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In contemporary English, a circus is defined as a traveling company of acrobats, clowns, and other entertainers which gives performances, typically in a large tent, in a series of different places. Its true semantic origins date back to Ancient Rome, where it was defined as “a rounded or oblong arena lined with tiers of seats, used for equestrian and other sports and games” (Merriam-Webster). Both of these definitions, whilst pointedly different, share a common theme: the notion that the circus was, is, and will always be a public arena presented for entertainment on the basis of spectacle. It predates modern methods of entertainment — before the advent of film could fossilize and transpose the every movement and expression of a person, the circus — in its various forms — served as the main source of entertainment for the people. Thus, the act in itself was in every sense an extrapolation of the word assigned to comprise it.
It is also no coincidence that the subject speculated is most often female, given that our media is dominated by the male gaze. From the inception of cinema, more attention was always given to women: after all, their ever-changing wide array of fashions proved hypnotic on screen as it did off, whereas men’s fashion evolved at a less noticeable and flamboyant pace. In the early days of the studio system, the cinema giants capitalized on the success of their female proteges, saving little regard or publicity for their male counterparts (swashbuckling heroes such as Clark Gable and Errol Flynn being the errant exception).
Alas, mortality is a fleeting and elusive concept. Naturally the beacons of the silver screen fell victim to aging, a feat seemingly incomprehensible given the immortality granted by celluloid. While men garnered a sense of acclaim and reverence for their tenure in the industry, women were by contrast tossed aside in favor of younger starlets, pretty young things that indicated the metamorphic nature of the world and the industry. It was a convergence of changing ideals which would birth inter-generational conflict and sparring.
Some women escaped this inexorable fate by retiring early, like actresses Norma Shearer and Greta Garbo, who both retired from films in 1941 in their mid-thirties. There had been no precedent set for the aging actress, no space carved out for her existence in the grand scheme of things. Older women who rose to prominence during the 1930s like Marie Dressler and Ethel Barrymore enjoyed roles of refinery and stature, and though not terribly important, they were still considered an honorable accolade. Many of these women had migrated from Broadway or Vaudeville, where they had enjoyed a successful career in their youth. For the young women gaining their start in film at the zenith of Hollywood opulence, the road ahead was indiscernible. What would become of them? Would society still demand the roles of the aging, sophisticated dame, or were times changing and aligning toward a more youthful audience? Would such a role continue to serve a need if the societal structures and boundaries of the world were rapidly changing and evolving?
Publicity of Marie Dressler, 1930s
SUNSET BOULEVARD, released in 1950, posed the first answer to this question, telling the story of a once illustrious but now eccentric silent film star (Gloria Swanson, in a role more or less synonymous with her own career) who has been forgotten by society, left to fester. She resides in an anachronistic sprawling mansion, accompanied by her lone butler and pet chimpanzee that dies before the movie even begins. Ego and unmitigated mental illness have left Norma with deranged delusions of grandeur, and she believes through the help of coincidental passer-by/writer Joe Gittes that her career is ripe for revival.
For all its fanfare, the role of Norma Desmond was not a flattering one, nor was it highly coveted — in fact, many aging actresses shuddered at the prospect of having to satirize their own fading careers. Greta Garbo notably turned down the role, aghast at being relegated to such a part — the woman who’d undividedly enraptured audiences around the globe in the 1930s was now seen as only suitable for an unflattering role. It was unprecedented, and posed a precarious return to the screen given the nature of the subject: would the marking of a true, good performance only succeed in further alienating audiences? The risk was immeasurable.
Swanson, appearing on WHAT’S MY LINE? in 1950 to promote SUNSET BOULEVARD
Swanson ultimately enjoyed a renaissance of her career that led to increased appearances on television (still in its infancy, and questionable in terms of prestige) and radio. Her performance, one of the greatest recorded on screen, cemented a caricature that would plague aging actresses for years to come. Yes, the audiences were thrilled and raptured by her interpretation of Norma, but not for flattering reasons: rather, the allure of morbid curiosity drew them to the picture. What had ever become of Gloria Swanson? What did she look like now? Was this really the same woman who once dominated the silent screen, the woman who was the driving force behind SADIE THOMPSON in 1928?
