Silver Screenings

The Star (1952) has a delicious meta scene. Like all great meta scenes, it’s done Without a Trace of Irony.

The movie stars Bette Davis, in an Oscar-nominated role, as a former Hollywood Superstar whose career has come to a Screeching Halt. She’s broke and, even worse, unemployable.

Her belongings have been auctioned off (“Do I hear a dollar for this item?”), and she’s on the Verge of being evicted from her modest apartment.

Not only that, her daughter (Natalie Wood) lives with Davis’s ex-husband, his new wife, and their two small children. Davis detests and resents this situation, but to save face, she lies to her daughter about her circumstances: She’s starting a new movie in a few weeks; she’s as big a Star as ever!

We learn that when Davis was wealthy and famous, everyone jumped on her bankroll, and she carried them. Naturally, not one of these people will assist her now. You know how it is – you can’t profit from a has-been.

To make matters worse, she embarks on a drunken tear through Hollywood with her Academy Award (“Come on, Oscar, let’s you and me get drunk!”), and has a minor vehicle accident for which she’s thrown into the Clink.

Happily, there is one person who will Help, the handsome Sterling Hayden, whom she cast in a movie years ago. Hayden has always been in love with her, for whatever reason, and after he posts bail, he gives her a place to stay.

Hayden is a good character foil for Davis’s ego-driven mania. His calm, easy-going exterior rebuffs her relentless fixation. He knows Davis is finished, and accepts her anyway. “You’ve had a sleigh ride,” he tells her, “and now it’s over.”

Davis airily dismisses his words. She won’t accept there are no more Leading roles for her, even if she is 42.

Hollywood studios, however, see her as aging out, and they’ve Closed Ranks.

About the meta scene.

Although Bette Davis, the actress, is utterly fabulous, she does skew towards Overwrought Melodrama, and it’s in full bloom in The Star. Davis hollers and stomps and chews the scenery like it’s hamburger steak. With gravy.

Director Stuart Heisler seems not to have the ability to Reign Davis In, to the film’s detriment. A person can quickly lose sympathy for a character if there’s no restraint or subtlety.

Ironically, in The Star, Davis’s character is given a screen test, and she ignores the director’s instructions. Davis is supposed to play a sullen, middle-aged woman in the screen test, but she plays the character like a Party Girl, complete with come-hither vibes.

She’s dreadful in this test, but you have to admire Davis’s ability to deliberately do a horrible job while convincing us she thinks she’s marvelous.

Watch Davis as she studies her audition on screen. You see a sickening realization slide over her, smothering her optimism. It’s the best scene in the film.

She weeps, alone in that screening room, and there’s something very Joan Crawford-ish about it.

The Star was, apparently, based on Joan Crawford, although to label Crawford as “washed up” at this time is inaccurate. After all, she received her third Best Actress nomination in 1953.

Davis’s character is surely based on Crawford’s ambition and career single-mindedness. She’s All Work, All Drive, and Davis beautifully captures this laser focus.

The Star was written by Dale Eunson and Katherine Albert, a couple who were once very close friends with Crawford. Eunson was her publicist for many years, and Crawford was godmother to the couple’s daughter.

Rumour has it Crawford was offended by their script about a washed-up, alcoholic movie star, and decided to repay Eunson and Albert through their daughter.

The couple was concerned their 17-year-old daughter wanted to marry a man ten years her senior, and they asked Crawford to intervene. Crawford promised to help, but instead arranged a secret midnight wedding at her house. (Katherine Albert was so angry, she never spoke to Crawford again.)

The Star feels like a mash-up of Sunset Boulevard and All About Eve, despite its contrived Studio ending. However, it’s still a relevant tale about Hollywood actresses getting older, as portrayed by Bette Davis as Joan Crawford.

The Star starring Bette Davis, Sterling Hayden, Natalie Wood. Directed by Stuart Heisler. Written by Dale Eunson & Katherine Albert. Twentieth-Century Fox, 1952, B&W, 89 mins.