Dark Victory_The Life of Bette Davis by Ed Sikov

Author:Ed Sikov [Sikov, Ed]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9780805088632
Publisher: Macmillan
Published: 2008-09-29T04:00:00+00:00

“We came to the elderly part after Fanny Skeffington had had the illness,” Sherman continued. “That morning when she came down she looked so hideous I said to her, ‘Bette, I’m very upset. I think that the woman should be affected, but I don’t think she should become so hideous that it’s hard to look at her.’ She said, ‘Don’t worry about it. My audience likes to see me do this kind of thing.’ I said, ‘Well, I think it’s hideous—it’s too much.’ ”46

Davis persisted with the monstrous makeup even in the face of the physical toll it took on her. Around this time someone—Hal Wallis? Jack Warner himself?—lit into Sherman, a fact recorded by Frank Mattison as follows: “You can tell by the report of pages covered and setups made yesterday that it did pay to slap Vince Sherman’s ears down. Perhaps if someone had the guts to sit down on him a little more often we could even improve our schedule and shooting.”

By the nineteenth, despite the fact that she was the one who insisted on its use, Davis was complaining about the makeup and how irritating it was to her skin. It didn’t help matters when, the following day, she took her rubber face home with her at the end of the day and forgot to bring it back in the morning. By February 1, she was out sick again, no doubt from the effects of the latex.

The mask and foundation and cakey powder were brutally uncomfortable, especially under the bright lights. Her face began to itch, but she had to suppress any reaction while the cameras were rolling. “Toward the end of the day,” Sherman later recalled, “as we’d complete the last shot, she’d often tear the makeup from her face hysterically.”47

Davis then lodged objections to certain Orry-Kelly gowns, which Kelly redesigned to her satisfaction.

On Valentine’s Day 1944, Frank Mattison was in despair: “I hope to hell this picture gets over pretty soon—it’s driving me nuts!”

Hell responded positively to Mattison’s wish: Mr. Skeffington wrapped on February 21, two months behind schedule. Mattison called Davis in her dressing room after shooting was over. She told him she was pleased with the way everything turned out, but, according to Mattison, she was “depressed because it had come to an end.”

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