Gloria Swanson (Sadie Thompson) is a San Francisco prostitute who is temporarily stuck on an island. She falls in love with Raoul Walsh (Sergeant Tim O’Hara). But then she is accused of immorality with the men.
That same year, another case study of the aging woman emerged, only slightly more flattering. ALL ABOUT EVE introduced a histrionic Broadway lioness by the name of Margo Channing. The role was originally crafted with Claudette Colbert in mind; the fact that Bette Davis landed it was a fortuitous fluke. Today, EVE is considered the quintessential Davis movie, a magnum opus that also netted her a nomination for Best Actress. It is hard to envision anybody but Davis as Margo; they are synonymous in temperament and legacy.
Unlike Norma, Margo is clearly in control of her faculties and enjoys a thriving career. Still, significant attention is given to convey her as a pitiable, miserable woman confronted by the rapidly encroaching finality of her career. Davis’ portrayal is moody and evocative; Margo broods, cries, laments, drinks and lashes out at loved ones as she struggles to come to terms with her new reality. There is ultimately sympathy for her character, but it is only brought about at Eve’s expense.
Both of these depictions are inoffensive and mild relative to what was to come only a decade later. The aging woman became less and less humane and relatable, devolving into a spectacle paraded about for entertainment. The same crowds that once ogled their beauty now relished in their decomposing depictions of unsightly lunatics. If the allure of the circus lay in its amoral exploitation of atypical misfits, then on screen it translated to a rapidly growing subgenre of horror that would come to loom over older women like a carpeted storm.
If not already established by SUNSET BOULEVARD the genre of Hagsploitation was officially cemented in 1962 with the release of WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? The premise drew inspiration from SUNSET, circling the unusual symbiotic nature of two sisters — both former movie stars who have lived in isolation following a tragic accident that disabled one in the 1930s. Unlike SUNSET, however, the focus lies not so much in the drama of the story (SUNSET was supplemented by the secondary storyline of Joe’s burgeoning romance) but in the gruesome psychological warfare in which the sisters engage. The side plot in BABY JANE, revolving around a broke musician who answers Jane’s ad for employment, ultimately circles back to tie in with the main story. It serves as necessary fodder, whereas the one from SUNSET BOULEVARD, comparatively speaking, has far less relevance to the central plot and its outcome.
If SUNSET is a dazzling callback to bygone days, BABY JANE tosses aside nostalgia in favor of squalor and decay. Extravagant chaos with a gilded finish, it bewitches the viewer in the same way a horrific accident does. Its continual unraveling commands the viewer to the screen, encouraging them to bask in its gruesome excess. The many allusions to the past extend far beyond the days of the silver screen — in fact, the entire film’s child-like mentality is framed theatrically by stardom born of 1917 Vaudeville, encapsulating not one, but two career deaths for former starlet Baby Jane. It becomes increasingly evident throughout the film that it is the first one that holds her in psychological custody.
Baby Jane Hudson (Julie Allred) and one of her signature dolls, as portrayed in the 1917 flashback in WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE?
The great, sad irony of Baby Jane’s character lay in her stunted naivete — for reasons one can only begin to extrapolate upon, Jane has regressed (or perhaps she never even make headway at all), perpetually and hopelessly under the belief that she is a still a great child star. She’s unable to understand that the root of her fame was exploitation, and how much like the circus, she was marketed as an idiosyncratic (yet endearing) marionette for the sole purpose of earning her family income. From an early age, Jane is pandered to by adoring fans, her parents, and any other adult hoping to capitalize on her fame, giving her an unfairly distorted sense of importance that persists long after her act has closed.
It’s tragic indeed, but no sympathy is spared for Jane in the story’s exposition. Jane is cruel, sadistic, and thoroughly rude and dismissive to everybody with whom she talks. Like Norma, her house is a tribute to the glory days of her old career — as a Vaudevillian, that is. She is irritable, unpredictable, and often displaces her anger by subjecting her sister Blanche to verbal and physical abuse. As the film progresses, Jane’s behavior is increasingly more erratic, violent, and frightening. Physical gore is juxtaposed expertly with psychological torture, evoking an evergreen uneasiness that propels the film forth from start to finish.
