Bette Davis Quotes

I have always felt proud of my Oscars and my numerous
nominations. This pride is due to the fact it was the
result of voters from the members of my own
profession. This, of course, is a great compliment for one's
work. I hope each winner of an Oscar is as thrilled as
I was when I received mine. ~ Bette Davis

Remember the great film with Bette Davis, All About Eve? There's a scene after the scheming Eve steals Margo's role through trickery & then gets this magnificent review. Margo of course is effing & blinding all over the place. And crying. Her director rushes into her house, puts his arms around her & says, "I ran all the way". That's what I want. ~ Martha Grimes

There is a certain ecstasy in wanting things you can't get. ~ Bette Davis

I'm a great believer in conversational rhythm. I think in terms of rhythmic dialogue. It's so easy, you can talk naturally. It's like peas rolling off a knife. Take the great screen actors and actresses, Bette Davis, Eddie Robinson, Jimmy Cagney, Spencer Tracy. They all talk in rhythm. And rhythm and movement are the life of the screen. ~ Lorenz Hart

There's like this great thing that Bette Davis said when someone asked her, "How do you get into Hollywood?" "Take Fountain!" ~ Winona Ryder

I was the Marlon Brando of my generation. ~ Bette Davis

Love is not enough. It must be the foundation, the cornerstone- but not the complete structure. It is much too pliable, to yielding. ~ Bette Davis

Two people, two hands, and two songs, in this case "Big Shot" and "Bette Davis Eyes." The lyrics of the two songs provided no commentary, honest or ironic, on the proceedings. They were merely there and always underfoot, the insistent gray muck that was pop culture. It stuck to our shoes and we tracked it through our lives. ~ Colson Whitehead

A sure way to lose happiness, I found, is to want it at the expense of everything else. ~ Bette Davis

Oh Jerry, don't let's ask for the moon. We have the stars. - Now, Voyager ~ Bette Davis

I think one of my biggest influences is Bette Davis. I've seen almost every one of her films, and she's been very inspiring to me. ~ Elisabeth Moss

I'm the nicest goddamn dame that ever lived. ~ Bette Davis

Technicolor makes me look like death warmed over. ~ Bette Davis

Mother of three; divorcee; American. Twenty years experience as an actress in motion pictures. Mobile still and more affable than rumour would have it. Wants steady employment in Hollywood. (Has had Broadway). References upon request. ~ Bette Davis

I adore Bette Davis and Vivien Leigh, but more because they were good actresses. That's what makes me interested in them, that they didn't present themselves as idols; they were just doing their jobs. ~ Imelda Staunton

That's me: an old kazoo with some sparklers. ~ Bette Davis

It's weird, because American films in the 1930s and '40s, particularly melodramas, were made for woman, from Bette Davis to Joan Crawford to Barbara Stanwyck to Katherine Hepburn, and for some reason we've taken a step backward in this sense. ~ James Gray

I'de luv to kiss ya but I just washed my hair. ~ Bette Davis

It was Ernie Haller, who had photographed Bette Davis in Jezebel and Vivien Leigh in Gone with the Wind, who was solely responsible for the visuals in Mildred Pierce, said Crawford. "Ernie was at the rehearsals. And so was Mr. [Anton] de Grot, who did the sets. I recall seeing Ernie's copy of the script and it was filled with notations and diagrams. I asked him if these were for special lights and he said, 'No, they're for special shadows.' Now, that threw me. I was a little apprehensive. I was used to the look of Metro, where everything, including the war pictures, was filmed in blazing white lights. Even if a person was dying there was no darkness. But when I saw the rushes of Mildred Pierce I realized what Ernie was doing. The shadows and half-lights, the way the sets were lit, together with the unusual angles of the camera, added considerably to the psychology of my character and to the mood and psychology of the film. And that, my dear, is film noir." "Mildred ~ Shaun Considine

As a female I think it's a terrible hindrance in business. I think it's a terrible hindrance for any female to have a lot of intelligence in private life, but I think in business sometimes it's even worse because there's deep resentment. ~ Bette Davis

I'd marry again if I found a man who had fifteen million dollars, would sign over half to me, and guarantee that he'd be dead within a year. ~ Bette Davis

To fulfill a dream, to be allowed to sweat over lovely labor, to be given the chance to create, is the meat and potatoes of life. The money is the gravy. ~ Bette Davis

There were giants striding the screen in the 1930s and '40s: four actresses so talented, hardworking and versatile that they became laws unto themselves. Joan Crawford and Bette Davis have also become high-camp figures of fun, as they both had such wildly theatrical offscreen lives, and their performances could sometimes veer into self-parody. But Barbara Stanwyck and Claudette Colbert stand the test of time in each and every film: our memories of them are not overshadowed by scandals or vituperative daughters. One rarely sees a Stanwyck or Colbert drag queen. But these ladies were fully the equal - sometimes the superior - of Davis and Crawford. ~ Eve Golden

For a long time, way back in the '30s and '40s, there were fabulous female roles. Bette Davis and all those people had incredible, great roles. After World War II, something happened where it was not only "get out of the factories," but "get out of the movies." That's when women's roles started to really [change]. ~ Geena Davis

Men become much more attractive when they start looking older. But it doesn't do much for women, though we do have an advantage: make-up. ~ Bette Davis

I keep saying that, if Samuel L. Jackson and Bette Davis could have a baby, it would be Taraji P. Henson. To me, she's one of the greatest character actors of our generation, let alone leading ladies. She's just phenomenal in everything she does. ~ Jussie Smollett

Daddy in his infinite knowledge always saw the roots and not the flowers. He took all the watches of the world apart and never knew what time it was. ~ Bette Davis

Once the love bug wears off, as it inevitably does, you are shocked to discover that you really didn't know the object of your affections at all. We know this to be so, even as we repeat the same mistake over and over and over. ~ Bette Davis

Everybody has a heart. Except some people. ~ Bette Davis

I don't think of myself as a character actress - that's become a phrase which means you've had it. ~ Bette Davis

I work to stay alive. ~ Bette Davis

I believe one should be a woman at home. ~ Bette Davis

Smoke was a person with a sense of history. Do you know what I mean? ... in truth, I DID know what she meant. Da Vinci, Martin Luther King, Jr., Genghis Kahn, Abraham Lincoln, Bette Davis - if you read their definitive biographies, you learned even when they were a month old, cooing in some wobbly crib in the middle of nowhere, they already had something historic about them. The way other kids had baseball, long division, Hot Wheels, and hula hoops, these kids had History and thus tended to be prone to colds, unpopular, sometimes plagued with a physical deformity (Lord Byron's clubfoot, Maugham's severe stutter, for example), which pushed them into exile in their heads. It was there they began to dream of human anatomy, civil rights, conquering Asia, a lost speech and being (within a span of four years) a jezebel, a marked woman, a little fox and an old maid. ~ Marisha Pessl

Being called very, very difficult is the beginning of success. Until you're called very, very difficult you're really nobody at all. ~ Bette Davis

Temperament is something that is an integral part of the artist. Not temper, temperament. There is a vast difference. ~ Bette Davis

Almost as many inhumanities are committed in the name of love as in the name of religion. ~ Bette Davis

Your luck is how you treat people. ~ Bette Davis

I always loved the bad girls in the movies. I loved Bette Davis; I loved Katherine Hepburn. I loved Ava Gardner. ~ Imelda May

The only reason anyone goes to Broadway is because they can't get work in the movies. ~ Bette Davis

We movie stars all end up by ourselves. Who knows? Maybe we want to. ~ Bette Davis

The secret of marriage is: separate bedrooms and separate bathrooms. ~ Bette Davis

When a man gives his opinion, he's a man. When a woman gives her opinion, she's a bitch. ~ Bette Davis

The casting couch? There's only one of us who ever made it to stardom without it, and that was Bette Davis. ~ Claudette Colbert

I always knew I was going to be successful in some way with films. I don't know why. I had no particular talent, but I always knew I was going to be sitting in a dining room with Lucille Ball and at a cocktail party with Bette Davis. ~ Robert Osborne

The real female should be partly male and the real male should be partly female anyway. ~ Bette Davis

Of Human Bondage?"

Will said quickly, moving just out of sight for a moment and forcing Charlie to move to the edge of the dining area to see him. He tossed one arch look over his shoulder as he reached up to grab that book, and even knowing it was an act, Charlie felt himself tensing. His eyes fell on the leather cuff at Will's wrist, as they were probably meant to.

"Kinky."

