Original subtitles

I know all the angles, and I think I'm smart enough to keep one step ahead of

them till I get enough to pack it all in and live on Easy Street the rest of my

life.

That's in your seatbelt.

It's going to be a bumpy night.

And so many people know me.

I wish I did. I wish someone would tell me about me.

Betty Davis is a basically benevolent volcano in constant

eruption.

I'll do everything in my power to make you happy.

That's not enough unless... Leslie, tell me

now, this minute, do you love me?

What is it? With all my heart, I still love the man I killed.

I really am too much. My enthusiasm is exhausting, number one. I've had more

people tell me, you have exhausted me through these years.

Exhausted me. My enthusiasm, my inherited vitality from my

mother's side of the family.

All of it doesn't seem to get much mellower as life goes on.

Betty Davis has survived the precarious world of Hollywood for more than half a

century.

She has flouted the system, refused to fit into a pattern, and changed the face

of the female on the screen.

From stage -struck schoolgirl, she moved with enviable confidence through drama

school to repertory to Broadway.

The story of her film career began in 1930.

with a screen test in New York for the formidable Sam Goldwyn. And I wore a

dress.

I guess I wanted to wear a charming evening dress.

And the order came back.

We want to see her legs.

Excuse me.

And I said to the director of the test, what have my legs got to do whether I

have talent or not?

But he said, well, they want to see your legs.

So I remember very, very well.

I would pull my dress up just this much, half an inch at a time.

And they'd say, keep going.

And I'd keep pulling it up and up till finally, you know, I got it to my knees.

But I was very Boston, Puritan, modest girl, believe me.

So anyway, they got the test of my legs back. But Goldman did not take me. As a

matter of fact.

He is quoted as saying, when he saw my test, who did this to me?

On December the 8th, 1930, Betty Davis left New York on a five -day journey by

train to Los Angeles.

Universal Studios had offered her a three -month contract.

But three years of applause and praise in the theaters of the East meant

in Hollywood.

I was told studio people would meet us. Well, nobody met us at all. So we hired

a taxi and went to the hotel.

And I called the studio and reported in and said, this is Betty Davis. I have

arrived today.

Well, they said we were at the station and no one there looked like an actress.

And I said, well, I had a dog with me. You should have known.

I had my terrier, Bousham, with me.

My first real test.

At Universal, they didn't tell me it was a test for the men, but they put me

down on a couch, and they were testing 15 men who had to come, enter the scene,

sort of get on top of me, make love to me, and then they'd test the next one.

Well, I was absolutely destroyed with the way I was brought up.

It was a very bad year, very bad.

They christened her the Little Brown Wren.

and cast her in a succession of sweet, drab sister parts, in which she appeared

so plain and virtuous that the head of Universal remarked, who would ever

believe that the hero would want to get her at the fade -out?

No, they didn't know what to do with me at all.

They just didn't.

You know, according to the beautiful women, I was an odd -looking person.

Most of us from the theatre were not beauties.

After nine months and six forgettable pictures, Betty Davis's contract with

Universal was not renewed.

At 22, her career seemed finished.

In September 1931, she and her mother were packing for the journey back to New

York when the phone rang.

This very elegant English voice said, Is this Miss Davis?

This is Mr. George Arliss.

Well, I said, Oh, my dear.

I thought it was some friend ribbing me. And this went on for about ten minutes.

He was very patient. He said, no, my dear, this is George Arliss.

And could you come out to Warner Brothers immediately for an interview?

Arliss, an Englishman of 64, had superstar status, complete control over

pictures, and such reverence from his studio that he was billed as Mr.

George Arliss.

So over the pass I went to Warner Brothers, met him.

And that day he gave me the part.

To be honest, Mr. Arliss was too old to play the man. There is no question.

I mean, it really was a question almost of father and daughter.

But he insisted on having a young girl.

But, oh, what a privilege.

I can learn more from you in five minutes than from anyone else in five

You love music, don't you? I love you. I love you.

Grace, my dear child.

I'm not a child.

Don't be foolish.

I'm old enough to be here.

You know I'm your grandfather.

I don't care how old you are. You love music.

You love the successful pianist, not me. I did at first, perhaps, but not now.

If I come to you in six months and say I love you, I love you, will you marry

me? But you... Don't you love me at all?

Of course I love you.

But I'm old and easily flattered.

I'm moved by your youth and beauty and emotion.

Then you will.

Appearing as George Arliss' leading lady was a turning point.

Warners picked up her contract, the movie fan discovered her, and it was

impossible for her to go anywhere without recognition.

It would be very easy to have it go to your head. Go Hollywood, is what they

about certain people.

And there would be no way anyone brought up in Yankee land could have this

happen. So I felt very fortunate that that was my background.

She was born in an unattractive mill town called Lowell in Massachusetts.

They named her Ruth Elizabeth Davis.

The date was April 5, 1908.

And, of course, I was born early enough to have a really puritan upbringing.

I mean, I can remember my grandmother lived with my aunt where I visited in

Massachusetts many times. I remember Mother making me a dress.

to go to a party, and the neckline was, I swear to you, it was about here.

And he said, Betty, you look as if you were going out in your nightgown.

Yes, very, very Puritan she was.

Mother believed in compliment, which was not the Puritan way. If she approved of

something or if she thought we looked particularly well, she would always

compliment us, which I think is one of the most important things you can do

children.

of all the important things.

She was rather modern in that way, as regards being a Yankee woman.

Her father was a solemn intellectual, a lawyer who looked upon children as a

necessary evil.

The parents were incompatible and separated when Betty was only seven.

We had the last sort of dinner all together.

Although I said something was wrong, I remember my father saying goodbye.

and Mother told us that Daddy would not be living with us anymore.

He was not very nice to my mother, so I was delighted.

I really felt happy for her and for all of us, because the atmosphere at home

was not a nice one.

From then on, my sister and I and my mother, we called ourselves the Three

Musketeers. It was sort of us against the world.

Ruth Davis struggled independently to raise her children.

and Betty was never more aware of the sacrifices her mother made than on her

graduation day at Cushing Academy.

My mother by then was a professional photographer, and she paid the final

tuition at Cushing Academy with the photographs of the senior class.

At that time, there was a developer poisoning you got, and I remember her

was all sort of covered with developer poisoning, and she was a rail.

And she had sort of, she couldn't afford to have a very beautiful dress. I

remember it was a big straw hat and this kind of sad little print dress.

And I remember standing on that platform and saying, one day you will never work

again. It was a terrific incentive.

And thank heavens my life worked out that I could live up to that promise.

When Betty Davis began her 18 -year association with Warner Brothers, they

producing films on small budgets and tight schedules.

Hard discipline gave the studio the nickname of San Quentin.

It was run by a tough team of brothers in business to make money, the Warner

Brothers. These men were at least gamblers.

Whether they knew anything artistically or not, they had funny hunches about

people. They were gamblers.

They were incredible men, really and truly.

And we haven't any left.

Jack Warner, the head of the studio, was known as the father, the power, and the

glory. He was a very moral man, in a very strange way.

Lots of these producers had what they called stables. A lot of little girls

under contract for 75.

dollars a week and they'd give them little bit parts to keep them happy and

they also had other services.

Warner was not that at all. He did not tolerate this.

As a matter of fact, no woman, gripped girls,

whatever woman was on the set was never allowed to wear pants.

Ever at Warner Brothers.

And you would not think of going into his office in pants.

He was a strange combination.

had a very weird, vulgar sense of humor.

His speeches to his employees, when we'd all have to gather when they all wanted

to give us cuts or something, were absolutely appalling for a man worth

what he owned, etc.

But in spite of the insurrections which had to be, that was the foundation of

everything I'm doing now.

It was glorious. It was a glorious time.

Lives were made happier because of Hollywood, because actually the only

America has ever had are the actors in Hollywood. I mean, by royalty, I mean to

look up to, to dream about, to want to copy, and to be liked.

In 1933, she became enveloped in a Hollywood fantasy.

at a time when the rest of America was trying to cope with a crippling

depression.

Money was scarce, and millions were jobless. The depression, of course, was

incredible because we were on a publicity train financed by General

did 16 cities in 16 days.

And we had some rough experiences because the banks were closed. We were

derailed twice.

because we looked like these gorgeous, rich Hollywood people.

And they didn't like rich Hollywood people, a lot of those people.

So we were in some kind of danger.

And sometimes we'd look out the window in stations and people would just be

sticking their tongues out at us and shaking their fists.

Yeah, it wasn't funny when he closed those banks.

In spite of that, the tour was incredible.

I learned what films meant to me.

In the film, Passions of 34, she was glamorized almost beyond recognition.

They gave her a platinum wig, false eyelashes.

a huge mouth and flinky clothes.

I was the biggest imitation of Miss Garbo that ever lived.

Oh, ludicrous. And I never did that again. Well, I look perfectly absurd.

It just didn't go with what I was.

And you must follow your own course. And I was basically an actress, not

somebody who was a glamour girl.

I'm giving a party, too. A big one.

Saturday night.

I got a jazz band coming up from Memphis.

Well, that's fine.

I want you to come and be my boyfriend.

Honest? Sure. It'll be a bit formal, but you needn't doll up. Just something

dark and nice.

Oh, thanks.

Thanks, Miss Madge.

Cabin in the Cotton was a signpost.

Had the powers that be really thought about it. A signpost of the kind of

parts I could play.

You'd look nice all dressed out, wouldn't you?

And don't call me Miss Madge.

What's the matter about it, honey?

A cigarette.

In Cabin in the Cotton, she played a rich and conniving southern belle, the

independent woman.

It was the type of part in which she would later excel.

I'll be seeing you.

Don't work too hard.

We're going to dance the Pecklewood Wiggle, or whatever you call it, and I

you to lead the figure.

Oh, I'd be glad to, Madge.

Cute. I'd like to kiss you, but I just washed my hair.

Bye.

I have often wondered why I had such enjoyment

from playing these women.

But they are media from the standpoint of your craft.

But they're also enjoyable.

Enjoyable to play. So I always...

As I grew older, I wondered if this was really in my nature way underneath.

I've never given a definite statement on this fact yet.

Feeling better?

I'd like a drink.

Before breakfast?

Get me a drink!

The role of a once famous actress turned alcoholic and bent on self -destruction

came in a film called Dangerous.

Her very individual quality could now be seen more clearly.

Why don't you lay off that stuff?

Because I'd rather be drunk than sober.

I gathered that last night.

Last night?

Oh, you must be quite proud of your conquest.

You're very wrong.

You see, I... Don't bother with an alibi. It really doesn't matter.

You're a perfect alibi.

Take a look at yourself. Take a good look.

Drunken, ill -kept. The only feeling you could arouse in a man is pity.

Pity?

Pity? You dare feel sorry for me?

You with your fat little soul and your smug face, picking your way so

through a pastel existence.

Well, I've lived more in a day than you'll ever dare live.

Pity for me?

That's very funny, because I've never had any for men like you.

She was given her first Academy Award for her performance in Dangerous in

1936.

By now, she had been married for four years to a band leader called Harmon

Nelson.

She was happily married, but still dedicated to her career.

Desire to want something, to obtain that desire and live up to every moment of

it. And then go on leaving yesterday behind.

On and on, higher and higher.

Frustrated actress reads lines for small audience.

After 31 pictures, two Academy nominations and one Oscar, the parts and

scripts they now offered were making her feel unhappy and unfulfilled.

She was bound to Warners for another five years. The contract system had

her security, but no privilege of choice.

Bad scripts, bad directors.

Terrible scripts.

Bureau of Missing Persons, Parachute Jumper, Housewife.

Oh, just junk.

And I knew that I would never attain my

goal without good scripts and good directors.

And so I walked.

She staged a one -woman strike.

She sailed across the Atlantic to take up an offer of work in Europe.

Warners stopped her salary, suspended her, and took her to court.

The case was heard in London.

Miss Betty Davis is in the headline news over a lawsuit with her Hollywood

employers.

Newspapers have made a lot of fuss because she wore the same clothes three

running, practically in rags.

Since people knew the salaries that Hollywood people got, That mitigated

her winning the case, in my belief.

One gets the feeling if somebody's getting in excess of $1 ,000 a week,

really should put up with anything.

However, if their career was being run into the ground, they wouldn't be able

get that money or any money very shortly.

These contracts are written strictly for the studio, not for the actor.

And the more powerful an actor got, the more control he tried to exercise

over... the quality of material offered him.

And so she had fights, so she had fights, but there was a reason behind

don't think... She never threw fits without a damn good reason.

I don't think so.

I lost the battle, but I won the war.

Warners paid her share of the damages, and when she returned, gave her a good

script, a shrewd director, and a strong supporting cast.

The film marked woman.

was a story about the New York underworld.

Warner Brothers, now known as the Working Man Studio, were making

films with a concern for society's losers, an approach to production which

suited Betty Davis well.

I remember on Mark's Woman, when the gang had beaten

me up, you heard it offstage, cut, scar, face.

The makeup people came down with the gauze. In those days, there was one

for any ailment to the face.

Went across here, came down here, and under here. So the entire face was in

view. Well, you looked like some kind of a nun.

And I knew this was ludicrous, so I said to the director, I'll be back in a

little while. I took the studio car, went to my doctor. I said, I've been

up hopelessly.

