Great Kate or Bitchy Bette...?

[Snarky Oracle!]

Which one was the Queen of the Movies in the twentieth century?

AFI cites Katharine Hepburn as #1 on their lists, and Kate did somewhat better theatrical movies a bit longer. Bette Davis was viewed as the Queen of Hollywood in the early-'40s (and Joan Collins feels Davis should be #1 instead of Hepburn).

Both conveyed an arisocratic sensibility, though Davis played a lot of southern belles and was less afraid of a slattern role, while Hepburn wouldn't touch the grande dame guignol genre of the '60s (although SUDDENLY, LAST SUMMER comes close).

Kate interviewed by Donahue in 1991:

Bette interviewed by Donahue in 1987:

Thanks, RC!

 

[Snarky Oracle!]

Kate interviewed by Dick Cavett, 1973:

Bette interviewed by Dick Cavett, 1971:

 

[Seaviewer]

Katharine Hepburn is undoubtedly the greatest actress of all time. The prototype for all the strong female leads that have followed.

 

[Barbara Fan]

I will pick a Bette Davis film any day over mz Hepburn

bette D was my mums fav and grew up watching re runs of now Voyager, dark Victory etc

 

[Snarky Oracle!]

I like the fact that Kate had insufferably good taste (not that every film worked out well, of course) and that Bette did not.

Kate's always-the-lady persona in her earlier career was admirable, but could get a little dull; while Bette's fearless slattern cinematic wanderings of the '30s & '40s were often mesmerizing. Yet with time, Kate climbed regal heights as Bette sunk to macabre depths.

Could Bette have done LION IN WINTER and hit all the right majestic notes Hepburn gave it? Or would it have just wound up hammy with Davis, another enraged queenly virgin performance as Eleanor of Aquitaine?

Yet it's also hard to imagine Kate bringing the raw tragedy of Bette to the drowning of all her London charges in the bath tub. But Hepburn wouldn't have been interested in attempting it, either.

Ahhh, Scorpio Risings. They bark orders and kill so well.

 

[Emelee]

Katharine Hepburn, of course!!

 

[Karin Schill]

Maybe it's not so surprising but I voted for Elizabeth Taylor!

Although I love Katharine Hepburn as well Elizabeth simply remains my most favorite actress ever so I had to vote for her!

 

[ginnyfan]

As years pass I am enjoying Hepburn's movies and performances less and less. I realize she pretty much played the same character most of the time and I guess I expect more variety from a 4 time Oscar winner. It's also hard to like her characters, not sure what it is, maybe Kate herself,the way she talked, they all tend to have that annoying quality.

That said, she was the only one who was able to have control of her career, from start to beginning and even in later years managed to get top quality roles and projects. I'm not sure how she managed to do that. Plus she ignored the Oscars and they still adored her and awarded her the most. Meanwhile Bette and Joan were clawing each other's eyes over nominations. Must have driven them and most of Hollywood crazy.

That said, I still enjoy most of Bette/Joan trash done in their final decades more than Kate's highbrow quality stuff. I think the roller-coasters that were their careers ultimately makes them much more interesting, exciting and fascinating to follow and research. Feud is another proof of that.

All of that said, Stanwyck is still the best and sadly the most underrated. She had more variety and more acting in her than all of the 3 mentioned above, imo.

 

[Snarky Oracle!]

I guess all four of the Golden Age Grande Dames had films that showed best what they were capable of -- usually ones with the best scripts or best directors.

I'd argue LION IN WINTER was Hepburn's magisterial peak. For Davis, is was likely ALL ABOUT EVE.

What was Stanwyck's: DOUBLE INDEMNITY? I'd almost want to say THE THORN BIRDS had it not been a swollen TV miniseries, but Stanwyck's performance is so great in that one.

And Crawford? She got the Oscar for MILDRED PIERCE but it's not her more demanding role. She didn"t like A WOMAN"S FACE because it bombed but Cukor got a terrific performance out of her __ I liked her best in POSSESSED (her second film of that title) and THE DAMNED DON"T CRY

I'd've posted my 'Divas Who Drink' pic, but photobucket will probably steal it.

 

[Snarky Oracle!]

LOVE AMONG THE RUINS (1975)

Hepburn's best film from the '70s and her first TV movie (it infamously bombed in the ratings, the victim of a dumb snob-appeal promo campaign by ABC which made it look stuffy and drab in a way it decidedly was not) and it won 6 Emmys including one for Kate, Lord Larry, and director George Cukor.

She and Cukor would re-team a couple of years later for the pretty good TV remake of THE CORN IN GREEN.

