Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?

Maybe you remember me?

I'm Baby Jane Hudson.

I've written a letter to Daddy!

Jane looks like she'd be fun to hang out with, and have a few drinks.

Or 10.

She liked her Johnnie Walker.

Damn, girl!

No wonder she's so cray cray.

Although, to be honest, Blanche was kind of annoying.

I'd sit there with Jane, knock back a few bottles of Scotch, and talk shit about Blanche all day.

It starts soon.

This has become part of my daily morning ritual.

One of the best horror films.

If Blanche was so damned rich, why did they live in a cruddy old house in the suburbs?

I thought she "bought Valentino's old house?"

The beginning of the hagsploitation films. A true classic.

Hack, Hack, Sweet Has-Been.....

The "I've Written a Letter to Daddy" scene was so fabulous.

Weird and wonderful at the same time.

Had Bette sung before that, or was it just for the movie?

If not, then I'd say it was pretty brave of her to sing, and she wasn't half bad.

People can be rich and still live modestly. Keanu is like that.

Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?

Song.

Did Elvira get a hammer to the head?

Damn, Baby Jane is hard core!

I've always wanted someone to get me this cake for my birthday.

On our last excursion to El Coyote, we went by the house (172 South McCadden Place) -- a true classic, just like the motion picture! Will probably do it again for my b'day this weekend!

I'd love to live in that neighborhood, R19.

It's very quaint.

I wonder how much that house costs?

Is this Johnsons?

r20 it last sold for $90,000 in 1972 & is now is estimated to be worth 3 to 4 million . . .

Thr real horror is Bette was just 54 years old during this!!!

Whoa, R23!

That's a rough 54.

IT WAS MAKEUP

I've posted about this before. It disturbed me, A lot. It reminded me of my Grandma's house, with my poor retarded Aunt Sylvia. Two old ladies, two chain-smokers. Only one rational mind, in a fragile body. The yelling and shrieking back and forth. Two unfortunate women, joined for the rest of their lives. I loved them both, and hated the abuse. My poor Grandma was finally separated from her abusive daughter, but my poor Dad was forever haunted by her query, "Will I ever be allowed to return to my home on Church St?" She never was.

When my Mom found out my ex=BF worked in social services, she asked a few questions. When she found out he worked with people with developmental disabilities, he became GOLD.

I am the 1960 novel by Henry Farrell, who needed (and got) a bestseller to pay for his wife's medical bills.

R10 I think the $$ was running out.

Bette said she imagined Jane as the kind of crazy person who never washed her face and just kept applying layer upon layer of makeup until it looked like a mask.

I was washing hush hush sweet Charlotte the back story on YouTube last night. Joan and better really didn't like each other. What a mess that film shoot was.

Do you even GO here, R30?

I got to hear Bette sing Letter to Daddy in person.

The overhead lighting also makes anyone look terrible.

In one of Bette's biographies there's a story about her doing a live appearance in the UK to promote the film. At one point she announces to the audience that under each seat is a genuine Baby Jane Hudson doll, whereupon everybody gets up and bends down. Bette cackles as only she can, "I've never seen so many pasty British fannies in all my life!"

Do tell, R32!

How is it Letter to Daddy has never been made into a punk rock song? If there is a version, I would love to hear it. God, I'm picturing the frontmen in drag a la Bette and Joan. This needs to exist.

^ That would be festive, all speeded up like the Sex Pistols!

R30 Joan must’ve known there would be hell to pay for being responsible for Bette losing the Oscar (this is what Bette thought, I think she would’ve lost anyway, even without Joan campaigning against her). What Joan did at the Oscars was childish, not even knowing Anne Bancroft and accepting the award for her. The filming was WHTBJ was tense at times, but they were all professional and filmed it fast. Bette actively turned all the crew against Joan on the HHSC set. Joan was really weak to bow out and let Bette get her way. Faye Dunaways portrait was hardly Joan Crawford. Joan was at best passive aggressive.

That would be Miss Anna Lee, r37

Here’s a clip of “I’ve Written a Letter to Daddy” w/Victor Buono on piano.

Here she is in her first film after WHTBJ? She looks fine.

I know the film has become camp, but I think Jane is her best performance: scary, appalling, heartbreaking.

I have tried to watch this movie a handful of times, but it's so horrifying I can barely make it to the half hour mark.

I suppose even a lesbian deserves a "Mary."

Marianne Faithfull's vocals on the "Dangerous Acquaintances" album always ping with Bette Davis's intonations when I hear them. The first time I heard this record (and fuck does that date ME!) it sounded like Bette Davis singing. I don't even think I was stoned. Then again, it WAS 1981...

blanche was rich and they WERE going to by Valentinos house but that was right before the accident 20 years before, quote unquote and afterwards they wouldnt have moved as she was an invalid................

the photo of her in the stills for empty canvas does look appealing. She looks like a period time warp portrayal of a rich/lush/ nynphomaniac. I knew somebody with that look decades ago.

the house looks like its in a suburb??????? Its hancock park............................hardly a suburb, it was inner city LA even in 1962.

Bette Davis should've won the Oscar for this. No other "name" actress would've dared give the performance she gave. Bette didn't give a fuck, if the character was supposed to be grotesque, that was how she was going to play it. She didn't pretty it up like other actresses of her era did.

R47 hard to “pretty” it up when you are 54 but look 70.

Everybody looked older back then.

R49 not me bitch

[quote]r10 If Blanche was so damned rich, why did they live in a cruddy old house in the suburbs?

It's not the suburbs, it's Hancock Park, an area of L.A. where Ellen DeGeneres lives. It's where old money had a place in town, when they didn't have a house in Pasadena.

Because Hancock Park and Pasadena wouldn't accept movie people, Beverly Hills started to be developed for that new crowd. (Which technically means a star like Valentino wouldn't have lived in that house ... but whatever.)

Yes, Hancock Park was an elite neighborhood back then.

Hancock park is still elite. Nate king Cole live there. Even though they didn't want him in the neighborhood. He still lived there.

The term elite is pretty broad today. It doesn't just mean old money anymore. It now applies to, Hollywood, wallstreet, academia, media figures, politics etc etc.

r53 I was responding to the notion that Hancock Park was not a fashionable neighborhood back then. It certainly was. We all know what "elite" means in 2019. Nobody thinks about "old money" anymore.

My favorite part of that whole movie is not Jane's immortal line to Blanche, but the facial expression she has just before it as she looks out the window and Blanche complains to her.

Blanche was an annoying fucking bitch.

"Who were you talking to?" "Who was at the door?" "Was that Elvira?"

SHUT THE FUCK UP, YOU STUPID TWAT!

No wonder Jane went fucking crazy.

BD Hyman is in it!

Why was and his mom so mean to each other?!

Rat! It's what's for dinner!

I bet porked Baby Jane!

Whatever Happened to My Hyman?

Blanche, your pussy smells like shit!

Trick?

Don't bother with the 1991 TV remake. It is dreadful. Although there is one memorable scene where Jane performs her signature song at a drag revue after being mislead/conned by an -esque character into thinking that it's a talent show. Because the song was originally a duet between both sisters, the type character shows up dressed in drag as Blanche which humiliates Jane and causes the audience to heckle her.

It's about to start.