Bette Davis - she didn't take nothin' from nobody

[spiderpig]

One of the movie mags back in the day called her "Popeye the Magnificent". Anyway, she liked to tell a story about Jack Warner wanting to cast her in a Civil War movie, saying it was perfect for her. Bette, famous for fighting with the studio, responded "Oh yeah? I'll bet it's a pip!"

Of course, the role was Scarlett O'Hara.

Loved Bette. She was a handful, alright.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

1. I always thought they never planned to go with Bette because she had starred in

Jezebel the year before. Basically she had already played Scarlett.

[spiderpig]

3. Prolly. Bette loved her own hype.

But could anyone deliver a line line "Fasten your seatbelts - it's going to be a bumpy night" or "What a dump" like our Bette? I still think of her fondly puffing on her cigs on the Dick Cavett show and not giving a rat's patootie what anybody thought of her.

I think it was Cavett who asked her if there was anything in her life she regretted. She responded "My. Daughter's. Book." Thud. End of subject.

[Tuesday Afternoon]

5. ha!

yeah. she was a hoot. and Dick Cavett ~sigh~

[Siwsan]

2. She is my all time favorite actress

All About Eve, The Little Foxes, and Now Voyager are movies I watch every time they come on television.

[longship]

4. OMG! "All About Eve"

Bette Davis played a great role. Her iconic line:

It's going to be a bumpy night.

Nota bene: Yes, that is a young Marilyn Monroe in the second scene.

[spiderpig]

7. Oh, thank you for that.

Did Bette rock that dress or what?

All About Eve is a goldmine for movie quotes. George Sanders was priceless.

Remember when he confronts Nasty Eve with her notorious past and she flings the door open and tells him to get out? Sanders dryly says "You're too short for that gesture".

I'm on the floor dying. Wish I'd written that script.

[spiderpig]

6. I've always tended toward dry eyes, so I often conjure up a scene from an old movie

to activate my tear ducts.

Now Voyager ("Oh Jerry, don't let's ask for the moon. We have the stars&quot Waaaaahhh.

And Mr. Skeffington, where the old, blind Job Skeffington (Claude Rains) returns from a concentration camp to an aged, no-longer-beautiful Fanny Skeffington (our Bette) and says "You'll always be beautiful to me".

Wahhhh Wahhhh Wahhhh Wahhhh Wahhhh

[Siwsan]

8. i just watched Mr Skeffington, last week

I love claud Raines and Bette together in a movie. Amazing chemistry.

[spiderpig]

9. Wasn't he fantastic?

He could put the most subtle spin on a word and make it memorable. His final line in Lawrence of Arabia is "On the whole, I wish I'd stayed in Tunbridge Wells".

I actually went to Tunbridge Wells based on that remark. I know. I'm weird.

[sarge43]

10. Capt Renault, "I'm shocked ... " He made that line immortal.

He could make just about any movie watchable.

[spiderpig]

11. And in real life, he had six wives.

What a guy.

[sarge43]

17. He and Liz Taylor should have matched up. n/t

[DearHeart]

13. Love the Little Foxes!! No one ever mentions that movie

and I haven't seen it on TCM in quite a while. She was amazing in that movie!! But then again, she was amazing in basically every role she played, IMHO anyway!

[spiderpig]

14. Bette owned the part of Regina.

While we've had a lot of great performances from other actors/actresses, nobody else comes close to just commanding the screen like Bette, even when she was in junk.

[DearHeart]

18. Don't remember that movie...will have to look it up!

I even like her "bad" movies. Have you ever seen her in Dead Ringer...not the best of her movies, but I really enjoyed her playing twin sisters!

[link:

|

[spiderpig]

20. Yes!!!

And a couple of others from that era: The Nanny and The Anniversary. In the latter she sported an evil eyepatch.

(Not making fun of eyepatches since I have to wear one most of the time, but hers was this funky-shaped thing that didn't have the elastic band holding it on. I want one.)

[DearHeart]

21. Wow! Lots of movies that I have yet to see! Will have to see if I can find them!

I swear, that woman could play any kind of part and it seems that she actually did!! She is without a doubt, my favorite actress!

[spiderpig]

22. Another favorite Bette story

She was filming Dark Victory, where she played a spoiled heiress with a brain tumor who found true love with her doctor, George Brent.

At the end, she nobly insists he needs to go to a meeting out-of-town and she'll be fine. She's digging in the garden with her best friend played by Geraldine Fitzgerald, when she remarks how strange it is that it's going dark, but she can still feel the sun on her hands.

Drama and hand-wringing ensue as Bette climbs the stairway to face death by herself.

OK - this from Internet Movie Data Base:

During the filming of the emotionally-charged scene when Bette Davis' character needs to find her way upstairs to her room after the brain tumor has caused her blindness, the cast and crew and several visitors were watching as Davis grasped the banister and began to feel her way up the steps, one-by-one.

Halfway to the top of the staircase, Davis paused, stopped the scene, briskly walked back downstairs, and addressed director Edmund Goulding. "Ed," Davis said, "is Max Steiner going to be composing the music score to this picture?" Goulding, surprised by the question, replied that he didn't know, and asked Davis why the matter was important enough to stop the filming of the scene. "Well, either I'm going to climb those stairs or Max Steiner is going to climb those stairs," Davis responded, "but I'll be God-DAMNED if Max Steiner and I are going to climb those stairs together!"

That's our girl!

[DearHeart]

23. Great story!

I wish I had even a little bit of her...gumption, spunk, chut-spaaah (as Michelle Bachmann would say!). Dark victory was a wonderful movie, although Ronald Reagan was in it (at least he didn't ruin the whole thing). OH, and Bogie too!

Is "Little Foxes" your favorite? I haven't seen all of her movies, but hoping to; had no idea that she was in the original Waterloo Bridge-now I really have to get my hands on that one. Loved the remake with Robert Taylor and Vivien Leigh. I think, of the movies I've seen up til now, I think my favorite is Mr. Skeffington. I think she did some of her best acting in Jezebel and Little Foxes.

[MrsBrady]

12. I love Bette Davis

to pieces...

but she would have been wrong for the roll of Scarlett. just my opinion.

[spiderpig]

15. i agree with you

sorry - shift key acting up - but vivien leigh was perfect

bette would have clopped gable right in the chops

[Adenoid_Hynkel]

16. Was just watching her Letterman interview from 1989

done about 6 months before her death - good stuff: