Feud: Bette and Joan (FX series)

Yup>

 

This series has really picked up for me. Didn't like Jessica Lange's version of Joan Crawford for the first 3-4 episodes but I like her performance now. Think I should go back and watch Sweet Dreams, which is my favorite Jessica Lange movie.

 

If there are any extras on a DVD set I will be in for that, preferably a huge amount of extras! I want an extra just on the making of the animated opening! Yes, will miss this after the finale.

 

While I think Susan Sarandon has the showier part (and I think has a very interesting performance), Jessica Lange has the harder job trying to make Joan "No Wire Hangers" Crawford a little sympathetic. The performances by both were tour-de-forces, really terrific. It's a very entertaining show if you're into "inside Hollywood" stuff like this.

 

Kudos to Lange and Sarandon. And Judy Davis as well. Are they smoking cigs or vaping? It's just one after the other.

 

I'm surprised by how much interesting material they found to fill an 8-hour series. IMO, this is Emmy material...especially for Sarandon.

 

They have prop "vegan" cigarettes that are totally unharmful and can be inhaled without any effects. And there are also high-tech electronic cigarettes that emit smoke and have a glowing tip, but are just water vapor.



Actor Cigarette Prop Kit

 

Lange is hampered a bit in that she doesn't look as much like Crawford, so in that sense it is a sort of 'her version of' Crawford. She plays a completely believable character comparable to Leonardo DiCaprio doing Howard Hughes and/or J. Edgar Hoover while not quite resembling either 'enough' to be absolute perfection. I wonder if any success for this series will lead to similar behind the scenes future projects? If so what are some possibilities? Perhaps something colorful revolving around Orson Welles, or maybe Clara Bow?

 

Already picked up for a second season, to feature Prince Charles and Princess Diana...

Feud Season 2 Will Focus on Prince Charles and Princess Diana

 

Judy Davis is fantastic. I missed not seeing her in the last episode.

 

Oh man, what a finale! They managed to make me tear up for Joan Crawford (that hallucination sequence)! It's horrible what these women went through in Hollywood. The reveal of where the documentary was taking place! That very last scene! Ah! So perfect! This show better be nominated for a boat load of Emmys and Golden Globes. And I loved both Susan and Jessica, but Jessica really really deserves awards for this performance. Again, she made me feel bad for Joan Crawford multiple times! That's an achievement!

 

Haven't watched the finale yet, but I really enjoyed this series... found myself googling facts for almost an hour or so after each episode... lol!

 

I don't think anyone mentioned it yet;
John Waters plays the director of that slasher film, 'coz he shows a bit of the original movie in his film, "Serial Mom"!

 

The finale was outstanding. What a sequence "The End" was (the juxtaposition of The Doors song with Old Hollywood dying was brilliant and moving). Or the hallucination sequence. A treat to see Lange, Sarandon, Stanley Tucci, and Judy Davis, all actors at the top of their craft in a scene together.

I thought Sarandon stood out more than she has. She seemed to have more fun playing older Bette. It still amazes me at 70, even trying to make Sarandon look older, she just looks so youthful.

Lange was brilliant as ever. She truly is one of the greatest American actresses.

A few digs at Dunaway and a sly reference to Mommie Dearest.

 

Fantastic finale! I also found myself digging for more info after each episode. Something I read last night left me wondering about Crawford; that she was worth around 2 million at the time of her death. While not being 'Hollywood' rich, it doesn't jive with the idea that she was hurting financially. Not saying she wasn't as I also read about her downsizing from one apt. to another, smaller one. But paper plates and microwaved meals? She left the majority of her estate to charity, a final FU to her kids, most of whom got nothing! Anyways....I'd also agree about Sarandon' s beauty, the woman's a friggin' chameleon! At times, in profile, with the wardrobe and make-up she looked eerily like Davis, whose looks did not age gracefully. But, especially during Joan's little hallucination 'party', Sarandon's natural beauty just shone through, she can't help it!

 

There was a huge blunder in the opening of one episode. There's a flyover of the Hollywood sign, and it's in perfect shape (which it wasn't in 1962) including the cell phone towers! I would think it would have fairly easy to find a vintage photograph and just zoomed on that.

 

I'm also expecting to see a boatload of awards come Emmy time. Having Lange & Sarandon together onstage presenting and hopefully, winning, should be fun to see!

 

I thought this series just got better and better, and its strength was that it had to deliver in eight episodes. Nice condensed story arc and pacing with no padding. After the final episode, I think Lange just has to sit back now and wait for her Emmy nomination.

In addition, I learned something quite fascinating in the final minute of the credits -- Olivia de Havilland celebrated her 100th birthday in 2016!

 

Surprised nobody mentioned this...Dominick Burgess KILLED as Victor Buono. Among the other stellar casting decisions for this miniseries, he looked the part (OMG!) and was amazing throughout.

 

Sarandon's gorgeous and was perfectly cast in this.

