IMDb Poll ( non-sanctioned) From Sirens to Matriarchs : The long distance career run and rank of pre-code actresses.
by st-shot | created - 20 Jul 2011 | updated - 02 Aug 2011 | PublicThis poll was conducted during the month of July 2011. Approximately 60 IMDb members partook in the voting process.
Reason for arriving at these five choices.
Garbo and Shearer were as big but ended their careers before WW ll ended. Loy had a long career but not that much above the title. Colbert moved away from film to television and back to the theatre in the early 50s leaving these grande dames as the last one's standing.
Given the power of the studios and the attitude towards women in their times we shall never see the likes of these legendary actresses who had a much harder road to travel but ultimately did it their way.
Ranked in order as voted on by board members.
1. Bette Davis
Actress | All About Eve
Ruth Elizabeth Davis was born April 5, 1908, in Lowell, Massachusetts, to Ruth Augusta (Favor) and Harlow Morrell Davis, a patent attorney. Her parents divorced when she was 10. She and her sister were raised by their mother. Her early interest was dance. To Bette, dancers led a glamorous life, but...
Davis received the most points as well as garner in excess of a third of the first place votes. All About Eve was voted her finest performance by a decent margin though second place finisher The Letter got the most first place votes. Now, Voyager, The Little Foxes and Whatever Happened to Baby Jane rounded out the top five. Bright Victory polled well but Oscar winners Jezebel and Dangerous were all but ignored. Her real Oscar deserving performance Of Human Bondage received but one mention.
2. Barbara Stanwyck
Actress | Double Indemnity
Today Barbara Stanwyck is remembered primarily as the matriarch of the family known as the Barkleys on the TV western The Big Valley (1965), wherein she played Victoria, and from the hit drama The Colbys (1985). But she was known to millions of other fans for her movie career, which spanned the ...
Stanwyck received the second highest point count and slightly over a quarter of the first place votes. Double Indemnity was selected as her clear cut best performance with The Lady Eve second and Stella Dallas third. Sorry Wrong Number and Baby Face completed the top five.
3. Katharine Hepburn
Actress | The Lion in Winter
Katharine Houghton Hepburn was born on May 12, 1907 in Hartford, Connecticut to a suffragist, Katharine Martha (Houghton), and a doctor, Thomas Norval Hepburn, who both always encouraged her to speak her mind, develop it fully, and exercise her body to its full potential. An athletic tomboy as a ...
Hepburn received less points but the same amount of first place votes as Stanwyck. Long Day's Journey into Night out distanced her four Oscar wins combined while Alice Adams finished second followed by Bringing up Baby and The Lion in Winter in a tie for third with The African Queen fifth. The Tracy pairings with the exception of Adam's Rib hardly registered and while all of the other actresses had best performance mentions in twenty films or more Hepburn's were restricted to thirteen choices.
4. Joan Crawford
Actress | What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?
Joan Crawford was born Lucille Fay LeSueur on March 23, 1906, in San Antonio, Texas, to Anna Belle (Johnson) and Thomas E. LeSueur, a laundry laborer. By the time she was born, her parents had separated, and by the time she was a teenager, she'd had three stepfathers. It wasn't an easy life; ...
Crawford finished a distant fourth with less than 10% of the first place votes. She tied for the most films mentioned (22) but Mildred Pierce was the clear favorite, doubling the combined totals of Humoresque and Grand Hotel which tied for second. The Women and Possessed tied for fourth. Whatever Happened to Baby Jane was a surprisingly high sixth. Considering Davis had the showier role, this is high compliment.
5. Marlene Dietrich
Soundtrack | Witness for the Prosecution
Her father was a police lieutenant and imbued in her a military attitude to life. Marlene was known in school for her "bedroom eyes" and her first affairs were at this stage in her life - a professor at the school was terminated. She entered the cabaret scene in 1920s Germany, first as a spectator ...
Dietrich was an even more distant fifth, receiving not one first place vote but tied Crawford for the most film mentions. The Blue Angel and Destry Rides Again tied for first in the best performance department followed closely by Witness for the Prosecution, The Shanghai Express and Judgement at Nuremberg.
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