Gay icon Elizabeth Taylor close to death

By Marc Shoffman • April 28, 2006 - 0:00

Elizabeth Taylor in 1948

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Dame Elizabeth Taylor, once named the most beautiful woman in the world, is close to death, reports claim.

The legendary Hollywood actress has been suffering from heart failure since being diagnosed with a congestive heart condition in 2004.

Friends close to the 74-year-old two time Oscar winner claim she is bedridden in her Bel Air California home.

A friend said: "Liz is inching closer to death every day and she knows it. It is not a pretty picture.

"She's not leaving a lot of money to her children. She wants the bulk of her fortune to go to Aids research."

Dame Elizabeth was born in Hampstead, London, in 1932. She has been an iconic figure for aspiring actors and actresses and has in the past been labelled the most beautiful woman and actress in the world.

The actress, who was awarded a DBE in 1999, has been married eight times to seven husbands, she has three children and one adopted daughter.

She converted from Christianity to Judaism in the 1960s, the same decade that she won Oscars for Butterfield 8 and for Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf, which is consider her best performance.

The star is rumoured to have planned to be buried next to one of her ex husband's, Richard Burton.

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