- I need sex for a clear complexion, but I'd rather do it for love.
- [In The Women (1939)] Norma Shearer made me change my costume sixteen times because every one was prettier than hers. I love to play bitches and she helped me in this part.
- If you start watching the oldies, you're in trouble. I feel ancient if Grand Hotel (1932) or The Bride Wore Red (1937) comes on. I have a sneaking regard for Mildred Pierce (1945), but the others do nothing for me.
- Love is fire. But whether it is going to warm your hearth or burn down your house, you can never tell.
- Nobody can imitate me. You can always see impersonations of Katharine Hepburn and Marilyn Monroe. But not me. Because I've always drawn on myself only.
- I think the most important thing a woman can have -- next to talent, of course, is -- her hairdresser.
- [regarding the ongoing feud between Joan and her daughter Christina Crawford] Mother-and-daughter feuds make for reams in print; they also make for reams of inaccuracies: the greatest inaccuracy is the feud itself. It takes two to feud and I'm not one of them. I only wish the best for Tina.
- Women's Lib? Poor little things. They always look so unhappy. Have you noticed how bitter their faces are?
- You have to be self-reliant and strong to survive in this town. Otherwise you will be destroyed.
- Recently I heard a "wise guy" story that I had a party at my home for 25 men. It's an interesting story, but I don't know 25 men I'd want to invite to a party.
- Send me flowers while I'm alive. They won't do me a damn bit of good after I'm dead.
- Not that anyone cares, but there's a right and wrong way to clean a house.
- There was a saying around MGM: "Norma Shearer got the productions, Greta Garbo supplied the art, and Joan Crawford made the money to pay for both".
- If I can't be me, I don't want to be anybody. I was born that way.
- [speaking to director George Cukor after learning of Marilyn Monroe's death] You're right. She was cheap, and an exhibitionist. She was never professional, and that irritated the hell out of people. But for God's sake, she needed help. She had all these people on her payroll. Where the hell were they when she needed them? Why in the hell did she have to die alone?
- I love playing bitches. There's a lot of bitch in every woman--a lot in every man.
- Hollywood is like life, you face it with the sum total of your equipment.
- If you've earned a position, be proud of it. Don't hide it. I want to be recognized. When I hear people say, "Joan Crawford!" I turn around and say, "Hi! How are you?"
- If you're going to be a star, you have to look like a star, and I never go out unless I look like Joan Crawford the movie star. If you want to see the girl next door, go next door.
- [on working with Bette Davis in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) at Legendary Ladies of the Movies, Town Hall (1973)] It was one of the greatest challenges I ever had. [pauses to allow the laughter from the audience to taper off] I meant that kindly. Bette is of a different temperament than I. Bette had to yell every morning. I just sat and knitted. I knitted a scarf from Hollywood to Malibu.
- [on director George Cukor] Mr. Cukor is a hard task-master, a fine director and he took me over the coals giving me the roughest time I have ever had. And I am eternally grateful.
- [commenting on the remake of The Women (1939), The Opposite Sex (1956)] It's ridiculous. Norma [Norma Shearer] and I might not ever have been bosom buddies, but we towered compared to those pygmies in the remake!
- [on Greta Garbo] To this day I deplore the fact that she is unable to share herself with the world. What a waste! . . . If only she hadn't been so afraid, she wouldn't today be a lonely stranger on Fifth Avenue, fleeing before recognition.
- [on Bette Davis and What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)] Sure, she stole some of my big scenes, but the funny thing is, when I see the movie again, she stole them because she looked like a parody of herself, and I still looked like something of a star.
- [on Bette Davis] She has a cult, and what the hell is a cult except a gang of rebels without a cause. I have fans. There's a big difference.
- [on Bette Davis and Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964)] I have always believed in the Christian ethic, to forgive and forget. I looked forward to working with Bette again. I had no idea of the extent of her hate, and that she planned to destroy me.
- [on Bette Davis] So I had no great beginnings in legitimate theater, but what the hell had she become if not a movie star? With all her little gestures with the cigarette, the clipped speech, the big eyes, the deadpan? I was just as much an actress as she was, even though I wasn't trained for the stage.
- [on Bette Davis and The Star (1952)] Of course I had heard she was supposed to be playing me, but I didn't believe it. Did you see the picture? It couldn't possibly be me. Bette looked so old, and so dreadfully overweight.
- [on Judy Garland] Over the years I've heard and read so many stories about the way Judy Garland was so badly treated at Metro she ended up a mess. I did not know her well, but after watching her in action a few times I didn't want to know her well. I think her problems were caused by the fact that she was a spoiled, indulgent, selfish brat--plus a stage mother who had to be something of a monster, and a few husbands whose egos absolutely dominated hers. There were times when I felt sorry for Judy, but there were more times when I thought, "For Christ's sake, get off your ass!" . . . but when she put her mind to it, she was good. And I mean damned good. Even in her silly pictures she came off.
