“As a great admirer of Ms. Bankhead, I wanted in no way to be influenced by her work. It was Willie’s intention that I give a different interpretation of the part. I insisted that Tallulah had played it the only way it could be played.”
Bette Davis on the difficulty of playing Regina Giddens in the film version of “The Little Foxes” (1941) after Tallulah Bankhead’s success with the role on Broadway.
(Bankead had portrayed Regina as a victim forced to fight for her survival due to the contempt with which her brothers treated her, but Davis played her as a cold, conniving, calculating woman.)
My Favorite Human: Bette Davis
“I have been uncompromising, peppery, intractable, monomaniacal, tactless, volatile, and ofttimes disagreeable… I suppose I’m larger than life.”
“I’m lucky, Horace. I’ve always been lucky… I’ll be lucky again.”
Bette in The Little Foxes.
Lookin’ foxy in “The Little Foxes.”