Charlie's throat locked. "I'm not..."

"Into Bette Davis? I know, a lot of people find her scary at first, but after awhile you really start to get into her."

The completely reasonable tone was at odds with the wicked light in the kid's eyes, the way his lips were curved up, how he held his breath when Charlie blinked and frowned, replaying the insane words until they made sense. Until he remembered that Bette Davis was in the film version of that novel, until he could finally take his gaze off that wide leather band.

His face was burning.

"Smartass," he muttered, completely mystified when being called a smartass made Will hop in place, since Will had already made it clear that he had a brain under all that hair and glitter. ~ R. Cooper

The best time I ever had with Joan Crawford was when I pushed her down the stairs in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? ~ Bette Davis

What a fool I was to come to Hollywood where they only understand platinum blondes and where legs are more important than talent. ~ Bette Davis

Never, never trust anyone who asks for white wine. It means they're phonies. ~ Bette Davis

There comes a time in every woman's life when the only thing that helps is a glass of champagne. ~ Bette Davis

There was more good acting at Hollywood parties than ever appeared on the screen. ~ Bette Davis

I've lost my faith in science. ~ Bette Davis

In the movies, Bette Davis lights two cigarettes and hands the second one to James Cagney. It was just so glamorous and romantic. ~ Loni Anderson

Dramatic art in her opinion is knowing how to fill a sweater. ~ Bette Davis

People stood on their chairs, cheering and waving. And it was all for me! Waves of love flooded the stage and washed over me. I started to cry. The sweetness of such a moment is impossible to describe. One is both lover and beloved ... I'd found the one true, enduring romance of my life. ~ Bette Davis

Paris Hilton came in the store occasionally and one day asked me for the song, "Bette Davis Eyes". I found it for her and she proceeded to the front to pay and as the cashier was ringing her up, she was putting on blush. I guess because there was a slew a paparazzi photographers in the parking lot waiting for her to leave the store. It was insane. What is she famous for anyway? I didn't get it then and I still don't get it now. I guess it doesn't matter what I think, I'm just a broke bum living in his van and she's a bazillionaire that people want to take a picture of, I guess she wins! ~ K.D. Sanders

I would take a bad script and a good director any day against a good script and a bad director. ~ Bette Davis

[Joan Blondell] biographer, Matthew Kennedy, quotes her as admitting, "If I had taken myself more seriously . . . if I had fought for better roles as, say, Bette Davis did . . . I think I might have been a damned good dramatic actress. But it was just my way; I don't think I ever had the security of feeling confident in myself, really, ever. I used to think, 'I'm just lucky to be here! ~ Eve Golden

I think I showed my restraint by not pulling her hair out by the roots. ~ Bette Davis

Look, you're either loved or hated. Which is a good thing, as Bette Davis used to say. ~ Mario Cantone

Bette Davis taught Hollywood to follow an actress instead of the actress following the camera, and she's probably the best movie actress there's ever been. ~ Elaine Stritch

I think one of my favourite films is 'Dark Victory' with Bette Davis. Why? She was so wonderful in that film. And maybe I just want a good cry once in a while without having to go through a divorce. ~ Debbie Reynolds

I'd like ta kiss ya, but I just washed my hair. ~ Bette Davis

I just loved Bette Davis and the fact that I had a chance to work with her [on the 1979 TV movie Strangers: The Story of a Mother and Daughter] was momentous. ~ Gena Rowlands

When I was a kid, it was Bette Davis. She was my idol. I used to cut school and sit in the back of the theater; of course, I would have snuck in because I couldn't afford a ticket. ~ Lauren Bacall

I was the female Marlon Brando of my generation. ~ Bette Davis

It's a rare man who can stand being around an intelligent woman, let alone married to her. ~ Bette Davis

If everybody likes you, you're pretty dull. ~ Bette Davis

I am doomed to an eternity of compulsive work. No set goal achieved satisfies. Success only breeds a new goal. The golden apple devoured has seeds. It is endless. ~ Bette Davis

I may not have been wearing a mink coat, but I was traveling with a dog. That should have made you think I was an actress! ~ Bette Davis

Some young Hollywood starlets remind me of my grandmother's old farmhouse
all painted up nice on the front side, a big swing on the backside, and nothing whatsoever in the attic. ~ Bette Davis

