There was hardly a less well-liked actress in Hollywood than Joan Crawford. Everyone from BETTE DAVIS to GEORGE CUKOR (not to mention her adopted daughter Christina) had their problems with her. But never was there such a durable star as Joan Crawford - the only actress to leave the silent era a star and continue with top billing for another 40 years. She managed that remarkable feat while being neither a particularly gifted actress nor starring in a great number of excellent movies. In fact, out of 80 motion pictures in which she appeared, barely a dozen have withstood the test of time, and many of them continue to be regarded for reasons other than Joan Crawford's performances.
The actress reached the Hollywood heights primarily because she learned to play one role to perfection: the ruthless girl/working woman from the wrong side of the tracks who would stop at nothing to reach the top. It was a role she played with almost infinite variations. The formula called ultimately for her to appear in gorgeous gowns in every picture, inevitably moving from low life to high life by the last reel. It was every working girl's fantasy, and Joan Crawford had a strong appeal to female fans who flocked to her movies in remarkable numbers, especially in the early to mid-1930s and then again in the latter 1940s, the two eras of her greatest success.
Born Lucille le Sueur, the future actress lived the life that she would later portray so often on the screen. She was poor and ambitious. After working as a waitress and a store clerk, she entered show business by winning a Charleston contest, which eventually led to a job as a chorus girl. She was still a chorus girl three years later, albeit on Broadway, when she was spotted by an MGM bigwig, Harry Rapf. Under the name Billie Cassin, the 19-year-old actress appeared in her first film, Pretty Ladies (1925). However, she was still in the chorus. Even though she moved up to an ingenue role in Old Clothes that same year, it wasn't until MGM sponsored a fan magazine contest to rename their new star - thus "Joan Crawford" - that her career began to take off.
She was given plenty of work, but Joan Crawford didn't break out of the pack as a genuine star until 1928 when she literally stole the script for Our Dancing Daughters from the story department and then buttonholed the film's producer, insisting that she be given the role of the wild flapper heroine. The movie was a huge success, and she was finally a bona fide MGM leading lady. She became so popular that her silent film Our Modern Maidens (1929) did big box office even as the talkie craze took over. She made her talkie debut singing and dancing in Hollywood Revue of 1929.
In 1931 she starred for the first of many times with CLARK GABLE in Dance Fools Dance. That film, like almost everything else she starred in until 1937, was a hit. Yet of all her films of that period, only Grand Hotel (1932) continues to be remembered, and that was an all-star film boasting stars of the magnitude of GRETA GARBO, John and Lionel Barrymore, and WALLACE BEERY. Nonetheless, Joan Crawford gave a vivid performance in the movie, once again playing a poor girl trying to make her way in the world.
When her career stumbled, Joan Crawford (like KATHARINE HEPBURN) was labeled box-office poison by theater owners in 1938. It looked as if they were right when she starred in several big flops in a row. She halted the slide with The Women in 1939, but she made just two more hits during the next five years, and MGM dropped her. It appeared as if Joan Crawford's long career had finally come to an end. But as it turned out, she had reached only its midpoint. WARNER BROS. signed her up, and Joan Crawford proceeded to make her most memorable pictures, all of them in just a five-year span.
Her career-woman phase began with Mildred Pierce (1945), a script she sought out after Bette Davis turned it down. Her performance in the title role brought her an Oscar for Best Actress, and her career was suddenly back in gear. The evidence of her popularity was clear when the big shoulder pads she wore in Mildred Pierce became a fashion staple. Joan Crawford's next films were Humoresque (1946), Possessed (1947), Daisy Kenyon (1947), and Flamingo Road (1949), all of them hits. As a group, these five Warner films undoubtedly represent her best work.
The 1950s weren't kind to Joan Crawford. She returned to MGM briefly for (incredibly) her first color film, Torch Song (1953). In retrospect, it seems clear that Joan Crawford's face, with its angles and big, deep eyes was made for black and white. Except for Sudden Fear (1952), Johnny Guitar (1954), and Autumn Leaves (1956) Joan Crawford's films were either poor or poorly received. She was aging and there weren't many starring roles for fading great ladies - until ROBERT ALDRICH made What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? in 1962.
Cast with Bette Davis, the two old warhorses were a sight to see, and people did, indeed, come to see them. The movie was a surprise hit, but much to Joan Crawford's dismay, Bette Davis was nominated for an Oscar. According to Davis, Joan Crawford campaigned actively against her. During the 1960s Joan Crawford starred in all sorts of horror films, such as Strait-Jacket (1964) and Berserk (1967). Her final film was Trog (1970).
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