Let's talk Kathy Bates' performance in "Misery" (1990)

I love Kathy Bates. Hollywood is weird. She should have gotten the Oscar for "Delores Claiborne", yet she didn't even get a nomination for that performance. I just hope to see more of her. I loved her as Madame Delphine LaLaurie on AHS. She's fun to watch when she's an evil bitch. More, please!

Yes she absolutely deserved the Oscar. And the campy parts are part of what make the movie so great because there ARE freaks out there that fly off the handle out of nowhere just like her character and leave you stunned.

No, let's not talk about Kathy Bates' performance in "Misery".

You don't get to decide what I talk about.

pushy

I actually felt kind of sorry for Annie. She seemed like someone who had been genuinely hurt by other people.

I agree with you, OP. “Dolores Claiborne” should have been Kathy Bates’ Oscar. Joanne Woodward should have won her second the year of Misery.

Don't forget uber cunt Betty Bacall at the end as the editor.

She was great the first two thirds of the film.3-Dimensional. You knew she was loony but you felt a lot of empathy for her. Then the script let her down. By the last 3rd, she lost all dimensions and became a cliched, deranged killing machine. Not the fault of the actress. .......

The following year with a much better role, she showed she deserved the Oscar. She just got it for the wrong movie.

I could have done her performance better, in my sleep!

Kathy was really hurt when NBC axed Harry's Law, her series, which was doing well in the ratings and in the demo, I think, and did better than its successor.

R9 ... and Ryan Murphy ran to her rescue so you don't have to feel bad.

I love Lizzy Caplan in Castle Rock as Annie Wilkes, she's doing a great job at coming off sympathetic.

Kathy Bates can do no wrong, imho. She's always great in everything she does.

And yes, she deserved a second Oscar for Dolores Claiborne, and Judy Parfitt should've gotten a Supporting Actress Oscar. A crime that they weren't even nominated.

I know she's a big fave to many, but except for a few roles I find her acting pedestrian. I'm often taken aback at how bland she is, having decades of experience in front of the camera. Has she learned nothing?

Agreed R7. For the first two thirds of the film, she is utterly terrifying and yet you feel sympathetic towards her. It's one of the only performances on film I can watch yearly when I catch it whilst channel flicking and still be blown away by.

I see where R7 and R13 are coming from, but at the same time, I think "killing machine" was the inevitable outcome of her character. We know she went on a murder spree killing babies in the wards she oversaw as a nurse. The bitch is crazy. She manages to evoke sympathy in some respects, but by the end of it, she realizes that Paul eventually will need to leave, and his attempts to thwart her drive her into an absolute fit of madness and rage. She plans on a double-suicide, so she starts taking out anyone who comes near because, in her mind, she isn't going to be there much longer.

It's no wonder that ship sank.

It wasn't the most competitive year but she still deserved it. I agree she should have been nominated in 96 for Dolores. If they had released the movie a couple of months earlier she would have been up in the notoriously weak 1994 year and possibly beaten Jessica Lange!

I'm glad to see all the love for Kathy's performance in "Dolores Claiborne." She was great in "Misery," but I think the performance in "Dolores" was a true marvel—she showed so much range in that film, and between significant spans of time, from a young housewife to an embittered, hardened woman. It was a devastating performance. Jennifer Jason Leigh, Judy Parfitt, and David Strathairn were all great as well. The whole cast was remarkable, really.