Mommie Dearest: Difference between revisions

In a nutshell, '''''Mommie Dearest''''' (1978) was a 1978 memoir written by Christina Crawford, depicting her physical and mental abuse at the hands of her adoptive mother, famed actress [[Joan Crawford]]. It hadwas the book that spawned the equally famous [[The Film of the Book|Film of the Book]], with [[Faye Dunaway]] in the role of Joan Crawford.

The book can be seen as one of the first (and arguably most successful) of the genre of nasty tell-all biographies of stars from the [[Golden Age of Hollywood]], told by their children. Others such as the kids of [[Marlene Dietrich]], [[Judy Garland]], [[Henry Fonda]], [[Loretta Young]], [[Bing Crosby]] and [[Bette Davis]] all tried to replicate the success with various results (the Bette Davis book flopped and was debunked, for example, but the books that Marlene Dietrich's and Bing Crosby's respective broods wrote did quite well).

The 1981 movie version of the book was an even bigger debacle: Faye Dunaway (who ironically had been praised by Crawford in print prior to her death and who even suggested that she should play her in the inevitable bio-film of Joan's life) was cast and Paramount mountedmarketed it as a serious bio-film. Sadly though, after numerous re-writes and an incompetent director whose previous directing experience was a handful of hammy melodramas, much of Joan Crawford's character development ended up missing, which turned her into a deranged cartoon character, and the abuse segments took on larger -than -life sadistic tones. By the end, even Christina Crawford (whose husband had a hand in producing the film) thought the film was too over-the-top. As such, Faye Dunaway came off as a [[Large Ham]], and the film picked up a huge word-of-mouth regarding it as [[So Bad It's Good|an unintentional comedy]], forcing the studio to [[Retool]] the marketing to focus on the over-the-top abuse. Sadly, it failed to save the box office take, though it secured itself as a [[Cult Classic]].