 

"My only friend, The End"..."Every time I hear that song, it means something else to me. It started out as a simple good-bye song... Probably just to a girl, but I see how it could be a goodbye to a kind of childhood. I really don't know. I think it's sufficiently complex and universal in its imagery that it could be almost anything you want it to be" quote by Jim Morrison in 1969.

As the song plays out in the finale of Feud we see Joan Crawford coming to her end, a Hollywood legend on an empty set of a trashy B-movie with a monkey mask in her hand. The set is a cage she is the freak she is the organ grinder's monkey she has no choice she dons the mask fade to black.

What a sequence what performances what a finale what a show. So brilliant. I was hooked the first minute and waited for my weekly dose and was mesmerized for the next 8 hours of incredible writing, directing and acting. I could write a book or a very very long essay (coming soon to a book store near you haha) about what we just witnessed but I'll just focus on the finale which really hits the main chords for the series.

So spoilers ahead if you haven't watched it yet (sorry about the Doors reveal) maybe wait after you've seen it.


Hard to know where to start so I'll go stream of consciousness and go for it. Sorry if somethings don't make sense or I misquote. I just watched it last night plus the previous "Abandoned" episode so after a night's sleep here I go.

The second to last show had the showdown between Joan and Bette each asking how did it feel to be the most beautiful (Joan) and talented (Bette) and both saying the best thing ever but both saying it wasn't enough. Besides being a truly bravura epic acting performance it creates a meshing of characters, both were the same and the finale nails this to the extreme. Fittingly the finale was entitled: You Mean All This Time We Could Have Been Friends? (also the last line in Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?)

They become the same character. Bette becomes Joan: she is professionally vain and lowers her standards to crappy TV pilots, she beats her grandchild for missing her mother, she drinks too much, and ironically must cede power to pretty starlet Faye Dunaway on a movie set (with the obvious Mommie Dearest nod). Meanwhile Joan on her set is the talented one making script suggestions etc. But it comes full circle in the nightmare sequence with Jack Warner and Hedda Hopper. Flames are in the background, the demons are back. Jack Warner made her a star but what she had to do scarred her for life (i.e. the buckle surgery to have cheekbones after age 25) Hedda Hopper helped her stay a star but also destroying friendships. They have their own demons jack his Jewishness, Hedda her lack of talent made her the puller of stings not the puppet Jack says the suffering is all worth it. Bette shows up dressed in red her true demon or is she? Instead the flames

disappear
the rain is falling
Bette makes Jack and Hedda disappear
it was their fault their puppetry so much so that Joan admits by herself she doesn't know who she is
they pay a game of cards called regrets your biggest regret I wasn't more generous yours? I should've been your friend let's start now
cue mamacita Miss Joan who are you talking to
Joan is alone in her dark apartment long gray hair ashen face she is Blanche dying on the beach the nightmare is over but she is content was the suffering worth it

she dies a week later

the oscar ceremony gives her a two second tribute

50 years of show business = 2 seconds

was the suffering worth it

of course everyone show up for the funeral

Bette is asked to make a statement: when someone dies you should say something good. Joan Crawford is dead. Good.

Snap but the way Susan Sarandon says it her mouth says those awful things but her eyes show her regret the pain
Bette sees a drawing of herself yep that's the old bag
the dean martin roast she must hear the indignities from 5th-rate comics

they are the same: Aries with 4 husbands whose lives produced great entertainment but left lives shattered and tell-all books tainting their legacy

she refuses to be in the documentary I won't say a goddamn thing mean about Joan Crawford

we find out her mother her only true support was actually against her

she is alone too was the suffering worth it

they end full circle on the set of Baby Jane they are looking forward to becoming friends they smile and laugh and go to their separate dressing rooms ugly wooden cubicles
cages for the monkeys

my dear friend the end

Okay sorry slipped away now some lucid comments.

This is brilliant artistry. Ryam Murphy really outdid himself. It is a celebration of art but also the pain behind it. It is about growing old and how we live our lives. It is about Hollywood and it's vanity.

And it is about us. The past is important but we hate it. Give me the new anything. Feud reminds us that we haven't come too far. The Jack Warners' and Hedda Hoppers' still control what we see the puppets pulling the strings.

Ryan Murphy pulls away the curtain away and reveals the ugly truth. It's not pretty but it can be celebrated. So instead of two seconds of tribute we got 8 hours of tribute almost 40 years later to Joan Crawford.

 

Joan Crawford did a tv show too after Baby Jane, guess it just didn't fit the Feud narrative...

 

Wife and I really enjoyed this show. Binged (only way to watch!) the last 2 episodes last night and discussed potential Emmy nominations today. We also loved the "Mad Men-ish" type opening graphics. Stellar all the way around. Bravo to all involved.

 

She also did The Lucy Show and that would've fit the Feud narrative perfectly.

 

Hopefully they license Mojo Nixon's Drunk-Divorced Floozie for the soundtrack.