Bette Davis

• 1. Introduction

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  Bette Davis died on the 6th of October, 1989, at the American Hospital in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, too weak to make the journey home after her cancer returned during a visit to Spain. Her tombstone reads: "She did it the hard way." That epitaph, suggested to her by director Joseph L. Mankiewicz shortly after they filmed All About Eve, captures something essential about a woman who spent nearly six decades fighting studios, directors, co-stars, and her own body to remain one of the most compelling figures in American cinema.

  She was the first person to accumulate ten Academy Award nominations for acting. She was the first woman to receive the American Film Institute's Lifetime Achievement Award. In 1999, the AFI placed her second on its list of the greatest female stars of classic Hollywood cinema, behind only Katharine Hepburn. Yet Davis reached those heights by playing characters that other actresses refused to touch: vulgar waitresses, adulterous killers, psychotic former child stars. Her willingness to appear unlovable, even monstrous, was the engine of her greatness.

  She was married four times, raised her children largely as a single parent, sued her own studio in a London courtroom, co-founded the Hollywood Canteen, and, in 1983, survived a mastectomy and four strokes within two weeks. The questions worth sitting with are not merely how she survived all of it, but how those ordeals shaped every role she played from her 1929 Broadway debut through her final film in 1987.

• 2. Becoming Bette

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  Ruth Elizabeth Davis was born on the 5th of April, 1908, in Lowell, Massachusetts. Her father Harlow Morrell Davis was a law student from Augusta, Maine, who became a patent attorney. Her mother, Ruth Augusta, came from Tyngsborough, Massachusetts. The family separated in 1915, and young Betty and her sister Barbara were sent to a boarding school named Crestalban in Lanesborough, Massachusetts, while their mother moved to New York City to work as a governess.

  The name change that would define her career came from literature. The young Betty adopted the spelling "Bette" after a character in Honoré de Balzac's La Cousine Bette. The decision was small but telling: she was already shaping her own image.

  In 1926, at eighteen, Davis saw a production of Henrik Ibsen's The Wild Duck featuring Blanche Yurka and Peg Entwistle. She later recalled, "The reason I wanted to go into theater was because of an actress named Peg Entwistle." That single performance pulled her toward the stage. When she auditioned for Eva Le Gallienne's 14th Street theater, Le Gallienne dismissed her as "insincere" and "frivolous." George Cukor, likewise unimpressed when she auditioned for his stock company in Rochester, New York, gave her a one-week stint as a chorus girl anyway. It was her first paid acting job.

  By 1929, she had circled back to Blanche Yurka, who cast her as Hedwig in the very production of The Wild Duck that had first inspired her. After performances in Philadelphia, Washington, and Boston, she made her Broadway debut that same year in Broken Dishes, followed by Solid South. The actress who had been called frivolous was now a professional, and she would not stay on Broadway long.

• 3. The Warner Years

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  The 22-year-old Davis arrived in Hollywood in 1930 to screen test for Universal Studios, inspired in part by seeing Mary Pickford in Little Lord Fauntleroy. The studio was not ready for her. A second screen test was arranged, and director William Wyler loudly mocked her to the assembled crew. Carl Laemmle, head of the studio, nearly let her go. Cinematographer Karl Freund intervened, noting she had "lovely eyes" and suggesting her for Bad Sister in 1931, where she made her film debut. The chief of production, Carl Laemmle Jr., overheard telling another executive that she had "about as much sex appeal as Slim Summerville" one of the film's male co-stars.

  After six unsuccessful films and one year at Universal, Laemmle did not renew her contract. Davis was preparing to return to New York when actor George Arliss chose her for the lead female role in the Warner Bros. picture The Man Who Played God in 1932. For the rest of her life, she credited Arliss with giving her the break that mattered. Warner Bros. signed her to a seven-year contract; she stayed eighteen years.

  The role that changed everything came on loan to RKO: the vicious, slatternly Mildred Rogers in Of Human Bondage in 1934, adapted from W. Somerset Maugham's novel. Many actresses had refused the part. Davis saw it as a chance to prove her range. Director John Cromwell gave her unusual latitude, later saying, "I let Bette have her head. I trusted her instincts." Davis insisted on a realistic death scene, declaring, "The last stages of consumption, poverty, and neglect are not pretty, and I intended to be convincing-looking." Life magazine wrote that she gave "probably the best performance ever recorded on the screen by a U.S. actress." Contentiously, she was not among the three nominees for the Academy Award for Best Actress that year.

  The omission provoked a rare intervention. The Hollywood Citizen News questioned it publicly. Norma Shearer, herself a nominee, joined a campaign on Davis's behalf. Academy president Howard Estabrook announced that, under the circumstances, any voter could write a personal choice on their ballot, making it the only time in Academy history that a candidate not officially nominated was considered. The following year, voting procedures changed: nominations would be determined by all eligible branch members, with results tabulated by Price Waterhouse. Davis won Best Actress the next year for Dangerous in 1935, calling the award a "consolation prize" for Of Human Bondage.

