Jeffers was Big Sur’s original poet laureate, and folk singer Joan Baez is still considered a local, although she recently moved to Carmel Highlands, a few miles north. Other famous residents have been Dennis Murphy, author of a best seller called The Sergeant, prize-winning poet Eric Barker, sculptor Benjamin Bufano, and photographer Wynn Bullock. Unfortunately, that era is just about ended. Big Sur is no longer a peaceful haven for serious talent, but a neurotic and dollar-conscious resort area.•