I've been close to Bette Davis for thirty-eight years - and I have the cigarette burns to prove it. ~ Henry Fonda

Oh, yes, we were on location with Another Man's Poison, which I wrote for Bette Davis. ~ Val Guest

A point often ignored in cinema history studies of [Bette] Davis," wrote Jim Parish and Don Stanke years later of Housewife, "is that Ann Dvorak, who plays the film's title role, was established as a strong dramatic actress long before Bette, and it was she who set the standard for battling with the studio for better roles. In her quiet performance as Nan Wilson Reynolds, it is Miss Dvorak and not the already mannered Bette, who woos the audience's attention and affection. It is Dvorak who provides the proper artistic control for the feature…" The big difference between the two actresses was maturity. Bette, in these early movies, was very rough around the gills; she became polished, but always tended to slip into campy tirades. Dvorak was a natural; she was intense, but always in control, even in highly emotional situations. ~ Ray Hagen

In this rat-race everybody's guilty till proved innocent! ~ Bette Davis

From the moment I was six I felt sexy. And let me tell you it was hell, sheer hell, waiting to do something about it. ~ Bette Davis

Today everyone is a star - they're all billed as 'starring' or 'also starring'. In my day, we earned that recognition. ~ Bette Davis

When asked what it takes to succeed in the acting profession, Bette Davis would answer, "the courage to be hated." ~ Frank Langella

You will never be happier than you expect. To change your happiness, change your expectation. ~ Bette Davis

Life is the past, the present and the perhaps. ~ Bette Davis

If Mr. Vincent Price were to be co-starred with Miss Bette Davis in a story by Mr. Edgar Allan Poe directed by Mr. Roger Corman, it could not fully express the pent-up violence and depravity of a single day in the life of the average family. ~ Quentin Crisp

If everybody likes you, you are not a very interesting person. ~ Bette Davis

I firmly believe, however, that if your children have never hated you, you have failed as a parent. ~ Bette Davis

Bette Davis had a phrase that called it "cigarette smoking acting" . ~ Joe Eszterhas

Wave after wave of love flooded the stage and washed over me, the beginning of the one great durable romance of my life. ~ Bette Davis

The male ego with few exceptions is elephantine to start with. ~ Bette Davis

My passions were all gathered together like fingers that made a fist. Drive is considered aggression today; I knew it then as purpose. ~ Bette Davis

Even as a kid, I was more enchanted watching Bette Davis than Errol Flynn. ~ Richard LaGravenese

Gay Liberation? I ain't against it, it's just that there's nothing in it for me. ~ Bette Davis

Old age ain't for sissies ~ Bette Davis

I loved all those classic figures from the '30s and '40s ... Bette Davis, Joan Crawford, Humphrey Bogart, Rita Hayworth. They had such glamour and style. I loved the movies of those times too - so much attention paid to details, lights, clothing, the way the studios would develop talent. ~ Grace Jones

If Hollywood didn't work out, I was prepared to be the best secretary in the world. ~ Bette Davis

I always felt that Bette Davis was one of the great screen actresses who never really got her due - she won two Oscars, but the last was in 1938, and that was really before all the great work that she did. ~ Robert Osborne

Life is a jest; and all things show it. I thought so once; but now I know it. ~ Bette Davis

I have been uncompromising, peppery, intractable, monomaniacal, tactless, volatile, and oftentimes disagreeable ... I suppose I'm larger than life. ~ Bette Davis

I grew up on Bette Davis movies, and Marlene Dietrich, Marilyn Monroe. ~ Charlize Theron

My favorite actress of all times is Bette Davis in Dark Victory. I have seen it six or seven times, and I still cry. ~ Bettie Page

Funny business, a woman's career. The things you drop on your way up the ladder
so you can move faster
you forget you'll need them when you go back to being a woman. That's one career all females have in common whether we like it or not. Being a woman. Sooner or later, we've got to work at it, no matter what other careers we've had or wanted. And in the last analysis nothing is any good unless you can look up just before dinner
or turn around in bed
and there he is. Without that you're not a woman. You're someone with a French provincial office
or a book full of clippings. But you're not a woman. Slow curtain. The end. (from "All About Eve") ~ Bette Davis

Evil people you never forget them. And that's the aim of any actress-never to be forgotten. ~ Bette Davis

There's only one way to work
like hell. ~ Bette Davis