On a crisp October day in 1989, Hollywood legend Bette Davis was laid to rest at Forest Lawn Memorial Park in Los Angeles. The two-time Oscar winner, who lit up screens for five decades, was buried next to her mother and sister under an epitaph she had chosen herself: “She did it the hard way.” Those words encapsulate the life of a woman who clawed her way to the top, leaving an indelible mark on cinema history.
In her lifetime, Bette Davis achieved fame, fortune, and an unprecedented ten Academy Award nominations. But behind the glitz and glamour lay a life marked by personal struggles. She endured three divorces, the sudden loss of a husband, betrayal by her own daughter, and the heartbreak of losing the only man she ever truly loved. Reflecting on her life, Bette once said, “If I was a fool in my personal life, I can’t blame acting for that. I chose very foolishly. None of my husbands was ever man enough to become Mr. Bette Davis.”
The Challenges of Fame in Love and Marriage
While Hollywood success didn’t guarantee relationship doom, it certainly posed significant challenges for Bette Davis’s marriages. Her first husband, musician Harmon Nelson, who had been her boarding school sweetheart, faced ridicule in the press for earning only a fraction of what his famous wife made. “She married him because he was a sweet guy, but he felt emasculated by her fame and success,” explains Julia A. Stern, author of Bette Davis Black and White. When they divorced in 1938 after six years of marriage, Harmon complained in their legal papers that all Bette ever wanted to do in bed was read scripts. “That was his humorous way of expressing that she had sort of abandoned him to a non-marriage,” says Stern.
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To be honest, Bette wasn’t exactly the easiest person to get along with. A perfectionist to the core, she couldn’t tolerate disorder. She was driven, ambitious, and a workaholic. “Her ambition made her a workaholic,” Stern explains. “But she wasn’t interested in being a movie star. She was passionate about acting as an intellectual pursuit. She wasn’t great at playing well with others.”
Love and Collaboration with William Wyler
One of the most significant figures in Bette’s life was director William Wyler, who helmed three of her best films: 1938’s Jezebel, which earned her a second Oscar, The Letter in 1940, and The Little Foxes in 1941. “When he would direct her, they would fight about what he wanted versus what she wanted,” recalls Stern. But these disagreements only fueled their creative spark. “He was her intellectual match and creative interlocutor,” Stern adds. Naturally, they fell deeply in love, despite Bette already being married at the time. “The love of her life was Willie Wyler. She always stated that,” says Kathryn Sermak, Bette’s longtime assistant and author of Miss D & Me.
There was a moment when they came close to tying the knot. After Bette’s second marriage ended, Wyler proposed in a letter, giving her a week to respond or he’d walk away. “She was so angry that she didn’t even open the letter,” Stern explains. “Then she heard on the radio that he had married someone else.”
Motherhood and Family Challenges
Bette gave birth to daughter Barbara, known as B.D., during her marriage to painter William Grant Sherry. She adopted two more children, Margot, who was later discovered to be mentally disabled, and Michael, during her final marriage to Gary Merrill, her co-star in 1950’s All About Eve. “She told me she would have stayed married to Gary, but he had a drinking problem,” Sermak reveals. “She feared he might harm the children. It was affecting B.D., so that’s what ultimately ended their marriage.”
Motherhood became Bette’s ultimate calling, but she struggled with boundaries, especially with B.D. “There were no limits or boundaries, and she let her get married at 16,” says Stern. “B.D. was willful and conflicted about her mother.” This tension culminated in B.D.’s publication of My Mother’s Keeper in 1985, where she portrayed Bette as a bullying, self-centered alcoholic. The book’s release couldn’t have come at a worse time, as Bette was recovering from a stroke and mastectomy. “She loved B.D. more than anyone else in the world,” says Sermak. “But they never reconciled.”
In her 1987 memoir, This ’n That, Bette fired back. “I hope someday I will understand the title My Mother’s Keeper,” she wrote. “If it refers to money, if my memory serves me right, I’ve been your keeper all these many years.” She left her fortune and legacy to her son, Michael, who has since created a foundation to award acting scholarships to students. “He’s devoted to her memory,” Stern notes.
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A Legacy of Resilience
When Bette passed away at the age of 81, she expressed few regrets about her eventful life. “I believe in one thing in this world,” she said. “Out of everything comes some good, even if you just learn something.” Bette Davis’s life was a testament to resilience, passion, and the pursuit of excellence, leaving an indelible mark on the world of cinema.