So he put big plugs in my nose to be swollen, and, well, it was the most

marvelous sight you ever saw.

And I came through the gate, and the guard at the gate called Mr. Wallace and

said, Mr. Wallace, Miss Davis has been in a terrible automobile accident.

Now, those things I was really one of the first fighters for.

Because I believe that's what the screen had to offer.

Real reality of appearance.

How?

By just closing my eyes, pretending it never happened?

I wish it was as easy as that, but it isn't.

1939 was a high point in Betty Davis's career.

She made five films in 12 months, every one a success.

A 28 -year -old actor and ex -sports commentator was in the supporting cast

film called Dark Victory.

His name, Ronald Reagan.

It's four o 'clock, sir.

Last drink.

Two here, two there. Same thing.

Yes, sir.

It's funny.

Why?

Time, Alex.

Did you ever think about time?

It goes, Alex.

That's the business of time.

Little Ronnie Reagan, we called him. I had two scenes with him.

In Dark Victory. Well, in all honesty, he did not make a great mark as an

He had one film that he got quite great praise for, King's Row,

where he played the man without the leg.

No, he was just a nice little contract player.

You know, one does sit around and say anything can happen in America. There's

question about it.

Then where are we, my friend?

High and dry.

That's the last drink.

Dark Victory was directed by a flamboyant Englishman, Edmund Goulding.

Betty Davis played an heiress who becomes blind.

Her best friend and companion in the film was an Irish actress new to

Geraldine Fitzgerald.

I was told that she would scare me. And I was told that she would steal.

all the scenes from me. People said before I went out, they said, just be

very careful. They said, if she's very good at doing this, and if she comes and

she puts her arm around you, and her character makes a friendly gesture

your character, be careful, because that means that she's going to maneuver you

out of the light, or she's going to turn you so the camera can't see you, so on

and so on. So I was very, very...

upset by this answer what I do and they said well the best thing to do would be

to wedge yourself in between a chair or table if there's one on the set and then

she can't turn you around so I took this advice to heart and every time I saw

any piece of furniture that was anyway kind of stalwart I got myself wedged in

behind it so that I couldn't be turned around she thought I'd gone mad because

the truth of the matter is I think she's the most generous person to other

actors have ever come across

This woman that she played is dying of a brain tumour, and she's been told

that she'll know when the end is coming because she'll start suddenly to lose

her sight.

And she's out in the garden with her friend and secretary and companion,

is the part I played, and they're planting spring bulbs.

Oh, here's one for you.

Ah,

that's a good one. I'll name a horse after that one.

It's a happy moment, and then suddenly...

She starts to lose her sight and says she can't see. And her friend says, no,

you can see. It's just that the sun has gone in.

It's getting darker by the minute.

We'll have to take our raincoats with us.

Old little rain cats and dogs and ruin all our night bulbs.

Look how it's clouding up. It's getting darker every second.

Funny, I can still feel the sun on my head.

Judith Tehan understands what's happening and she won't let her friend

her. She says she wants to do it alone.

And she starts to go upstairs.

And we all gathered around. There's just some shots in a picture, if the actress

or the actor's good enough, that everybody wants to see. So there were a

people on the set watching her do this.

And she was going up with this sort of transcendent look on her face. And

suddenly she came all the way down the steps and said in a very ordinary way to

Eddie Goulding, she said, is Max Steiner going to score this?

And he said, oh, well, I don't think so, Betty, because if she was known to hate

having the moments that she was, her big moments in the film, she was to hate

having them underscored.

So he prevaricated and said, I don't think so, no. She said, well, I'll tell

one thing. She said, either I'm going up those stairs or Max Steiner's going up

those stairs, but for God damn well not going up together.

Martha, Miss Judith.

I'm going up to lie down now.

And of course, afterwards, Max Steiner did give up the stairs with her, and so

she was furious.

I don't think I have ever been completely satisfied

with my work.

The nearest to being satisfied that I can remember was Dark

Victory.

And that had a lot to do with the dream of what the film itself could be.

plus the performance and all.

And I asked for a separate showing of it.

I went in the projection room all alone and saw it.

Well, I remember walking across the lot, and I could not get the grin off my

face. I would kind of go, you know, you shouldn't be smiling, pleased with

yourself in front of everybody.

That's almost the only time that I really felt.

The film and the performance was a very good job.

That's your mother?

Yes, ma 'am.

I don't want to be disturbed.

Betty Davis put life into a script which looked improbable on paper and won the

best reviews of her career.