- [commenting on sex in films] I find suggestion a hell of a lot more provocative than explicit detail. You didn't see [Clark Gable] and [Vivien Leigh] rolling around in bed in Gone with the Wind (1939), but you saw that shit-eating grin on her face the next morning and you knew damned well she'd gotten properly laid . . . In my fallen-woman roles . . . nobody saw me do the actual falling . . . but they knew I'd fallen, and when it happened again--well, they got the point, and maybe the pornography that went on inside their heads was better than the actual thing would have been on screen. Censorship was a pain in the ass--when it was moral or political--but in the long run, considering what I see now, I think it served a purpose. Marlon Brando . . . Oh, what was the film [Last Tango in Paris (1972)] . . . anyway the nude scene. He's at least 40 pounds overweight, and I think the only sex appeal he has would be to a meat packer. That's art? The emphasis seems to be on the seamier side of real life, as though we should be more interested in what happened in the bathroom and the bedroom instead of living room, kitchen and office. The perspective is crazy. If we think about our lives, and divide time into the portions spent on making a living, eating, talking, reading, being entertained by TV or movies or radio or theater or whatever, and having sex, I think we'd find sex coming out on the short end of the stick. Unless you're a whore it doesn't give you the wherewithal to survive. Good God, isn't it more fun doing it or imagining it than watching it? . . . I know I sound like some sort of old Puritan, but I still think back to "Gone with the Wind", and that morning scene with Scarlett O'Hara. It was a hell of a lot more sexually stimulating than a glimpse of fat Marlon Brando.
- Be afraid of nothing.
- When we were making [What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)], Bette [Bette Davis] admitted to me she was "absolutely smitten" with Franchot [Franchot Tone], who had made Dangerous (1935) with her, but Franchot and I were already very much involved. That proves that Bette did have some good taste in men. Franchot said he thought Bette was a good actress, but he never thought of her as a woman. Our marriage didn't last, but we had some wonderful years. I wouldn't give them back for anything, and we remained friends as long as he lived.
- Sensitive husbands don't like second billing. I don't believe Franchot [Franchot Tone] ever for a moment resented the fact that I was a star. Possibly he resented Hollywood's refusal to let him forget it. There was never a doubt in my mind that his talent was greater than mine.
- Franchot [Franchot Tone] was an extremely loving, intelligent, considerate man, but he was also very haunted. He was one hell of a fine actor, but he loved the theatre and despised Hollywood. He very seldom got the parts he deserved, and I think this bugged him a lot. I wasn't as nice to him, as considerate, as I should have been. I was extremely busy during those years, and I didn't realize that his insecurities and dissatisfactions ran so deeply. His sex life diminished considerably, which didn't help matters, and there finally came a time when we only had things to argue about, not to talk about, and after hundreds of running arguments and a few physical rows we decided to call it quits. I missed him a lot, for a long, long time. He was so mature and stimulating. I think I can safely say that the break-up was another career casualty. If I'd tried a little harder - who knows.
- [on The David Frost Show (1969), (1970)] I feel that if you have one ounce of good sense and one good friend, you'll never have to go to a psychiatrist.
- [The 1930s] Hollywood was capable of hurting me so much. The things about Hollywood that could hurt me (when I first came) can't touch me now. I suddenly decided that they shouldn't hurt me--that was all.
- When television killed comedy and love stories, the movie makers went in slugging. They offered the downbeat, the degenerate as competition. This seems to me to be a sad campaign for Hollywood to use to combat box office disaster.
- [on Hush...Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964) (1973)] I still get chills when I think of the treachery that Miss Davis [Bette Davis] indulged in on that movie, but I refused to ever let anger or hate enter my heart.
- [on Bette Davis]: There was one thing where Bette was one up on me. She'd had a baby, a child of her own. I wanted one, and Bette was so lucky to have been able to have her own daughter.
- [on her children Christina Crawford and Christopher Crawford] You know the troubles I've had with my two older children. I can't understand why it turned out so badly. I tried to give them everything. I loved them and tried to keep them near me, even when they didn't return my love. Well, I couldn't make them love me, but they could have shown some respect. I couldn't insist on love, but I could insist on respect.
- [on the red carpet treatment Norma Shearer attracted at MGM] What do you expect? She sleeps with the boss [Shearer's husband Irving Thalberg was production head of MGM].
- [To Spencer Tracy, made up with curled hair for Captains Courageous (1937)] Oh, my God, it's Harpo Marx!
- I had always known what I wanted, and that was beauty . . . in every form . . . a beautiful house, beautiful man, a beautiful life and image. I was ambitious to get the money which would attain all that for me.
- [after seeing Greta Garbo for the first time on the MGM lot] My knees went weak. She was breathtaking. If ever I thought of becoming a lesbian, that was it.
- [commenting on her final days at Warner Brothers] They were grooming Doris Day to take over the top spot. [Jack L. Warner] asked me to play her sister in one picture [Storm Warning (1950)]. I said, "Come on, Jack. No one could ever believe that I would have Doris Day for a sister".
- [on Planet of the Apes (1968)] Sure, I'd play an ape if they asked me. Maurice Evans did.
- I absolutely will not allow anyone to call me grandmother. They can call me Auntie Joan, Dee-Dee, Cho-Cho, anything but grandmother. It pushes a woman almost to the grave.
- [on What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) and whether she hid weights on her body so that Bette Davis would have a hard time lifting her off the bed when she takes her out of the house for their trip to the beach] Weights! And have Bette tell everyone I was as heavy as an elephant. Absolutely not. I may not have made it as easy for her to lift me out of the bed as I could have, at least at first, but when you're a pro you get over any animosity you may feel and help your fellow player out. It simply didn't happen.
- [on her son, Christopher Crawford] I remember most clearly when a teenage Christopher spat in my face. He said, "I hate you". It's pretty hard to overlook that. I couldn't.
- While making Possessed (1947), I wept each morning on my drive to the studio, and I wept all the way back home. I found it impossible to sleep at night, so I'd lie in bed contemplating the future. I fear it with all my heart and soul even as I fear the dark.
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