Jane (Bette Davis) as she appears in the “present” (1962)
Perhaps, though, the biggest lure of all rested in the star-studded billing of the cast, headed by the unlikely duo of heavyweights Joan Crawford and Bette Davis. Never before had a pairing of their power and stature headlined a film, and while both women were certainly on the down and out, the intoxicating lure of their names together elicited enough of a stir for production to go forward. Davis would play Jane, bolstering the character by driving her exaggerated, overblown style into full gear (including control over costume and makeup design).Crawford, on the other hand, elected to be the reticent Blanche.
Crawford and Davis team-up for WHATEVER HAPPENED TO BABY JANE? Publicity
While Swanson was certainly a fixture in silent film, her career waned considerably in the 1930s with the introduction of talking pictures. Though Joan had started in silent films, both she and Davis thrived and enjoyed illustrious careers well into the 1940s. It was still unprecedented for a star of the talkie era to be studied retrospectively and parsed apart in a morbid case study — Baby Jane would be the first to clear that hurdle, igniting a trend that would ultimately come to reign over the fate of aging actresses faced with the collapse of the studio system. New Hollywood was fast approaching, where directors and themes took precedence — no longer were vehicles constructed to revolve around a singular actress, save for the newly anointed genre of Hagsploitation.
There were two courses of action: namely, to embrace or eschew it. Davis and Crawford exemplify both ends of the spectrum: whereas Crawford did go on to star in several more films of this nature, she eventually capitulated to pride and retired from motion pictures after the completion of TROG (1970), which stands as a bizarre cross-venture across the worlds of Sci-Fi and Grand Guignol horror. Davis, on the other hand, actively lobbied for such roles: her last one that would garner significant acclaim was 1965’s THE NANNY, but she milked the opportunity until it lost steam in the early seventies — which was more or less inevitable regardless, given the fact that by 1973’s SCREAM, PRETTY PEGGY! Davis was practically aged out of the genre at 65-years-old, relegating her to a new level of restrictive parts.
TV ad promoting SCREAM, PRETTY PETTY!
The best example — and the one that ultimately achieves unity through the application of metaphor — is 1967’s BERSERK!, an low budget English production starring Joan Crawford. Everything culminated in one flagrant spectacle, finally espousing the roots of the circus to its cinematic equivalent. Flanked by parading poodles and a roster of atypical characters reminiscent of Browning’s FREAKS, Joan plays ringmaster Monica Rivers, co-owner of a traveling circus. A tightroper’s untimely death, thought to be accidental, is deemed premediated upon closer inspection, invoking a grim and somber shift that plays out discordantly against the vivid, theatrical colors of the set. Tension rises and paranoia seeps in, and Monica ultimately discovers that her life is subject to great danger. There’s a number of red herrings, all of which eventually drive Monica to the brink of insanity — which, of course, is the viewer’s ultimate reward. What could be more amusing than watching a campy, over-confident, leotard donning Joan Crawford be reduced to a quivering shell of herself?
French poster art for “BERSERK!” (literal translation: CIRCUS OF BLOOD, a title it shared with several other international releases, including Italy)
Though the movie spends its entirety on the seedy fairgrounds of this circus, it is Monica — not her act — that is the ultimate spectacle. Despite the innumerate distractions consistently tossed at the viewer, the true attraction is the real-time degradation of her mental stability. It is the perfect meta encapsulation of the hagsploitation genre, unintentionally self aware and provoking contemplation. This brings the idea and dynamics of power into question as well: Monica, on paper, may be the one in control: but the heart of the business, built on the cruelty, infamy, and the monetization of the aberrant, unquestionably rules over her. She is just as much a freakish spectacle as are her performers, if not more — for if the woman presumably in control is no greater than a pawn in the game, who else is worthy of more derision? Monica is the ultimate sucker, but clings to this mendacious illusion of control to dissuade her wounded ego, a solipsism that ultimately came to define the very conflict that aging actresses had to face when presented with an opportunity of this genre.
Left to right: Judy Geeson, Ty Harding, Joan (as Monica), and Diana Dors in BERSERK!
