Lindsay Lohan as Elizabeth Taylor: A Train Wreck Becomes an Icon

When Lindsay Lohan first walked onto the set of Lifetime’s Liz & Dick dressed as screen legend Elizabeth Taylor, people were astonished at the resemblance.

"There was an audible gasp,” the movie’s costume designer, Salvador Perez, who gets a boatload of the credit, tells People. “You’d swear it was Elizabeth.”

Occasional Lindsay Lohan wardrobe malfunction aside, the actress looked remarkably like her screen idol with the aid of vintage clothes, hair and makeup.

“She just walked into the clothes and became Elizabeth Taylor,” says Perez.

Producer Larry Thompson, with a precise attention to detail, had some of Taylor’s most famous bling, including the 33-carat Krupp diamond, recreated for the film.

Lohan’s hair and makeup will span all of Taylor’s looks, from the long lashes and red lips of the 1950s (attained using M.A.C’s “Hot Tahiti” lipstick) plus Liz's Cleopatra-inspired eyeliner and nude mouth of the ’60s to her teased ’80s bouffant.

“Part of the magic is the wardrobe,” he says. “but Lindsay brings magic to the movie.”

High praise. Many of the vintage dresses fit her like a glove, too; Lindsay Lohan’s waist measures a tiny 23 inches, while Taylor’s was a mere 22 inches.

Lohan will wear 66 different looks in the 80-minute biopic, which begins in 1961, ends with Richard Burton’s (True Blood's Grant Bowler) death in 1984.

The film focuses on their tumultuous relationship (an affair while she was still married, two weddings and two divorces), giving them plenty of material.