The Liv Tyler Biography

Biography for
Liv Tyler

Date of Birth

1 July 1977, New York City, New York, USA

Birth Name

Liv Rundgren Tyler

Nickname

Liver
Livy

Height

5' 10" (1.78 m)

Mini Biography

Daughter of Steven Tyler of the band Aerosmith and Bebe Buell, former model (and Playboy Playmate of the Month) and stalwart of the backstage rock scene of the 1970s, Liv grew up thinking that rock star Todd Rundgren was her father. But as she was growing up, Tyler began dropping by to visit, and Liv noticed that his daughter Mia Tyler looked enough like her to be her twin. She confronted her mother, and was told the truth; by the time she was 12, she had taken her father's name. At 14, she and her mother left Portland, Maine, for New York, where she got her start as a model. A year was enough of the modeling grind, and she decided to become an actress. She was offered the part of "Callie" in Heavy (1995) after a single reading and, only three weeks later, was cast in Silent Fall (1994); James Mangold, director of Heavy (1995), decided to delay shooting until Liv was available. With seven films in the 1993-96 period, her career took off.

IMDb Mini Biography By: Bruce Cameron

Spouse

Royston Langdon

(25 March 2003 - June 2008) (divorced) 1 child

Trade Mark

Pale skin

Black hair

Her voice

Trivia

Liv's mother named her after Liv Ullmann because she was on the cover of TV Guide the week Liv was born.

Chosen by "People" magazine as one of the 50 Most Beautiful People in the World. [1997]

A cameo role in Everyone Says I Love You (1996), a musical directed by Woody Allen, was cut; Allen was impressed enough by her performance to write a personal letter explaining that her part was cut in editing.

Her half-sister, Mia Tyler, is a fashion model for Lane Bryant.

Armageddon (1998/I) opened on her 21st birthday.

Is dyslexic.

Aerosmith's video for "Crazy", in which Liv co-starred with Alicia Silverstone, was voted #23 in VH1's top 100 music videos of all time.

During filming for The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001), she left her pair of prosthetic ears on the dashboard of her car. When she returned, they had melted.

Quit smoking after starting at age 14. [2002]

Voted the 6th Sexiest Female Movie Star in the Australian Empire Magazine (September 2002).

Measurements: 34B-25-38 (Source: Celebrity Sleuth magazine).

Didn't meet her father until 1988.

Her name Liv means 'life' in Norwegian, Swedish and Danish.

Learned swordfighting for her role as Arwen in the The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring (2001). But the script was changed and she never got to use her skills.

Was nicknamed Liv Taylor by film critics and the media when she first began acting because her dark hair and striking blue eyes reminded them of Elizabeth Taylor.

The decision to cast her in the video for "Crazy" was based on seeing her Pantene commercial, with absolutely no knowledge her father was in the band.

Was born at 6:08 a.m.

She is a spokesperson for Givenchy Perfume and Cosmetics.

Has three younger half-siblings: Chelsea Tallarico, Taj Tallarico and Mia Tyler.

She got married in Barbados.

Voted #2 in TheAge.com's Top 100: Natural Beauties of all time. (Audrey Hepburn took the top spot)

Ex-sister-in-law of Dave Buckner.

Gave birth to an 8-lb. son named Milo William Langdon on December 14, 2004, in Manhattan.

Her son Milo was born on the same day as the release of the Platinum Series Special Extended Edition of the Lord of the Rings Trilogy (December 14, 2004).

She has never taken acting lessons.

On a TV documentary about the making of the "Lord of the Rings" movies, she said she really liked delivering her lines when they were in the fictional Elvish language.

Her father is of Cherokee Indian, Russian and Italian descent, and her mother is of French descent.

Used to be a vegetarian.

Recorded a song for The Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers (2002), but because Peter Jackson didn't feel the song was right for the intended scene, he put it into the extended edition of The Lord of the Rings: The Return of the King (2003). Since then, Liv has stated how much she enjoyed singing and recording and how she has always felt a strong relationship towards music.

Best friends with Kate Hudson.

Godmother of Marlon Richards's (Keith Richards's son) children.

Granddaughter of etiquette books author Dorothea Johnson.

Is only eight years younger than Cate Blanchett, but plays her granddaughter in The Lord of the Rings.

She and her Lord of the Rings cast mate, John Rhys-Davies, have both appeared in films about the "Incredible Hulk". Rhys-Davies plays "Wilson Fisk", AKA The Kingpin, in The Trial of the Incredible Hulk (1989) (TV), while Tyler played "Betty Ross" in The Incredible Hulk (2008). Daredevil and Kingpin have also been played by her Armageddon (1998/I) cast mates, Ben Affleck and Michael Clarke Duncan.

