Bette Davis: The made-for-television movies

A bunch of Bette's TV movies are on Youtube in their entirety.

Yes, that’s how I saw Strangers, White Mama, and Right of Way. As Summers Die is on there, too. And probably others.

I’ve seen these two:

A Piano for Mrs. Cimino (1982)

Little Gloria...Happy at Last (1982)

Not bad for what they were.

Bette Davis was pretty good in Dark Secret of Harvest Home. It's in two parts on Youtube. Also starring David Ackroyd who originally played Gary Ewing on Dallas and a young Rosanna Arquette.

Murder With Mirrors on Youtube also. It's one of those Agatha Christie mysteries with Helen Hayes as Miss Marple. Bette Davis is hardly in it though. I think at the time she was still recovering from her stroke.

We had a wonderful time making "The Disappearance of Aimee" together.

I love Madam Sin. I have it on a VHS tape that I recorded off TV but have never bothered to have it transferred to DVD.

You don´t have to.

Thank you R7!

Disappearance of Aimee was one of those big TV event movies at the time. Dunaway was white hot in her career and the pairing of Davis and her was a huge coup.

Another entertaining on with R. Wagner

I recall Strangers as being excellent.

It is!

"Dark Secret Of Harvest Home" isn't nearly as good as the title suggests. Watchable, that's it.

Faye and Bette HATED each other filming that movie. It's been well-documented.

Disappearance of Aimee was a decent movie: the script tried to give a somewhat nuanced, and sympathetic, view of an intense mother-daughter relationship, and Faye and Bette were both good. It's an interesting true story fleshed out as a character drama.

I read the recent memoir by Davis's assistant Kathryn Sermak. Murder With Mirrors was a difficult shoot because it was the first job Bette had after the stroke and the broken hip and if that wasn't stressful enough, it was also when she found out her ungrateful bitch daughter had written that book.

No we did not. R14

Miss Davis expressed her admiration for my youth,talent and beauty through the way we handled this in Hollywood then.

Through jealousy. She kept praising me up to her last appearance on J. Carson.

I showed my respect for her age and status through giving her the time she needed to prepare for the scenes.

That was miread as letitng her wait.

The “secret” kinda turned me on when I first saw it.

Madame Sin is fantastic.

She's doing Gail Sondergard in "The Letter."^^^^

She took over for Raymond Burr when he was ill on "Perry Mason".

Bette's Perry Mason episode used to be on Youtube, but unfortunately it got taken down. She was very good in it.

Her part in Little Gloria...Happy at Last earned her an Emmy nomination in 1983.

Bette should've done Dynasty or Falcon Crest as a special guest star. That would've been a fucking hoot.

[quote] Bette should've done Dynasty or Falcon Crest as a special guest star. That would've been a fucking hoot.

Did she ever appear on Hotel with Anne Baxter?

Dynasty could have been fun.

Bette and Joan 02

When TV movies were actually good.

This is a marvelous discovery, OP. Thank you! I’m forwarding this to poor Glenn immediately.

[R25] Aaron Spelling convinced Bette to star in HOTEL, which she started working on before her stroke. She fell ill after getting several episodes in the can but refused to continue once she recovered. She hated the show - she called it "BROTHEL." This decision drove daughter BD insane because Spelling was paying Bette HUGE money but she wouldn't budge. It wasn't a wise business decision but Bette had made up her mind. When Anne Baxter replaced Bette in HOTEL, many people pointed out that Anne "stole" Bette's role, just as she angled to do in ALL ABOUT EVE. It wasn't true but it made good copy.

[quote]This decision drove daughter BD insane because Spelling was paying Bette HUGE money but she wouldn't budge.

Because BD and her idiot husband were living off of Bette, and had been for nearly 20 years at that point. If Bette hadn't cut BD off when she did, she would've died broke.

HOTEL

[R31] Jesus that's a LOT of guest stars! Among them shoplifter Lainie Kazan, tragic Erin Moran and glorious Morgan Fairchild. I can think of no through-line.

She did some short TV dramas.....

The Cold Touch

Dark Morning

Have the Bette Hotel episodes surfaced? You think there is a market for them. Or were they foolishly destroyed?!

Harvest Home was OK.....just B level camp.

Bette was really only in a bit of it here and there.

A couple of the above and more

Some of those movies were very good. I can remember being scared out of my wits after watching "The Dark Secret of Harvest Home." Bette Davis did not have a big role in "Little Gloria, Happy At Last." She played the matriarch of the Vanderbilt family. Angela Lansbury had the better role of Gertrude Whitney.

Bette Davis was a good actress. I'm sure she took those TV roles, because she needed the money (like Laurence Olivier in "A Little Romance"). But network television in the seventies and early 80s used to produce some very good made for TV movies and serials. And there were quite a few that dealt with topical issues. "An Early Frost" was the first to deal with AIDS. And "Something About Amelia" dealt with child sexual abuse.

Bette had to work until the end for the money but you know that she would have anyway.

Bette supported a lot of people during her career, she didn't spend a lot of money on herself. Her mother, sister and daughter were totally dependent on her and she also had her husbands to deal with. BD nearly drained Bette dry, since BD and her husband liked living a comfortable lifestyle but didn't want to work for it.

Katharine Hepburn, Mae West and Greta Garbo all died wealthy because they never had kids!

[R34] Thanks for posting! Never watched that one before. Bette was so masterful as an actress. She gets the most out of every situation and expression.

Thanks, R29.

Bette is hilarious in the Suspicion episode "Fraction of a Second".

^ As in hilariously-over-the-top.

Here it is.

I love how Bette pronounced "lawyer" as "loy - YAH."

Bette's relationship with her leach family is coincidentally documented in her movie The Star.

If you come nearer even one step....

As Constant Doyle on Perry Mason.....

Don't fuck with Marian Seldes!

Trying again...

R21 beautiful, blonde James Dean wanna be Michael Parks is in that episode too. Hot as balls

Faye and Bette as Sister Aimee and her mama

Her spookiest role!

I was an extra in the above. Bette was wonderful. Faye was a pill.