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| The Career of Bette Davis |
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Imagine, Bette Davis thought she was unattractive—an attitude
certainly not held by her millions of fans through the years. Such
interesting information is added to the many details about Bette Davis,
her acting career, and her life. Here are a few more fascinating facts
about, as one fan calls her, the “incomparable” Bette Davis.
One of the most esteemed and most often impersonated Hollywood legends, Bette appeared in 103 films and television movies and shows and made guest appearances in over 50 shows. Between 1934 and 1962, Bette was nominated nine times for Academy Awards, and won two—the Best Actress Award for her role as a drunken performer in the 1935 movie, Dangerous, and another Best Actress Award for her primadonna “headstrong” character in Jezebel (1938). When the American Film Institute (which honored Bette with the first Lifetime Achievement Award to a woman) announced its list of top 100 movie lines (in June of 2005), Bette Davis took second place, quoted for her lines “Fasten your seatbelts. It’s going to be a bumpy night.” [number 9 on the list]; “Oh Jerry, don’t let’s ask for the moon. We have the stars.” [number 46]; and “What a dump.” [number 62]—from All about Eve; Now, Voyager; and Beyond the Forest, respectively. Kim Carnes scratched out a stunning song abut Bette, called “Bette Davis Eyes,” written by Donna Weiss and Jackie DeShannon. Upon hearing the song, being impressed with the amount of information about her life in it, and having her grandson thrilled that he now had a “cool” grandmother—because she had a song written in her honor—Bette wrote to DeShannon and Weiss, thanking them. Bette was for many years cast in roles she found unacceptable. When the casting continued to displease her, she took off to England—until Jack Warner (of Warner Bros.) sued her for breach of contract. She was forced to return to honor the remainder of her contract, but at the same time, began getting much finer roles. Bette Davis married four times, bore one child and adopted two more, and wrote three books, autobiographies that lean on each other as chronologies and/or updates of each other. And Bette Davis had her rivalries—specifically those with fellow star, Joan Crawford. Behind the scenes of the filming of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane, for instance, Bette so disliked Joan (then widow to Pepsi Cola president and CEO Alfred Steele) that she commissioned a Coca Cola machine to be brought to the set. In turn, Joan, also at odds with Bette, weighted her pockets for scenes in which Bette’s character had to lift and drag Joan’s. If you have seen …Baby Jane, you have seen that beyond the stunning performance was a palatable disdain that fed or carried the character acting. And if you have seen any of Bette’s other films, you have seen the best in pain, repression, suppression, elation, and liberation…in Bette Davis’ acting and, yes, in Bette Davis’ eyes. |
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