They came at a time of personal distress.

Her first husband had just divorced her.

By now, William Wyler had come into her life.

The film director, in his early 30s, was demanding, temperamental, talented, and

often ruthless.

Betty Davis had met her match.

Without Willie Wyler, I think I would have had not as big a career.

Jezebel was the true beginning of that name above the title, Making Money.

It was a great film, under his guidance.

And the director is it.

There's no question.

For instance, I had never done more than two takes in any film up to Jezebel. If

you got the lines right and all, that was fine.

He was very exacting.

Would you like to see my new dress?

That's what I wanted to do all day.

Well, let me go then.

There it is.

For the Olympus ball.

Isn't it lovely?

Julie, it's red.

It's gorgeous, they rain.

You can't wear red for the Olympus ball. Why not?

You never saw an unmarried girl in anything but white.

Well, you're going to see one tomorrow night.

He went his own way making a film. He always said, I do not care what happens

while we make this, whether we like each other or dislike each other. I only

care when the people walk into that theater, what they see.

He knew the film from beginning to end. And of course, that in those days was

the director's protection from a Mr. Jack Warner, who after the first cut

take over, say, Jezebel and ruin it. And Mr. Wyland never gave a Mr.

Warner any optional cuts of any kind.

Hitchcock did this.

All the bright directors in that day did this because the powers that be who had

the final print.

could ruin it from what they thought was right about it. I want to leave.

We haven't danced yet, shall we? No.

Go on and play.

Go on and play.

Please let me go.

Please take me out of here.

He was the first person that ever really directed me, because you really are

only as good as your director.

He really put me in a different category as a performer. There is no question

about it.

Miss Davis, I am very happy to present to you on behalf of the Academy of

Picture Arts and Sciences for the second time that award for your performance in

Jezebel. May I be the first to congratulate you?

Thank you, Mr. Cedric.

I'm very grateful to members of the Academy, members of the Screen Actors

for this award.

I have never not been honored or thrilled to receive an award.

And I have been very fortunate with awards.

And I see that they kept shined, very prominently displayed.

And I call them my blood, sweat, and tears, because, of course, that's what

are. No question about it.

opportunity, mister. You can tell the folks back home you saw Betty Davis

picking flowers in her own backyard.

There's a million thrills in Beverly Hills. How about it, sailor? Show the

little lady all the homes of the movie stars.

I'm sorry, Mac. I've only got an hour and I've got to get back to my ship.

better way can you spend your last hour than a nice bus ride?

Are you kidding?

With America at war, Betty Davis set out on a bond -selling tour.

She was invited by the government to encourage factory workers to buy war

stamps.

Her personal appearances in Missouri and Oklahoma had startling results.

She gave an equally patriotic performance in a fundraising propaganda

Ginny, this is for you.

And Billy, this is for you.

It's Mother's Christmas present.

War bonds.

Yes, darling, war bonds.

Gee, thanks a lot, Mom, but I wanted a bicycle.

I know you did, Ginny.

And I know that Billy wanted a railroad.

But I feel that you're both old enough to realize that your country's at war

to be willing to make sacrifices for it.

Just think, if Daddy were wounded, one single war stamp might pay for the

medicine that would save him from pain, even save his life.

In 1942, Betty Davis became the president of the Hollywood Canteen for

Servicemen. The building, a former livery stable off Sunset Boulevard, was

converted by Hollywood craftsmen. All those marvelous workmen.

who redid this old, decrepit building. All the guilds and unions did all this

work for free, restored it inside.

It was mammoth. It was mammoth. It really was.

I was head of it, and I was responsible for it.

It was very exhausting, because I was working in all those years very hard.

oh, how worthwhile. And we had to have it, because the...

The servicemen that came through here never saw any Hollywood people.

And of course, that's what they wanted to see.

So that we provided.

When she performed in Thank Your Lucky Stars, she made her ultimate

to the war effort. She sang.

We were all paid by one of $50 ,000 to do these numbers, all of which went to

the canteen fund.

You marched away and left this town as empty as can be.

And I am like the driftwood in a deadly comet deep.

I can't sit under the apple tree with anyone else but me.

For there is no secret lover that the draft board

didn't discover.

When they asked me to do a song, I just... roared with laughter for the

two days.

And then they convinced me to do it.

And I'm glad I did.

It was fun.

The battle is on, but the fortress will hold.

They're either too young or too old.

Conrad Weidel, the winner of many jitterbugging contests, was chosen as

dancing partner.

