Ryan Murphy, the personality director of the American Horror Story and American Crime Story series about the eternal feud between two women , brings a new series this year, "The Enemy: Betty and Joan", to reproduce The epic feud between Bette Davis and Joan Crawford, two of Hollywood's golden age stars. Interestingly, the two Oscar-winning actresses in the play are played by Susan Sarandon and Jessica Lange, who are also Oscar-winning actresses in real life. Such a drama with a lot of attention has gained attention since its launch. and numerous accolades. And the audience with the heart changed the name of the play to "American Tear Story" according to the director's previous routine, which is both simple and rude, and full of fun. Of course, this drama is different from the kind of popcorn works that rely on pure tearing and fighting to win attention. Instead, it inherits the essence of the director's previous dramas and continues to explore the fragile and complex relationship between people and the deep human nature. pain.
When it comes to the golden age of Hollywood, a long list of splendid names automatically pops into the minds of many moviegoers: Greta Garbo, Katherine Hepburn, Vivien Leigh, Ingrid Bergman, Audrey Hepburn , Grace Kelly, Elizabeth Taylor, Marilyn Monroe... and Bette Davis and Joan Crawford are also two of the most famous actresses in the golden age, and the two have been fighting for a long time. For 30 years, this is probably the most influential and longest-running scandal in Hollywood in the 20th century. The actors of the same generation describe it as follows: They have never had competition like them, and they have hated each other for nearly half a century. As for the source of the conflict between the two, director Murphy also borrowed the words of another golden age actress, Olivia de Havilland: "Veterans have nothing to do with hatred, but from pain.
" A legendary actress in the history of Hollywood film, Bette Davis, a "drama idiot" from a professional background, has a brilliant performance in her life: 11 Oscar nominations for best actress and two awards, Cannes Film Festival actress, Golden Globe Award for life Achievement Award, American Film Institute (AFI) Lifetime Achievement Award, the first female president of the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, ranked second in AFI's list of the 100 greatest Hollywood actresses in the past century, second only to four Oscar-winning actresses. Katherine Hepburn, whose representative works include "The Shackles of Life", "Women and Women", "Tears in the Red Shirt", "The Comet Beauty" and so on.
In contrast, the glamorous Joan Crawford had a tragic childhood and a very disgraceful past, and climbed from the bottom of society to the position of a big star step by step, during which she worked as a toilet worker and a stripper. The girl, and the mistress of the Hollywood staff, occupied a place in Hollywood by herself, nominated for 3 Oscars, and in 1945, she won the 18th Academy Award for Best Actress and AFI Top 100 Women The actor list ranked tenth.
It is said that the literati are indifferent to each other, but the same is true of the artists. As the most famous rivals in the history of Hollywood, the two have a long history of grievances. Disgust and meanness to each other, and they don't even care about the criticism of public opinion. The mediocre Betty is not as beautiful and delicate as Joan in appearance, and she is good at dealing with men, which has become her eternal heart disease; while Joan, who was born from a bad background, has always longed for the outside world, especially Betty who is the most talented in acting. respect, in order to prove that they are not only beautiful. They despise each other's mediocre or bad aspects from the bottom of their hearts, and they can't help but envy each other's shining talents. Yes, the unreachable is always in turmoil. But apart from these differences, the two do have too many similarities: a strong character, a hot and irritable temper, a marriage that is doomed to fail, a broken family, burning and consuming themselves like a flame, and burning at the same time the people around you. These two pitiful and hateful women, beneath their mighty exteriors, deep down in their hearts there is a sense of inferiority and loneliness that cannot be erased.
As the so-called "iron screen, flowing actors", with the growth of age and the decline of their appearance, these two female stars who used to be hot and powerful in Hollywood, the road of acting will inevitably go downhill. With the emergence of new blood such as Monroe, Hepburn, etc., Joan, who has become tomorrow's yellow flower, tried her best to choose a script for herself in order to return to the center of the spotlight, and invited and persuaded her former nemesis Betty to co-star in the thriller "Lan Lan". Shocked Change." The story of this play focuses on the grievances and grievances that occurred during and after the filming of the two twilight beauties.
