{"id":365472,"date":"2011-04-04T06:26:32","date_gmt":"2011-04-04T06:26:32","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.ghanamma.net\/2011\/04\/04\/liz-taylor-how-last-man-to-marry-star-refuses-to-give-up-secrets\/"},"modified":"2011-04-04T06:26:32","modified_gmt":"2011-04-04T06:26:32","slug":"liz-taylor-how-last-man-to-marry-star-refuses-to-give-up-secrets","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/04\/liz-taylor-how-last-man-to-marry-star-refuses-to-give-up-secrets\/","title":{"rendered":"Liz Taylor: How last man to marry star refuses to give up secrets"},"content":{"rendered":"

\n<\/p>\n

\nBy
\nAlison Boshoff<\/a>
Last updated at 7:26 AM on 4th April 2011<\/p>\n

\n\"Overweight<\/p>\n

Overweight and broke: Larry Fortensky was once married to one of the most famous women in the world<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Menifee in California is the sort of dusty, unremarkable town that people tend to drive through without stopping. Perhaps that\u2019s why Larry Fortensky chose to make it his home.<\/p>\n

It\u2019s a place where he can wear his pyjamas all day as he shuffles around his scruffy two-bedroom rented home, emerging only to feed the chickens he keeps. The house is dwarfed by the ancient motor home he bought just after his divorce.<\/p>\n

Broke, unemployed and with few friends \u2014 this is how the man who shared Elizabeth Taylor\u2019s life and bed for five years now lives. Fortensky, 59, has long since blown the \u00a31million divorce settlement given to him after their five-year marriage ended in 1996.<\/p>\n

Last year, he lost his ranch house in nearby Temecula, and sold his
\nhorses \u2014 he could not keep up the mortgage payments and was deep in
\nnegative equity after the U.S. property crash.<\/p>\n

Overweight,
\ndishevelled and said to be fond of smoking marijuana, it\u2019s fair to say
\nLarry Fortensky no longer resembles the rugged, party-loving
\nconstruction worker who stole the heart of a Hollywood\u00a0 screen goddess.<\/p>\n

He hasn\u2019t had a job in 11 years, or a serious girlfriend, and relies on his sister Donna to do his laundry and cooking.<\/p>\n

Ex-wife
\nKarin Fleming, who divorced Larry in 1984, tells me: \u2018What has happened
\nto Larry is sad. He has no motivation. He sleeps in until noon every
\nday. He\u2019s not the person that Elizabeth loved and married. That person
\nhas gone.\u2019<\/p>\n

So, what happened to the man once considered such a charmer he was
\nnicknamed \u2018Lucky\u2019? One of his sisters, Linda Untiet, said in an
\ninterview last week: \u2018Liz never stopped caring about Larry and he loves
\nher to this day.\u2019<\/p>\n

She said the star had written a note to him last
\nyear that read: \u2018Larry darling, you will always be a big part of my
\nheart! I\u2019ll love you for ever.\u2019<\/p>\n

Larry Lee Fortensky was a high-school dropout from blue-collar
\nStanton, California, with a taste for partying and boozing when he and
\nTaylor met.<\/p>\n

Discharged from the army in 1972 for reasons never
\nmade public, he married 18-year-old factory worker Priscilla Torres
\nlater that year. It lasted less than two years and produced a daughter,
\nJulie, who was raised by her grandparents.<\/p>\n

\n\"Odd<\/p>\n

Odd couple: Larry was a blue collar high school dropout, his bride was an international megastar<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

When his second marriage, to Karin \u2014 also 18 when he married her \u2014 ended in 1984, he filed for a restraining order, claiming she threatened him. In court papers, she said he had tried to choke her and slashed\u00a0 her clothing.<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

Karin told me this week: \u2018He was very charming, always, but the problem was his drinking. When he was drunk there was always some kind of trouble. Eventually, I couldn\u2019t handle it any more.\u2019<\/p>\n

There were a series of minor drug and alcohol arrests dating back to 1987, which is why Larry checked into the Betty Ford Clinic for 90 days. It was here he met Liz Taylor, who was battling a long addiction to painkillers and alcohol. As with Richard Burton before him, she was attracted to his blunt talking and macho personality.<\/p>\n

They \u2018dated\u2019 for a year before Larry moved in. Sometimes she would
\ntake him to expensive LA restaurants, but on other occasions Larry would
\ncollect her in his truck and take her to a burger drive-through for a
\n$5 meal. <\/p>\n

He was also in for plenty of ribbing from his workmates
\nthanks to Liz\u2019s habit of getting her chauffeur to deliver exquisitely
\nwrapped gifts (anything from a T-shirt to aftershave) to the
\nconstruction site where he worked.<\/p>\n

