The woman who eventually rose to fame as an actress tied the knot with her eighth husband exactly 34 years ago today.

Elizabeth also had a pet parrot named Alvin, trained to call out “Larry, Larry.” Larry was not amused, saying, “That [expletive] bird sounded just like her. I’d be running all over the house.”

When it came to gifts, Larry never tried to outdo Elizabeth. She once gave him a BMW for his birthday. He gave her chocolate-covered roses for Christmas and even bought her a dog. “When we went to England for her birthday, I bought her a Shih-tzu named Sugar. She loved that dog,” Larry said.

Though their life together seemed like a fairy tale, Larry insisted he never wanted to be a kept man. Even married to one of the world’s biggest stars, he kept working. He woke early and went to his job. Elizabeth got up with him to eat breakfast but never cooked. “Elizabeth never cooked. She’d go back to bed after I left,” Larry said. However, she made sure he was cared for. A private chef prepared his lunch, which was delivered to his work site — something his coworkers teased him about. After work, Larry came home for dinner with Elizabeth, and they watched movies together, though never one of hers.

Cracks Behind the Glamour
The happiness they shared slowly faded. At Elizabeth’s insistence, Larry quit construction and traveled with her, but he felt lost without his work. As Elizabeth’s health declined, their intimacy decreased, and Larry moved out of their shared bedroom. His sister Donna said that was “the beginning of the end.”

Larry also struggled with the constant media attention. “Everywhere we went, there were cameras. Elizabeth would constantly put on lipstick because she never knew when she was being photographed. I found that hard,” Larry admitted. “It wasn’t my cup of tea. Elizabeth was used to it; I never got used to it.”

A Million Dollars and a Letter of LoveContinue reading…