  At the 8th Academy Awards ceremony, she wore a plain dress, having not expected to win. Joan Crawford, attending with her new husband Franchot Tone, greeted her with "Dear Bette! What a lovely frock." Davis had once been in love with Tone herself. The rivalry between the two women, which had its roots in a box-office collision in 1933, would define the industry's gossip columns for decades.

• 4. The Lawsuit and Its Aftermath

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  In the spring of 1936, Davis asked Warner Bros. to loan her to RKO to make Mary of Scotland. The studio refused and instead assigned her two films she found unappealing. She refused to report to the set of God's Country and the Woman, demanded a salary increase from her $1,250 per week, and rejected Jack Warner's counteroffer of $2,250 per week. Her agent Mike Levee described her position plainly: she wanted $3,500 a week plus radio rights and permission to make outside pictures. Warner Bros. suspended her.

  Davis then traveled to England with her husband Harmon Nelson on what was billed as a vacation. In England, she signed a contract with a British production company for a film with Maurice Chevalier at a salary of $50,000. On the 9th of September, 1936, Warner Bros. filed a legal injunction against her in England, forbidding her from making films without their consent. Davis publicly declared, while on a shopping trip in Paris, that she intended to defy the injunction.

  On the 14th of October, a British court heard the case. On the 19th, Mr. Justice Branson ruled in Warner's favor, dismissing her representative's claim that she was an "underpaid slave" held under a "life sentence." The judge found she was in breach of contract "for no discoverable reason except that she wanted more money." Davis was ordered to pay Warner Bros. $80,000 in restitution and to cover the studio's legal costs. The British press called her overpaid and ungrateful.

  She lost the case. She returned to Warner Bros. But Justice Branson's ruling, paradoxically, marked the beginning of her most celebrated period. The studio, aware now of her determination, began assigning her more substantial roles. Within two years she had won her second Academy Award, for Jezebel in 1938, and been listed in the Quigley Poll of Top Ten Money-Making Stars.

• 5. Peak and Rivalry

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  Jezebel in 1938 brought Davis a second Academy Award for Best Actress for her portrayal of a strong-willed 1850s Southern belle. It was the first of five consecutive years in which she received the Best Actress nomination: the others were for Dark Victory in 1939, The Letter in 1940, The Little Foxes in 1941, and Now, Voyager in 1942. During Jezebel's production, she entered a relationship with its director, William Wyler, whom she later described as the "love of my life."

  The film's success prompted press speculation that Davis would play Scarlett O'Hara in Gone with the Wind. A radio poll named her as the audience's first choice. David O. Selznick, who was conducting a prolonged search for the role, rejected a package deal from Warner that also included Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland. Davis did not want Flynn cast as Rhett Butler. Vivien Leigh eventually won the role; de Havilland was cast as Melanie and received an Oscar nomination; Leigh won the award.

  Dark Victory in 1939 paired Davis with George Brent, Ronald Reagan, and Humphrey Bogart. She cited her performance as the role of Judith Traherne, a spirited heiress with a malignant brain tumor, as her personal favorite among all her films. The same year, she appeared in three other box-office hits: The Old Maid with Miriam Hopkins, Juarez with Paul Muni, and The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex with Errol Flynn. The last was her first color film and her only color film made at the height of her career. To play the elderly Elizabeth I, she shaved her hairline and her eyebrows.

  Visiting the set was actor Charles Laughton, who responded to Davis's comment that she had a "nerve" playing a woman in her sixties by telling her: "Never not dare to hang yourself. That's the only way you grow in your profession." Davis later said his advice influenced her for the rest of her career. By this time, she was Warner Bros.' most profitable star, and the studio filmed her increasingly in close-ups that emphasized her distinctive eyes.

  In January 1941, Davis became the first female president of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. She refused to serve as a figurehead, proposed radical changes, alienated the committee, and resigned within weeks, succeeded by her predecessor Walter Wanger. The pattern was consistent: she pushed further than the institution was willing to go, and paid for it. On The Little Foxes, directed by Wyler for the third time, they clashed over the character of Regina Giddens; Davis refused to imitate Tallulah Bankhead's stage interpretation and insisted on making the role her own. She received another Academy Award nomination. They never worked together again.

• 6. The Hollywood Canteen

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  In 1943, Davis told an interviewer that she had built her film career on the motto "I love tragedy." Before Pearl Harbor, she had been a favorite of Japanese moviegoers because, she was told, she "represented the admirable principle of sad self-sacrifice." When the United States entered the war, Davis channeled that intensity into an organization that would outlast most of her films in cultural memory.

  In 1942, Davis and John Garfield were the driving force behind the founding of the Hollywood Canteen, supported by 42 unions and guilds, thousands of celebrity volunteers, and the Hollywood Victory Committee. The Canteen offered food, dancing, and entertainment to servicemen, staffed entirely by members of the entertainment industry. Davis served as its president through the end of the war.