Bette, who devoured such roles with voracity (something she attributed to her unrelenting drive), may have thought that by doing so, she was having the last laugh. After all, such films did provide income, and furthermore helped to fuel the changing publicity machine. Davis’ strong will likely ensured that she never saw through the illusion — given her stalwart and resolute disposition, she had the ability to convince herself of anything. But looking back at the decline of her career post BABY JANE objectively does not foster positive reception. Davis would never go on to score another nomination, and her roles became increasingly laughable. In the end, it’s only her willpower that is commendable, the very same tenacity that saw her through to Hollywood from her mill hometown of Lowell, Massachusetts.
Joan’s eventual retirement shows a woman with a weighty conscience, true and indicative of her nature. The growing realization that such roles were only growing to capitalize further on shame, coupled with the ensconcing, unwelcome truth that she was no longer a young screen siren, ultimately pushed her to this limit. Though Crawford was as assiduous as Davis in her career, she suffered from the lifelong disadvantage of glamour: it was what helped her to initially achieve fame, but held her back career wise from seeking more intrepid and offbeat roles. Her acting career was reduced to that of a “Star”, a backhanded moniker of sorts that dismissed her talent in favor of looks. As much as she struggled with this notion, she also undoubtedly reaped many benefits, choosing at some point along the way to accept the label in spite of its negative connotations. By the time she reached middle age and realized that her identity was losing its hold as a constant in her life, she wasn’t mentally equipped to adjust to whatever life would become after her “Star” imploded upon itself.
Joan Crawford photographed by George Hurrell and dressed by Adrian for LETTY LYNTON, 1932. This was the height of her stardom (sans her comeback with Mildred), and MGM capitalized on her glamorous images, soon forcing her into the stereotypical ‘rags to riches’ roles in order to appeal to despondent crowds at home.
Davis was a rogue from the start, vocal about her aspirations and headstrong in ways that often saw her at odds with studio officials. Though she played a glamorous role or two (and was even subjected to the platinum trend popularized by Jean Harlow in 1931 that spared no young starlet. Davis was not to be molded; capitalizing on her unique and piquant features, she threw herself at risky projects with neuroticism. By the end of the 1930s, less than a decade into her career, she had two Oscars to her name as well as bearing the honor of being Warner’s top leading lady, Kay Francis a distant memory. It didn’t take much longer for Davis to earn the reputation of an actress who was daunted by no role, no matter how controversial or unsavory.
Davis in MARKED WOMAN, made in 1937 at the start of her “golden years” at Warner Brothers. Her character suffers a violent attack, resulting in a gruesome facial injury (hence the film’s title); Davis was so dissatisfied with the studio’s attempt to soften and glamourize her look that she marched off set, went to her doctor, and asked him to fix her up as if she had actually suffered such a blow.
In a strange foil to Crawford, Davis’ abject self confidence (appearance wise) in the beginning of her career helped her to steamroll through the hangups of middle age. She’d twice played a hag before the age of 40, and epitomized insanity with BABY JANE; what else could possibly prove to be anymore trying? Privately Davis often detailed her insecurities with aging: she boasted of showing a fan her unretouched countenance during a tour of her AN EVENING WITH BETTE DAVIS run in 1978, she’d admit to getting a facelift just two years later. But even still, she persevered, keeping these doubts at bay and ultimately throwing the entirety of her energy into her career, waning or not.
Many of their contemporaries fell somewhere in between regarding the fates of their diminishing careers: Mary Astor took a small role in HUSH, HUSH … SWEET CHARLOTTE! As a favor to Bette, but not before decrying the production and making her absolute retirement well known. Others, like Constance Bennett and Susan Hayward, died too soon to rule out what their trajectory would be. Lana Turner and Shelley Winters would serialized such roles, but Lana ultimately retired after one too many unflattering failures.
Poster for PERSECUTION (1974), which would ultimately mark the end of Lana Turner’s film career.
Today, the climate is only marginally better for aging women in film, but progress is continuously being made and these actresses, building upon the legacies of their ancestors, continue to loudly and proudly advocate for themselves. Spectacle is indeed the heart of show-business — but it doesn’t have to derive from decadent, misogynistic caricatures in order to provide hearty and robust entertainment. Let us instead marvel at the grace and precision with which a tightrope artist treads his twine, or the carefully layered deliverance of a performance that transcends the mind to speak straight to the heart.
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