Ruth
Elizabeth Davis (April 5, 1908, October 6, 1989), better
known as Bette Davis, was an Academy Award winning American
actress.
Davis was born in Lowell, Massachusetts.
Her parents divorced when she was 7, and she and her
sister were raised by their mother, who aspired to
be an actress. Davis was denied admission to Eva LeGallienne's
Manhattan Civic Repertory because she was considered
insincere. So, she enrolled in John Murray Anderson's
dramatic school (who sent her classmate Lucille Ball
home because she was "too shy"), and became
a star.
Her first professional stage performance
was The Earth Between, Off-Broadway in 1923. Her first
Broadway performance was in 1929, in Broken Dishes
and later in Solid South. The next year, she was hired
by Universal Studios, but they felt she was not star
material, and in 1932, they let her sign with Warner
Brothers. Her first starring role was in The Man Who
Played God, and she became a star in Of Human Bondage.
The Motion Picture Academy failed to nominate Davis
for this tour de force and such was the outrage that
she received many write in votes from disgruntled
Academy members, the eventual winner was longtime
rival Katharine Hepburn.
After a much publicised legal battle
with Warners, to stop them putting her in inferior
movies, led to a dramatic improvement in the quality
of her films (although she lost the case). She went
on to win the Academy Award for Best Actress for Dangerous
(1936) and Jezebel (1938), and was able to name her
own roles, with the exception of Gone With the Wind
in 1939. Her career began to stagnate through the
1940s, but her performance in All About Eve (1950),
for which she received another Oscar nomination, put
her back on top. When her career began to fade again,
in 1961, she placed a notorious ad for "job wanted"
in the trade papers. Her role in 1962's over-the-top
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, in which she played
a parody of herself opposite her long-time rival Joan
Crawford, earned her another Oscar nomination.
In 1977, Davis became the first woman
to receive the American Film Institute's Lifetime
Achievement Award, and in 1979 she won a Best Actress
Emmy. She wrote a biography, The Lonely Life, in the
1960s, and Mother Goddam in 1975.
In 1985, her daughter, B.D. Hyman
(born Barbara Sherry), wrote a tell-all book, My Mother's
Keeper, in which she savaged her mother. Davis admitted
that her career always came first, and, although she
married four times, and had sveral affairs, including
ones with George Brent and William Wyler, it should
be pointed out that many who knew both her and her
daughter claimed that this book was largely fiction
and that Davis, although in some ways difficult, was
really a loving mother and grandmother.
Davis wrote another book, This N That,
in the late 1980s, and Bette Davis, The Lonely Life,
which appeared the year after her death, updating
what had happened since her first biography had been
published.
On July 19, 2001, Steven Spielberg
purchased Davis' Oscar statuette for Jezebel at a
Christie's auction and returned it to the Academy
of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences. This was to protect
an Oscar from commercial exploitation.
Bette Davis died, aged 81, in 1989
in Neuilly-sur-Seine, France, following a long battle
with breast cancer, and after having suffered at least
one serious stroke. On Davis's tombstone is written,
"She did it the hard way."
She walked out of her last film, "Wicked
Stepmother," which was released posthumously
with her still included in 1989. She is also credited
with many famous quotes about acting often about Hollywood
and rivals like Crawford and Hepburn.
After the song "Bette Davis Eyes"
became a hit single, Davis wrote letters to songwriters
Donna Weiss and Jackie DeShannon, and singer Kim Carnes
to ask them how they knew so much about her. One of
the reasons Davis loved the song is that her granddaughter
thought her grandmother was "cool" because
she had a hit song written about her.
Academy Awards and Nominations
Nominated What Ever Happened to Baby
Jane? (1962)
Nominated The Star (1952)
Nominated All About Eve (1950)
Nominated Mr. Skeffington (1944)
Nominated Now, Voyager (1942)
Nominated The Little Foxes (1941)
Nominated The Letter (1940)
Nominated Dark Victory (1939)
Won Jezebel (1938)
Won Dangerous (1935)
Nominated Of Human Bondage (1934)
Filmography
Mina Tannenbaum (1994)
Wicked Stepmother (1989)
The Whales of August (1987)
As Summers Die (1986)
Murder with Mirrors (1985)
Right of Way (1983)
Hotel (1982)
Little Gloria, Happy at Last (1982)
A Piano for Mrs. Cimino (1982)
Family Reunion (1981)
Skyward (1980)
The Watcher in the Woods (1980)
White Mama (1980)
Strangers, The Story of a Mother and Daughter (1979)
Return from Witch Mountain (1978)
Death on the Nile (1978)
Dark Secret of Harvest Home (1978)
The Disappearance of Aimee (1976)
Burnt Offerings (1976)
Scream, Pretty Peggy (1973)
Connecting Rooms (1972)
The Judge and Jake Wyler (1972)
The Scientific Cardplayer (1972)
Madame Sin (1972)
Bunny O'Hare (1971)
The Anniversary (1968)
The Nanny (1965)
Hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964)
Where Love Has Gone (1964)
Dead Ringer (1964)
The Empty Canvas (1964)
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)
Pocketful of Miracles (1961)
The Scapegoat (1959)
John Paul Jones (1959)
Storm Center (1956)
The Catered Affair (1956)
The Virgin Queen (1955)
The Star (1952)
Phone Call from a Stranger (1952)
Another Man's Poison (1952)
Payment on Demand (1951)
All About Eve (1950)
Beyond the Forest (1949)
June Bride (1948)
Winter Meeting (1948)
Deception (1946)
A Stolen Life (1946)
The Corn Is Green (1945)
Mr. Skeffington (1944)
Old Acquaintance (1943)
Watch on the Rhine (1943)
Now, Voyager (1942)
In This Our Life (1942
The Man Who Came to Dinner (1942)
Shining Victory (1941)
The Little Foxes (1941)
The Bride Came C.O.D. (1941)
The Great Lie (1941)
The Letter (1940)
All This and Heaven Too (1940)
The Private Lives of Elizabeth and Essex (1939)
The Old Maid (1939)
Juarez (1939)
Dark Victory (1939)
The Sisters (1938)
Jezebel (1938)
It's Love I'm After (1937)
That Certain Woman (1937)
Kid Galahad (1937)
Marked Woman (1937)
Satan Met a Lady (1936)
The Golden Arrow (1936)
The Petrified Forest (1936)
Dangerous (1935)
Special Agent (1935)
Front Page Woman (1935)
The Girl from 10th Avenue (1935)
Bordertown (1935)
Housewife (1934)
Of Human Bondage (1934)
Fog Over Frisco (1934)
Jimmy the Gent (1934)
Fashions of 1934 (1934)
The Big Shakedown (1934)
Bureau of Missing Persons (1933)
Ex-Lady (1933)
The Working Man (1933)
Parachute Jumper (1933)
20,000 Years in Sing Sing (1932)
Three on a Match (1932)
Cabin in the Cotton (1932)
The Dark Horse (1932)
The Rich Are Always with Us (1932)
So Big! (1932)
The Man Who Played God (1932)
Hell's House (1932)
The Menace (1932)
Way Back Home (1931)
Waterloo Bridge (1931)
Seed (1931)
The Bad Sister (1931)
source from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki
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