It’s mid-century madness as the Film Society of Lincoln Center and the BAMcinematek prepare to uncork salutes to a pair of the biggest (at least best-publicized) stars of the ’50s and early ’60s, Elizabeth Taylor and Marilyn Monroe.

The folks at the Walter Reade have scheduled what’s billed as the first posthumous salute to ET, “Elizabeth: The Golden Age,” for May 20-22. Over just three days, they’re packing in 11 titles, including the super-long roadshow versions (plus 10-minute intermissions) of George Stevens’ “Giant” (201 minutes), Joe Mankiewicz’ “Cleopatra” (242 minutes) and Edward Dmytryk’s not-on-DVD “Raintree County” (188 mnutes).

The series also includes Jack Conway’s “Julia Misbehaves,” Mike Nichols’ “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf,” Richard Brooks’ “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof,” Clarence Brown’s “National Velvet,” Vincente Minnelli’s “Father of the Bride,” John Huston’s “Reflections in a Golden Eye” and George Stevens’ “A Place in the Sun.”

I saw the last one for the first time at the TCM Classic Film Festival last weekend in Hollywood For decades I had been laboring under the delusion I’d seen “The Place in the Sun” when I really dimly recalled a college screening of Josef von Sternberg’s earlier version of the same story, “A Place in the Sun,” back in the early 1970s.

BAM’s Monroe series — getting a huge jump on the fiftieth anniversary of MM’s death in August 2012 –will be spread out over a more leisurely 13 days beginning on July 11. 

The roster includes Mankiewicz’ “All About Eve,” Huston’s “The Asphalt Jungle” and “The Misfits,” Josh Logan’s “Bus Stop,” Howard Hawks’ “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” and “Monkey Business,” Cukor’s “Let’s Make Love,” Henry Hathaway’s “Niagara,” Laurence Olivier’s “The Prince and the Showgirl,” Otto Preminger’s “The River of No Return,” Billy Wilder’s “Some Like It Hot” and Roy Ward Baker’s underrated “Don’t Bother to Knock.”