And I knew whatever young man they hired was going to be petrified because I was

Betty Davis.

So I took him aside and I said, now, I am not Betty Davis because I

didn't want to rehearse it because then I knew it wouldn't come out right

because I could guard myself then.

So I'm just a dame who took to a dance floor.

and do just with me what you would do with her. Well, he was wonderful.

He did. He certainly did.

When I was up there flying through the air and actually fell on my knee very

badly, but I said, you keep going.

You get out that door for this take because you do not ever want to do this

again.

And I did. I made it out the door.

I'll never, never fail you when you are in Australia or out in the

Aleutians or off among the Rooshians.

During the second year of the Hollywood canteen, Betty Davis's second husband,

Arthur Farnsworth, died very suddenly, leaving her a widow at the age of 35.

Suffering a setback in her private life, she turned to her professional life for

compensation.

Stanley did.

Stanley. In the film In This Our Life, she played a spoiled, self -centered

young woman who attempts to blame a Negro boy for a hit -and -run accident

had committed herself.

Something terrible's happened.

Peter. Don't talk.

You're going to stay, aren't you? Please stay with me. When your rest doesn't

feel better, I'm going to take you home. Home?

Yes. They don't want me. Nobody wants me.

They want you very much.

A theatre, by contrast, calm and sensible, was played by Olivia de

were on the set and Ernie Haller, the cameraman who had done Gone With The

was carefully lighting a scene which was very important for Betty.

And the first assistant began to sort of hurry him,

Ernie Haller, to speed it up. And Betty understood.

that what really counted was what went on film, even more than the budget.

And the time schedule meant the budget. So she lashed out at the

first assistant, Jack Sullivan.

In such a manner, it was like sheet lightning, like the crack of a whip.

All of us froze in absolute terror, including Jack Sullivan.

A second later, I thought, what a remarkable and brave thing she's done.

She's protecting the quality of this film, and she's protecting her own work

which the film depends.

I've done a dreadful thing.

That accident, it wasn't Perry.

I did it.

And now they've found out, and they're going to tell the police.

And they'll send me to prison.

Prison, Uncle!

Oh, it was an awful thing. I know that.

But I didn't mean to hurt anybody, and it just happened, and then I was so

I didn't know what I was doing.

Uncle, I don't want Harry punished.

Maybe you could fix it so that he'd get out of prison and I wouldn't have to go

to the police.

I can't face it.

You're the only one who can save me, Uncle. The only one in the world.

I'll do anything you say. Just tell me what to do.

Uncle, I'll come and live here.

I'll take care of you.

I'll make you laugh. Remember how we laughed the other night? Oh, we'll have

fun. We'll do anything, anything you want.

I think that one should know one is acting.

I think we can sit on the street corner and see the real people.

And I think a terrible thing has happened today. It's all getting so

Very little makeup, no hair, nothing.

And I always believed that acting was larger than life.

Why don't you say something?

Uncle.

Uncle, what's the matter with you?

Six months at the outside.

That's all he gives me.

Six months.

What are you talking about?

Only six months to live. That's what the doctor said. Well, I'm sorry, Uncle,

but maybe the doctor's wrong. There isn't much time.

They may be on their way to the district attorney's office right now. Call him

up, Uncle. He'll listen to you. Say anything.

Just so they don't arrest me.

But I'm going to die, don't you understand?

I'm going to die. Oh, right, so you're going to die. But you're an old man.

You've lived your life. I haven't lived mine. Mine's hardly begun.

Think of me.

Think what will happen to me if you don't get me out of this.

I know that she sometimes alarms people, especially if they're new or

inexperienced, because she has a habit of repeating what you say.

I think she really wants to know, do you really mean it?

I mean, for example, if you were a young director and you said to her, Miss

Davis, now here you come in from stage left, she might say, stage left?

And then he'd say, well, if you like, then come from stage right. And then

say, stage right?

And she would then become impatient, thinking that he doesn't know what he's

doing. By that time, he doesn't.

But every now and then I would run into a director who was very conscious that I

was a female and therefore he must not give me my way.

or let me play the scene the way I wanted to.

But that never discouraged me. We ended up playing it the way I wanted to.

In Beyond the Forest, she played the frustrated wife of a small -town doctor.

Professionally, too, it proved to be a deeply frustrating experience.

Number one, I was too old to play the girl.

Number two, the husband should have been Eugene Paulette, a great, fat, obese

man.

And they cast Mr. Joseph Cotton.

And who wants to ever leave Joseph Cotton?

So I spent weeks trying to change him.

