Joan Crawford – Mildred Pierce
Crawford had a very different look from her arch-nemesis Bette Davis, but produced similarly accomplished and affecting work and none more so than in 1945’s definitive Hollywood melodrama, Mildred Pierce. Crawford had been applying her craft in largely uncredited roles from as far back as the silent era, but hit her stride through the 1930s and 1940s with Mildred Pierce, The Women and Grand Hotel. She was still hard at work through to the early 1970s but she had primarily moved over to the small screen by then.
The legendary Whatever Happened to Baby Jane tends to most often vie with Mildred Pierce for Crawford’s best performance and although there is little more than a cigarette paper between the two, Mildred Pierce is arguably fractionally the better work. Covering such “issues” as surviving as a single mother and businesswoman, whilst contending with a spoiled brat of a child, Mildred Pierce gets way past what might otherwise have been a lot of histrionics and “meaningful” scenes to instead deliver a compelling vision of how one contends with difficult (if not impossible) personal circumstances. Crawford manages to effortlessly convey strength, brittleness, vulnerability and determination and is never overwhelmed by the material. Although Crawford’s feud with Davis is in danger of overshadowing both of their careers, thankfully performances like this one stand testament to her enduring class.