To Fortensky\u2019s credit, he could
\neasily have quit work to be kept by his wealthy new girlfriend, but he
\ncontinued to leave her Bel Air home at 6am every day to work on a
\nbuilding site as a \u00a310-an-hour labourer.<\/p>\n

But after their marriage
\nin October 1991 \u2014 he was 39, she was 59 \u2014 the relationship was buffeted
\nby a series of misfortunes. Liz Taylor\u2019s mother died, her secretary
\nkilled himself and her publicist died of cancer. Following a hip
\nreplacement in 1994, which left Liz in great discomfort, she and
\nFortensky started to sleep in separate rooms. <\/p>\n

The anger outbursts, so familiar to his ex-wives, re-emerged and Liz would lock herself in her bathroom to escape his rages.<\/p>\n

\n\"Happy<\/p>\n

Happy days: Although Larry was attracted by Liz’s fame and lifestyle, he claims he never married her for her money<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

She complained that he wouldn\u2019t\u00a0 communicate his feelings with her and she hated that he still smoked, even though she had suffered pneumonia. In September 1995, they announced their separation. <\/p>\n

Karin says: \u2018He did not marry her for the money. I\u2019m not saying that the fame and how she lived didn\u2019t appeal, but it wasn\u2019t only that. But he missed his old life, and he didn\u2019t like being Mr Elizabeth Taylor and he felt awkward socially.\u2019<\/p>\n

He and Liz came to an amicable arrangement over money. Karin says: \u2018Larry said that he had got around $1.5million, which is nowhere near as much as everyone said. <\/p>\n

‘I asked him why he allowed everyone to think it was more, and he just smiled. He had such a big ego, he wanted everyone to think he got more. He was in a bad way after the divorce, with drink and girls and partying. He had money and it attracted hangers-on.\u2019<\/p>\n

In January 1999, he fell headlong down the spiral staircase of his new home in San Juan Capistrano during a party, and was discovered on the tiled floor below. <\/p>\n

His girlfriend, Kelly Matzinger, said he was drunk. Others suggested there had been an argument with a partygoer. The mystery was never cleared up, as Larry suffered memory loss and couldn\u2019t recall the months before the fall. He was in a coma for a month.<\/p>\n

At one point, doctors feared he would die, prompting Liz Taylor to\u00a0 visit his bedside to say goodbye. He also injured his right leg and his hand, and suffers reduced mobility in both to this day. He moved to Temecula in 2002, and bought a bungalow for \u00a3285,000 in cash.<\/p>\n

He survived on disability benefits of around \u00a315,000 a year, plus \u00a31,600 a month from Liz Taylor. <\/p>\n

Karin said: \u2018Before the accident, he had been drinking a lot and doing dope. When he came back from hospital, he got back into that. He looks terrible. He\u2019s heavy and puffy and he doesn\u2019t shave. He looks like someone who isn\u2019t looking after himself. He just stays in.<\/p>\n

\u2018After he got out of hospital, there really was no money left. That is when Elizabeth stepped in to support him. She didn\u2019t want him to have a lump sum any more because she knew how self-destructive he was, but she wanted to make sure he had enough to survive.\u2019<\/p>\n

Two years ago, he asked Liz for a further \u00a330,000 because he was so behind in his mortgage on the house \u2014 which she gave him.<\/p>\n

Not long before she died, he tried again to get some more money from her, but she was too unwell to respond. He gave his house back to the bank, as he owed more than it was worth. It is for sale at \u00a3290,000. <\/p>\n

Of course, there is a simple solution to his money problems. He could give an interview about Elizabeth, or write a book about their life together \u2014 but he\u2019s never done this. I\u2019m told there was no gagging clause in their settlement \u2014\u00a0 Larry is simply too much of a gentleman to exploit her.<\/p>\n

As Karin puts it: \u2018They loved each other but brought out the worst in each other, too. It really is a\u00a0 tragic story.\u2019<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\u00a0<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

Read more from the original source:
\nLiz Taylor: How last man to marry star refuses to give up secrets<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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It\u2019s a place where he can wear his pyjamas all day as he shuffles around his scruffy two-bedroom rented home, emerging only to feed the chickens he keeps<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-365472","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard"],"yoast_head":"\nLiz Taylor: How last man to marry star refuses to give up secrets - Ghanamma.com<\/title>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.ghanamma.com\/2011\/04\/04\/liz-taylor-how-last-man-to-marry-star-refuses-to-give-up-secrets\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"Liz Taylor: How last man to marry star refuses to give up secrets - Ghanamma.com\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"By Alison Boshoff Last updated at 7:26 AM on 4th April 2011 Overweight and broke: Larry Fortensky was once married to one of the most famous women in the world Menifee in California is the sort of dusty, unremarkable town that people tend to drive through without stopping. 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