Bette Davis named the best movies of her career: “Those defining moments”
As one of the leading lights of Hollywood’s ‘Golden Age’, there was no shortage of contenders to choose from when Bette Davis was pressed to name the best movies of her legendary career.
Making history was part and parcel of her rise to the summit of the A-list, with Davis becoming the first performer ever to earn ten Academy Award nominations for acting, all of which were in the ‘Best Actress’ category, a run that included five consecutive nods between 1939 and 1943.
After cutting her teeth on Broadway, Davis jumped to pictures at the turn of the 1930s, but success was hardly immediate. Under contract with Universal, several of her early efforts underperformed with both critics and audiences, but once she freed herself from her deal and shacked up with Warner Bros in 1937, she was off to the races.
It hit her in the pocket, though, with Davis forced to pay $80,000 in legal fees. However, that show of confidence in her own abilities and earning power was justified and then some when she effortlessly evolved into one of the most popular and well-rounded talents the industry had at its disposal.
Unsurprisingly, the performances Davis singled out as her finest were among the 11 she received Oscar nominations for, but only one of them was directed by one of her most adored professional collaborators, William Wyler, who helmed several of her most famous features, including The Letter and The Little Foxes.
“I think Mr. Wyler is, without doubt, through all the years, our greatest American director,” she told Vanity Fair, with her second Oscar-winning performance in a seminal film for Davis. “Jezebel was one of those defining moments in my career. I owe so much to Willie. He was the director who helped me achieve my full potential. Because of him, my name was above the title for the first time, and it’s stayed there ever since.”
Davis admitted that she’d become accustomed to getting asked which character was her favourite to play, so she cut out the middle man and answered it herself. “It was Judith Traherne in Dark Victory,” she offered, another Oscar-nominated turn that saw her co-starring with Humphrey Bogart and marked her eighth time sharing the screen with 11-time co-star George Brent.
After that, things became a little trickier to narrow down, but Davis went and dropped in another classic anyway. “I haven’t the foggiest, which is my favourite film after Dark Victory,” she mused. “Oh, I suppose I’d have to choose All About Eve; Joe Mankiewicz was truly a genius.”
As mentioned, Davis hardly lacked options when she was virtually synonymous with the Oscars race during the peak of her career, but the recurring theme is that working with directors she trusted and admired was her preferred method for doing what she believed to be her best work onscreen.
