This semester (fall 1996) I took an English class here at Swarthmore called American Narrative Cinema. I was in a group assigned to cover the movie, Mildred Pierce, and I ended up doing research to learn about its star, Joan Crawford. If you're at all interested in this actress, read my essay, "A Look at Joan Crawford's Role in Hollywood".

Here are some links to interesting and/or informative sites regarding Crawford:

• The Joan Crawford Home Page --A temple to Joan, with biographical information, pictures, a movie poster archive and audio pieces.
• JoanWatch --Offers many links to related pages, covering wide range of movie sites.
• Joan Crawford --Reveals Joan's affairs with women
• Joan Crawford: A Portrait --Description of Crawford & her stardom, with info about a bio film
• Joan Crawford --One picture and a brief description
• Relics Update by Craig Calman --An article going through some of her movies
• Joan Crawford --Five links
• Their Stories: Joan Crawford and Roseanne --Bizarre, interesting site that shows the parallels between Crawford and Barr/Arnold.
• Narrative Innovations in Film Noir --Discusses the film noir of Mildred Pierce, among other movies.
• Filmography for Crawford
• MILDRED PIERCE (1945) --Part of Internet Movie Database, with all the film's basic info.

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• Crawford had 4 husbands, yet also affairs with women. She had a strong friendship with Eve Arden, the actress who played Ida in MP, a character who some say hinted at her own lesbianism. What are the masculine characteristics of both Crawford and Pierce? (defining style of large shoulder pads, success in climbing the business ladder, etc.)

• Speaking of Eve, here's what Crawford had to say about her: "Eve Arden worked with me twice. I wish she had been given an Academy Award for Mildred Pierce, as I was. She deserved one, too... I'm eternally grateful to Eve, for it's thanks to her that I was able to adopt my first children. Eve had adopted, and when I told her how desperately I wanted children, she informed me how to go about having children of my own." Because of her own miscarriages, Joan ended up adopting four kids. In 1981, one of her daughters released Mommie Dearest, a biography of her mom which revealed her supposed excessive drinking and cruel punishment to her children. This certainly contrasts Mildred*s over-caring image of mother in the movie.

• By the end of the '50s Joan was spending more time travelling with her Pepsi Cola executive husband than making films. She gained an influential executive position in the company, showing another parallel to Mildred with her strategic business decisions. She died in 1977.

• "There are a number of kitchen recipes for feeding the hair. It needs the contents of the refrigerator just as much as your skin does. Right back to mayonnaise! Olive oil, eggs, and lemon juice. Massage the mixture into your hair, let it stay on for ten or fifteen minutes, then rinse it off with cool water. Cool--or you'll have scrambled eggs on your head." --Joan Crawford

• "There are no hard-and-fast rules for fending off an outright pass, especially if it comes from the boss. Every intelligent woman has her own method of turning it off without wounding a sensitive male ego. An even cleverer woman knows how to prevent the pass in the first place. She's charming, friendly, capable--and not seductive. If you can't control your cleavage, your perfume, your walk, and your eyelashes--you'd better stay out of business." --Joan Crawford