This pair of "sisters" who are mortal enemies both inside and outside the show will undoubtedly add to the attention of this movie without a popular star. Once the filming started, it caused quite a stir. I get gossip and satisfaction. In the play, there are sisters who torture each other, and the story outside the play is far more complicated and weird: Betty looks down on the other party for flattering the staff in order to get better lighting effects, and Joan is dissatisfied with the other party's studio expenses. Why? more than her own; there is a scene where Betty's sister kicks and beats Joan's sister, so Betty fakes it and kicks Joan's head so hard that she gets bagged; in response, in a subsequent scene , Betty needs to carry Joan's character out of the bedroom. Joan deliberately added heavy objects to her clothes, which caused Betty's back pain to recur; this two heroine movie was only Betty to shine and was nominated for an Oscar. The promoter Joan was hit hard, and Betty, who was in desperate need of another Oscar to consolidate her acting status, finally missed the award, and Joan, who missed the nomination, took the stage to accept the award on behalf of the winner, giving Betty a heavy blow... Joan, who had successfully humiliated Betty at the Oscars and seemed to be complacent, when she returned to her home alone, she looked at the little golden man on the bed that did not belong to her, leaving only a desolate and lonely figure for the audience. . In this bloody battle, both sides were bruised and no one really belonged to the winning side.
In Hollywood, known as the "Dream Factory of Stars", men are always in control, and women are nothing more than delicate puppets manipulated in their hands. The so-called ideals and art seem insignificant, and naked capital is their real of concern. When Pauline, an enthusiastic assistant director, planned to make a big splash in Hollywood with her own script, Joan poured cold water on her head: "What do you think is holding back the new wave of female directors? Capital. Capital comes in. Silent films are low cost and low risk, and the producers may not be comfortable with a naive teenage girl or a female editor standing behind the camera, but when the studios are in power, they send women out to fuck women It takes perseverance, leadership, financial responsibility to be a director, so the megaphone is in the hands of men, and we women couldn’t be any worse.” Joan is a smart woman, She is familiar with the way Hollywood operates, and is soberly aware of the problem, but she can only adapt to the laws of survival and choose to help the tyrants. Simone Beauvoir famously said: “I am like everyone, half accomplice, half victim.” Women are oppressed, and she resigns to this oppression in desperation, while helping oppress others woman. In such a difficult world of patriarchy, the two superstars have to compete for limited resources by running and hurting each other, which can't help but sigh.
The only rule for the continuous development of the film capital industry is to frequently replace the old with new people, and always satisfy the freshness of the general public. The entertainment industry has always been a place to eat youthful meals. It has always been "but seeing new people laugh, then hearing old people cry", which is especially cruel to female artists. A male artist who is over his age has the opportunity to play with a female artist who is in his prime. Play the leading role, while female artists over the age of 40 can only be reduced to the mother or mother-in-law playing the leading role. "Senior" is sometimes not a compliment, it is often compared with "older". "Sunset Boulevard" and "Comet Beauty", which can be called the two monuments of film history in 1950, are the true portrayal of Hollywood's replacement of old and new: the former is the most ironic dirge of a bygone era, and the once glorious actress has become An old woman over fifty years old, her face covered with thick powder, is addicted to the flashy old dream of thousands of pets, unwilling to wake up, and longing for the sun to return one day; How many "ugly ducklings" have exhausted their efforts to become "white swans", but they are fleeting like comets. The front waves have not been beaten to death on the beach, and the back waves have already come in waves one after another, endless.
The public is always the most forgetful, the most fond of the new and the old. In the entertainment industry, which is never short of youth and beauty, how many people are willing to pay to watch the performances of old and old stars in front of the big screen? Female artists who are at an embarrassing age, those who see through, choose to retreat bravely; those who are obsessed are determined to give it a go. Betty and Joan, two proud and stubborn women, are obviously not reconciled to the former. Choosing to age gracefully is a kind of wisdom, and choosing a moth to fly into a fire is also commendable courage, even though the background is so desolate.
After acting for most of their lives and fighting for most of their lives, the two superstars who were surrounded by countless flowers and applause all ended up in a lonely and desolate evening scene, but they never shook hands to make peace. It was originally a personal conflict that could be resolved, but due to the involvement of too many other factors, it was like a snowball. Appear! It is never too big of a deal to engage in affairs and watch the fun. The game of human nature and the unspoken rules of the entertainment industry have contributed to this unparalleled grievance after all, so that both parties have become victims of Hollywood Vanity Fair. The end of the play gives a touch of softness and light to this sharp and oppressive hostile relationship from beginning to end: the terminally ill Joan Meng meets Jack, the business representative who is chasing capital profits, Heda, the media representative who writes gossip and eats readers, and Su Ri Dou. Have your life-and-death counterpart, Betty, at the same table, laughing and reconciling. A short glance at each other and a smile seems to have passed thousands of sails. The world goes with the flow of water, and it is a dream come to life.
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