Friend of Orlando Bloom, Gwyneth Paltrow and Kate Moss.

Ex-stepdaughter of Cyrinda Foxe and Teresa Barrick.

Daughter of Bebe Buell and Steven Tyler.

Believed until she was 8 years old that Todd Rundgren was her father. Rundgren and Liv's mother were in a relationship when Liv was born and conceived.

Considers Todd Rundgren, whom she believed to be her father until she was 8 years old, as her "spiritual dad".

Her two "dads" Steven Tyler and Todd Rundgren met for the first time at her wedding to Royston Langdon.

Personal Quotes

I have these slumber parties with my father and when we can't sleep we stay up all night trading beauty tips. He knows all about the good creams and masks.

{About her favorite smell] Those smells that remind me of home. I can smell my dad [Steven Tyler] from a mile away. I can smell it whenever he's worn my clothes. He has this ambery smell that just melts into him.

[on playing Arwen in "Lord of the Rings":] It wasn't until I came back home after such a long time away that I realized how much hype there was about this. I get to play someone 3,000 years old. I'm 23, so that's quite an acting challenge.

I've been told that if I'd lose weight I'd have more work, but I refuse to submit myself to those standards. To the rest of the world, I'm slim, and I like the way I am.

When I did Stealing Beauty (1996), I was just a kid. I'd done a couple of movies, but I'd never been to an acting class in my life. But what I took away from it more than anything was the sense that, even though I was the central character, it was my job to get completely lost in the film. I had a real awareness of Bernardo Bertolucci as a filmmaker, not just a director, painting a canvas in which I was just one element.

Subtlety is my favourite thing in cinema. It lets you dream. When everything is on the nail and on show, it leaves no questions in your mind. I find that so boring.

Clothes have become too important and films are saturated with fashion. So you find yourself wearing designer clothes that aren't relevant to your character. I'm always so intrigued by Christopher Guest and his movies, like Best in Show (2000) and A Mighty Wind (2003). He hires the actors and they all come up with the story and the concept, improvise. And they are all responsible for their own hair and make-up. They buy their own clothes, are in control of creating their characters. I would love to do that.

Life excites me. I'm not talking about appearing in movies or doing interviews, but just little, normal, everyday things. Getting out of bed. Getting dressed. Making food. I find it all exciting, you know?

I don't live a very posh life. There are no drivers waiting or people doing everything for me. I pretty much live like a normal person. . . . It's not good to have a life without responsibilities, you know?.

It's cool to be compared to her [Elizabeth Taylor], but honestly, who gives a damn?

There were times when I would get mad at him (Viggo Mortensen) because he would push me harder. There was a weekend when I got really sick and had a horrible flu, and that was my one and only day to sleep and recover and not work. We were supposed to go horseback riding together and I cancelled it because I wasn't feeling well, and Viggo gave me a really hard time about it. So I went, and it was one of the greatest days of my life. It was actually the one time, while I was riding, that I really broke through to the other side with the canter and becoming more comfortable on the horse. I had a beautiful day and am incredibly grateful to Viggo for pushing me further. He taught me so much about that, about really being willing to submit and submerge yourself into making the film and the character work.

My mom [Bebe Buell] was so amazing. She was a singer and she'd been a model so she had all these beautiful clothes and makeup, and in the bathroom all her jewelry was pinned to the wall...it was more than a little girl could ever dream of! When she went out, she would always say, "Don't get into my stuff!" and the first thing I would do was go mad dressing up.

I was in New Zealand for a long time and preparing for fight sequences - all of these kind of elaborate things. And the more I did that stuff the further we were getting away from why they cast me and what was true of Arwen. And we all realized that. . And we went back into the book and into the appendix. And . . reshaped it. I think originally that, when they were looking at this character, they wanted her to be a strong character. She is a strong character, but . . maybe they thought, "Oh, well if she's a fighter she's strong." And over time they realized that you don't have to put a sword in a woman's hand to make her seem tough. That's little actual makeup of who Arwen is, and her sheer will and strength and love for this man was strong enough.

on Edward Norton: Edward is the best! He is so sweet and wonderful and he did such a great job with everything he did for this film (The Incredible Hulk (2008) and everything he brought to it. I'm really grateful to have been in it. There were points when I was like, 'Wait! We cannot do this love scene because his body looks so much more beautiful than mine!'.

on Ben Affleck: Ben is an angel! By some reason we have a special chemistry. I've worked with some of the world's most fantastic actors and actresses and I love them all, but I actually feel a special spark when we act together. It's easy for us to be very free together.