You know, that's one of the nice things about living in a small place like this.

You're not just a number over the door.

People are interested. They like you.

Oh, write yourself a book, Lewis.

I don't want people to like me. Nothing pleases me more than when they don't

like me. It means I don't belong.

I know you're not interested in my work, but I just saved a woman's life.

Saved her for what?

Because it's my business to save lives when I can.

There's only one person in this town that does anybody a real favor. That's

undertaker. Carries them out.

Rosa, why do you torment yourself like this?

Because it makes me feel alive.

To hate everything so?

Keeps me from getting soft and forgetting about all the things I really

Weary of the whole production.

She made one last appeal to Jack Warner to be taken off the film.

He refused to listen.

And so I decided that if after all the proof I had

given of what I wanted to do with my career, that I was still having to argue

after 18 years about an unsuitable property

that I was going, that I just had to branch out.

Because I had a 10 -year more contract. So it did take courage to go. It would

have been nice and easy, but that was never for me anyway, being nice and

So I got Mr.

Warner on the phone at 3 o 'clock in the morning, finally.

And we had two more days of shooting.

And I said, if you want this film finished, I get my release the day after

finish well.

You can imagine.

But he called back. I got it.

And the most amusing thing is I had to dub one line for Beyond the Forest.

And I'm in a projection room, and this is the line I had to dub.

If I don't get out of here, I'll die.

Well, the sound people, everybody just collapsed.

was the perfect line.

I finally left.

Because I thought that daughter had better leave father and mother. Because

studios were really like you had your family.

And your problems got to be worse as you grew up and knew more, just like we are

with our children when they get to know more. It's pretty devastating.

And they would always say, well, we gave you your original chance.

You really have no right now to grow up.

But I grew up.

And I just had to go.

Beyond the Forest brought down the wrath of the critics in the worst reviews of

her career.

One critic wrote, if Betty Davis had deliberately set out to wreck her

she couldn't have picked a more appropriate vehicle.

Another, Betty Davis has reached that point in her career when it is prudent

pause, to take stock, to weigh future prospects against past triumphs.

There had been many triumphs in her partnership with Warner Brothers.

She had appeared in over 50 films and created a bewildering gallery of screen

portraits.

to help me tell you how humbly I ask you to forgive me.

Press, I'm kneeling to you.

I had a lovely time. Lovely, lovely.

It was lovely.

Lovely.

Yes.

Well, I'll have to get up early in the morning.

Good night.

Good night.

I can only stay for a minute.

You're so right.

Don't you just love Sunday afternoon?

Everything quiet.

Nobody at home to disturb you.

Mac, I've always wanted to ask you something.

Have you ever killed a man?

After her professional divorce from Warner Brothers, she was alone for the

time in 18 years.

At the age of 42, and with a two -year -old daughter, she divorced her third

husband, William Grant Sherry.

At this low point in her private and professional life, she was offered the

of Margot Channing, a theatrical first lady whose career is threatened by a

scheming young girl.

The film was all about Eve.

The writer and director, Joseph Mankiewicz.

And the scheming young girl was played by Anne Baxter.

She had told me that when that script arrived in the mail, she thought she was

through. Did you know that?

41 years old.

Marvelous. It was the greatest break at that point in my career that ever

happened. There's no question about it.

I wouldn't have found that. As I told Mankiewicz, he resurrected me from the

dead. There's no question about it. Well, Willie Wilder said...

You know, be prepared. She can be rough.

You know, but she's good, but she can be tough.

Oh, Margaret, darling.

Edmund Goulding called me and said, Dear boy, you're out of your mind. This

woman will annihilate you.

She will grind you to a fine powder and blow you away.

She will come on the set with a large yellow pad and sharp pencils, and she

write.

And having written, she was then direct.

It's all over.

What's all over?

The audition.

Eve read with Miss Caswell.

Eve?

Oh, how enchanting.

However did you two get the idea of letting Eve read with Miss Caswell?

Well, she's your understudy.

Eve, my understudy? I had no idea.

Oh, I thought you knew. She was put on over a week ago.

It seems inconceivable. I'd never seen her backstage, but of course, with so

many people loitering about, well, well.

Though Eve is not working for Max after all.

Max, you sly puss.

But we were thrilled, because it was literate in the extreme. I mean, when do

you have a script that you can read as you can read a play? For Eve, God, that

was fantastic.

And to have had so much fun.

You're supposed to be at one another's throats and...

cut the atmosphere with a knife and that sort of thing. There was nothing like

that. Not only that, but Betty fell madly in love with Gary.

