Wondertrash®

A big victory for screen legend Liz Taylor, well sort of anyway. Liz was never a stranger to controversy. She became the most hated woman in America when she stole Eddie Fischer from Debbie Reynolds. Stole is a harsh word, since as it turned out, Liz was only briefly borrowing him. Once she hooked up with Richard Burton, on the set of Cleopatra, she dropped Fischer like a hot potato. Without Liz or Debbie, that left a drunken Eddie to sing bitter torch songs on the Vegas night club circuit. Meanwhile Liz had burned up every ounce of public sympathy, accorded her after the death of Mike Todd, and faster than you could say "Britney Spears".

Now Jewish convert Taylor has scored another impressive win, and against her own kind! Liz has just won a court battle over an expensive 115 year old van Gogh - "View of the Asylum of Saint-Remy"! The painting holds a special place in Liz's heart, since it belonged to her father, Francis Taylor, who bough it at a London auction, back in 1963. It holds a special place in the hearts of Margarete Mauthner's descendants, as well, since it was looted from the woman by the Nazis.

Mauther's descendants want the $10 million painting back (Liz's old man bought it for a fraction of it's present worth - $257,600. What a steal!). Liz, however, feels it's a clear case of "finders keepers, losers weepers". So accompanied by her lawyer - Canadian Andrew J. Orkin, Liz went off to court.

Liz's attorney maintains that there is no evidence that the painting was forcibly taken from Mauthner. 'Forcibly taken' implying 'gun to the head'. While Taylor's lawyer acknowledges that the Nazi's forced Mauthner's family to give up jobs, pensions, and homes, they maintain that there is no clear record of how the painting changes hands.

Liz herself has even commented on the controversial object de art. In a public statement made last month, Taylor said, "I have not been presented with any information that suggests the painting was ever in Nazi possession, nor that there is any other basis for these claims." She even went on to say that she has "a tremendous amount of sympathy" for those who lost art to the Nazis. Sympathy or not, though, she's hanging on to that painting!