  Warner Bros. donated 40 percent of the proceeds from the 1944 film Hollywood Canteen, which used the venue as the setting for a fictional story and in which Davis appeared as herself. In 1983, the Department of Defense awarded her the Distinguished Civilian Service Medal for her work with the Canteen. It was a distinction that placed her alongside generals and Cabinet secretaries, not actresses.

• 7. Decline, Comeback, and Baby Jane

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  All About Eve in 1950 is regularly cited as Davis's finest performance. She read the script, called it the best she had ever encountered, and joined the cast in San Francisco within days. Director Joseph L. Mankiewicz later described her as "syllable-perfect." One of her lines, "Fasten your seat belts, it's going to be a bumpy night," became one of the most quoted in cinema. She won the Cannes Film Festival Award for Best Actress and received another Oscar nomination. That same year, at the Cannes Film Festival, she also accepted the San Francisco Film Critics Circle Award as Best Actress, having been named by the same critics as the Worst Actress of 1949 for Beyond the Forest.

  Despite All About Eve, her career stalled through much of the 1950s. Critics noted mannerisms that seemed self-parodic. In 1952, she underwent surgery for osteomyelitis of the jaw. Her adopted daughter Margot was diagnosed with severe brain damage caused by an injury at or shortly after birth, and was eventually placed in an institution. Davis and her fourth husband, Gary Merrill, whom she had married in 1950, began arguing frequently; they divorced in 1960.

  In September 1962, Davis placed a now-famous advertisement in Variety under the heading "Situations wanted - women artists": "Mother of three - 10, 11, & 15 - divorcee. American. Thirty years' experience as an actress in Motion Pictures. Mobile still, and more affable than rumor would have it. Wants steady employment in Hollywood. (Has had Broadway.)" She later said she intended it as a joke. The role that answered it was anything but.

  What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? in 1962 starred Davis as the demented former child star Baby Jane Hudson alongside Joan Crawford, whose interest in the project had prompted Davis's casting. Davis believed the film could reach the audience that had recently made Alfred Hitchcock's Psycho a success. She negotiated a deal for 10 percent of worldwide gross profits in addition to her salary. Despite years of publicized animosity, both actresses praised each other's professionalism during filming, while simultaneously calling director Robert Aldrich nightly to complain about one another. In a scene where Jane drags Blanche, Crawford made herself as heavy as possible to aggravate Davis's back problems. In a scene where Jane beats Blanche, Davis hit Crawford as hard as she could. The film became one of the year's biggest successes. At the 35th Academy Awards, where Davis received her final Best Actress nomination, actress Anne Bancroft won for The Miracle Worker. Bancroft was absent from the ceremony. Crawford, who had arranged to collect the award of any absent nominee who won, accepted it in Bancroft's place while Davis watched.

• 8. Final Chapter

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  In 1977, Davis became the first woman to receive the American Film Institute's Lifetime Achievement Award. The televised tribute included William Wyler, who joked that given the chance Davis would still like to reshoot a scene from The Letter, to which Davis nodded. That same year, her longtime rival Joan Crawford died. Davis reportedly said: "You should never say bad things about the dead; you should only say good... Joan Crawford is dead. Good."

  In 1981, Kim Carnes's song "Bette Davis Eyes," written by Donna Weiss and Jackie DeShannon, became the best-selling record of the year in the United States, staying at number one on the charts for more than two months and winning two Grammy Awards, including Song of the Year and Record of the Year. Davis wrote letters of thanks to Carnes and the songwriters. She hung gold and platinum records sent by Carnes on her wall.

  In 1983, after filming the pilot episode of the television series Hotel, Davis was diagnosed with breast cancer and underwent a mastectomy. Within two weeks, she had four strokes that caused paralysis in the left side of her face and in her left arm, leaving her with slurred speech. She began a lengthy period of physical therapy with the help of her personal assistant Kathryn Sermak and regained partial recovery. Even late in life, she smoked one hundred cigarettes per day.

  Her daughter B.D. Hyman published My Mother's Keeper in 1985, depicting Davis as overbearing and prone to drunken behavior. Davis later wrote in her second memoir, This 'n That: "I am still recovering from the fact that a child of mine would write about me behind my back, to say nothing about the kind of book it is. I will never recover as completely from B.D.'s book as I have from the stroke. Both were shattering experiences." She disinherited Hyman. Her estate at death was valued between $600,000 and $1,000,000; she left roughly half to her adopted son Michael Merrill and half to Kathryn Sermak.

  Her last completed film role was in The Whales of August in 1987, in which she played the blind sister of Lillian Gish. Though in poor health, she memorized her own lines and everyone else's, as she always had. She died on the 6th of October, 1989. A memorial service was held at Burbank Studio's stage 18, where a work light was turned on to signal the end of production. In 1997, Merrill and Sermak established The Bette Davis Foundation, which awards college scholarships to aspiring actors and actresses in her name.