Crawford On Crawford
What did Joan Crawford think about daughter Christina’s book, Mommie Dearest? Not much: I plan not to read it. Why spoil days of your life reading a book that can only hurt you? It’s against my beliefs… I’ve learned that there are people who will hurt you if you let them—even if you don’t let them. I prefer to cut off people who want to hurt me, rather than to continue to give them power over me to go on inflicting pain.†[Vanity Fair]
No, I don’t believe it. Crawford died in May 1977, the book didn’t appear until the tail end of 1978, and I don’t believe Christina was that long working on it, or that it was anything that worried Joan back when it could only have been -at most- in ‘idea stage,’ November 1976. Uh-uh.
It was a classic case of elder abuse against Joan Crawford by an unattractive non talented adopted daughter with bad inherited genes and no talent. A case of intimidation. She was right. I am going through that now with an adopted son. He wants me dead, so he can inherit my money and marry a woman………
Why can’t he give you the respect that you’re entitled to, Charley? Why can’t he treat you like you’d be treated by any stranger on the street?!
According to Bette Davis’ autobiography, “This and That,” which was written after Davis’ daughter wrote a similar book, “My Mother’s Keeper,” Christina Crawford’s allegations against Joan Crawford were true. Davis wrote of Crawford’s chronic alcoholism and called her a consummate sexual politician.
She also wrote of Joan Crawford’s deliberate undermining of the Oscar campaign for “Whatever Happened to Baby Jane,” because Davis referred to both of them as “a couple of old broads” when talking about their comeback on a talkshow (Crawford wrote her a letter demanding that Davis never refer to her as an “old broad” ever again).
Davis chronicles of how high maintenance Crawford was on the sets of both Baby Jane and “Hush, Hush, Sweet Charlotte,” before she was fired from the later for calling in sick too often and replaced with Olivia DeHaviland.
I thought I told you! No Wire Hangers!
What do Crawford’s other kids have to say? A friend of mine met Christina Crawford, and she still used Wire hangers! Some people never learn.