And on top of everything else, love was in bloom.

It was marvellous.

In All About Eve, Meryl played Bill Thompson, theatre director and lover to

Betty Davis's Margot Channing.

In July 1950, they eloped and married in Mexico.

In a way, that should have worked, except she said to me, you know, that...

Something peculiar happened that he married Margot Channing, not Betty

and she married Bill Sampson, not Gary Merrill.

They adopted two children.

But after ten years, almost to the day, Betty Davis' fourth marriage collapsed.

I loved being a wife.

Never married anybody I didn't think I loved.

Was brought up to marry.

I was not brought up as we are today, that one may experiment, have affairs,

then see.

In my world, you're married, or nothing, just you're married.

Had I been brought up differently, I think I would have married much, much,

later, and maybe found the right person.

Funny business, a woman's career. The things you drop on your way up the

so you can move faster.

You forget you'll need them again when you get back to being a woman.

It's one career all females have in common, whether we like it or not.

Being a woman.

Sooner or later, we've got to work at it.

No matter how many other careers we've had or want.

And in the last analysis, nothing's any good unless you can look up just before

dinner or turn around in bed.

There he is. Without that, you're not a woman.

When she says something to the effect that if you can't look across the dinner

table or wake up in bed with a man, in other words, that's basically what it

says, you're not a woman.

And there is no question about it, that should be a part of a woman's life.

And that I didn't in the long run have.

And would have liked it, believe me.

Jane, it's a big thing, getting married.

What? I said it's a big thing, getting married to somebody.

Well, sure it is.

You've got to prepare for it.

What do you mean, prepare?

Well, I was just saying marriage isn't all roses, you know.

Well, who on earth ever said it was?

You've got to look before you leap.

Look, Ma, I've known him about three years, and I... Well, I wasn't saying

didn't know him all right. I was just saying that marriage is a big thing,

some girls don't know nowadays.

And you've got to make sacrifices.

And when the children start coming, you've got to put them first ahead of

everybody. I know, Ma. Oh, and you can't go throwing money around.

I hope you've got more on your par than me, but if you don't, don't go throwing

it around.

No, Ma.

And then one day you'll find out a lot of time's gone by, and you'll wake up

knowing this is the way it's always going to be, just like this.

Day after day, year after year, just the same.

And that's why...

Being married's such a big thing.

A woman who has to make a decision, an actress who has to make a decision,

I play the mother of this teenage girl, a boy?

That is a very important decision she has to make.

Because if she decides to play that mother, that automatically rules out for

any romantic role.

She can, from that moment on, not play the young romantic girl anymore.

And that is a very important time.

That usually hits them around age 40.

At 44, Betty Davis embarked on what she would later call her ten black years.

Illness and injury, family problems, and the death of her mother, Ruth.

All this happening at a time which was professionally unrewarding.

Working far below her going salary, On a high -risk, low -budget film, she took

an unprecedented step and challenged the money men of Hollywood.

By then, the bankers were giving all the money to the studios.

And the bankers had lists.

And if you weren't on the list, they wouldn't give the studio any money, even

they cast you.

And so this was an employment ad, written just like an employment ad.

divorcee, mother of three, more affable than recommended.

Thirty years' experience as an actress in motion pictures.

Mobile still, and more affable than rumor would have it.

Once steady employment in Hollywood.

Everybody begged me not to put it in the Hollywood Reporter, but I did, and it

was quite a day in Hollywood that day.

It was fun.

The low -budget, high -risk venture was called Whatever Happened to Baby Jane.

It put her back among the box office stars and won her her 10th Oscar

for Best Actress.

Her 10 black years were over.

Once again, she had overcome the crisis of middle age.

This life begins at 40. It's perfect nonsense.

It does not.

60 was pretty rough. I was given a very huge birthday party, 60.

My 70th birthday, I put on blackface,

an afro black wig, all black clothes,

and had a black funeral wreath on my door for my guests.

70 is awesome.

I would like always...

to be doing something, not just think back and say, well, I've done it, I've

made it, and now I'll just go on cruises and do all this.

No, I love to work. You see, that is really what my survival is, I think.

Every now and then there is a part that I say, oh, I wish

I was 30 or 40 years younger. Would I love to play that part?

Turn you back.

The devil had a story about Willie the Weeper.

Made his living as a chimney sweeper.

He had a dope habit and he had it bad.

Listen while I tell you about a dream he had.

Marvin. Madge.

It was totally incredible that a little shy

Yankee girl from Boston led the life she led.