 

[Barbara Fan]

I would have to say Bette Davis, diverse roles and on the stage as well

Katherine Hepburn films never did it for me and she left me cold, (whether that was my mothers influence on me when i was young Im not sure as she was a Bette fan)
But her voice grated on me and the only film i really like is On Golden Pond at the end of her career.

Liz Taylor, I never considered her as a great actress, apologies to E T fans and K H fans

 

[Alexis]

I cant really decide. I love both, probably equally. Though I think I get more enjoyment out of Davis' hammier performances. I just do.

Incidentally, I think A Woman's Face is my favourite Crawford film. That or Sadie McKee, or was it Daisy Kenyon or Strange Cargo?

 

[Willie Oleson]

I like Bette's voice better than Katherine's, and I like Barbara's voice better than Bette's.

She wins!

 

[Snarky Oracle!]

Joan Collins wrote a magazine piece about a decade ago entitled, "Bette Davis Taught Me how to be a Bitch" and took issue with AFI's granting Kate Hepburn top ranking as the movies' most important film actress ahead of Bette Davis at #2. Collins, despite or because of the mistreatment she received at the hands or feet of Miss Davis when they made THE VIRGIN QUEEN, insisted Davis should have been #1.

Probably, by the end of the twentieth century, Davis had slipped and Hepburn was elevated in the minds of the critics and film historians because Davis' important big screen career had faded after the mid-'60s while Hepburn had future achievements both artistic and commercial like LION IN WINTER and ON GOLDEN POND. Plus, Hepburn exuded scrappy class and taste, while Bette had that slattern thing about her, and a tendency to be overly mannered increasingly with every word that emerged from those lips.

But in their heydays, it's true that Hepburn never had the box office that Bette Davis did.

Liz Taylor, I never considered her as a great actress, apologies to E T fans and K H fans

Katharine Hepburn said to her biographer about Taylor that, "I think she's more interested in being a movie star than an actress, but make no mistake -- Elizabeth Taylor is a brilliant actress." And even Joan Crawford said circa 1966 that Taylor had in recent years given some of the finest screen performances she'd ever seen.

I tend to agree, to a point. Not every movie or performance works, of course, and Taylor had that shrill, fishwife thing (and was apparently well-aware of it) but when she was good she was very good, and could do determined heartbreak soliloquy like almost no one else.

Even her looks in her youth can't create the level of stardom Taylor achieved and maintained. There has to be something else.

 

[ClassyCo]

Referring to the original question, I voted for Bette Davis. I have enjoyed many of Katharine Hepburn's movies, but I lean more towards Davis as being the better actress and perhaps more versatile. Out of all of the names I've seen mentioned, however, I have to say that I prefer Joan Crawford over all of them. As for Barbara Stanwyck, I don't care for her at all.

 

[Jessie]

I voted Bette Davis she was my Mom’s favourite. Katherine is equally amazing and I’m a huge Elizabeth Taylor fan so this was a hard vote.

 

[Jessie]

I voted Bette Davis she was my Mom’s favourite. Katherine is equally amazing and I’m a huge Elizabeth Taylor fan so this was a hard vote.

 

[Angela Channing]

Katherine Hepburn was the better actress but Bette Davis made more entertaining and commercial films.

 

[ClassyCo]

Hepburn was great at doing what she did best, which was basically playing some variation of her real-life personality. Of course, there were certain characteristics added or subtracted for melodramatic purposes, but she frequently seemed to be playing women cut from the same cloth.

As for Davis, she was more versatile. She played a variety of ladies, but there are some patterns in her performances, too. Almost all great actors have a similarity in their performances. It's hard to escape.

 

[Crimson]

Neither ranks among my favorites, but objectively I think Hepburn and Davis have the best claim to "Queen of the Movies" in the twentieth century. I think Hepburn wins by a thin margin.

I think Davis was the better actress, at least in terms of creating a character; she could almost disappear into a role. Hepburn was always Hepburn. Both had their limited ranges, though. Hepburn excelled in comedy and light drama, but I find her terribly unconvincing in heavy drama. Davis was more comfortable in the deep end, but had no forte for comedy. Davis had an impressive run from the late 30s to the early 50s, with only a few dips; otherwise, her career is kind of, well, crummy. Audiences were largely indifferent to Hepburn in her younger days, but from the 60s onward she was rather beloved*; less regarded as an actress than revered as some kind of national monument. However, she was a leading lady in 1932 and she was a leading lady (albeit in TV movies) in 1994; she never had to lower herself to guest appearances in episodic television or appear in horror films.

*Of all the fiction and conjecture in FEUD, Davis' seething resentment of Hepburn's late career renaissance seemed the most plausible.