SPOILER ALERT!
(1964): A Study in Gothic Horror and the Birth of “Hag Cinema”
Robert Aldrich’s What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962) and Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964) stand as twin pillars of mid-century Gothic horror, films that redefined the possibilities of psychological suspense while resuscitating the careers of Hollywood’s fading icons.
These films, often credited with launching what has now entered the lexicon as the “Hag Cinema,” a subgenre defined by legendary actresses, who were gracing the screen in the seasoned elegance of their later years, taking on roles that are as grotesque, often macabre as they are compelling. And as much about the erosion and slow fading of old Hollywood glamour as they are about the horrors lurking in decaying mansions and the unsettling truths that emerge as the façade of the luster quietly dims. The sheen of stardom is softly eclipsed by misogyny.
Aldrich, a director known for his unflinching exploration of power dynamics and moral ambiguity, leveraged the fraught histories of his leading ladies to craft narratives steeped in psychological torment, societal decay, and the haunting weight of the past.
These films also laid bare Hollywood’s vicious cycle of discarding and marginalizing its once-revered stars, reducing them to monstrous caricatures under the demoralizing “Hag Cinema” label- a cruel irony for women who had once been heralded as paragons of talent and glamour. Davis, Crawford, and de Havilland, whose careers were built on Oscar-winning artistry and box-office dominance, found themselves exiled by an industry that deemed them obsolete past 40. Imagine that—forty, and suddenly you’re tossed on the Hollywood scrap heap, as if a star’s brilliance evaporates, as if time alone can erase allure.
It’s a telling reflection of our culture that once women reach forty, their capacity for sex appeal is so often dismissed, as if that allure and desirability are the exclusive property of youth. This notion not only disregards the depth and complexity that come with age, but also perpetuates the myth that a woman’s value is tethered solely to her appearance—an idea both reductive and profoundly unfair. I’ll be delving into these very questions in my forthcoming special, Deconstructing the Myth of Hag Cinema, where I’ll examine the cultural narratives, industry biases, and enduring complexities that have shaped this provocative subgenre, not to mention not to mention the glaring hypocrisy that allows male stars to age into gravitas and continued desirability, Meanwhile, aging male stars had continued to secure roles that keep them firmly in the narrative driver’s seat, their box office appeal undiminished—and all without ever being saddled with a reductive label. If fairness prevailed, perhaps we’d be talking about “Sagging Ball Cinema,” but curiously, no such moniker exists for their encore act on screen. I’ll have a section referring to these ‘masculine’ Hollywood heroes using this delicious reversal – a bit of poetic justice to coin a new term.
The term “hag,” wielded as a dismissive shorthand for their late-career roles, underscored the systemic misogyny of a studio machine that prized youth over legacy, reducing complex women to campy spectacles.
Yet Aldrich’s films, for all their Gothic excess, refused to let these actresses fade quietly. Instead, they weaponized that marginalization, transforming it into a searing indictment of Hollywood’s cruelty. In Baby Jane? and Charlotte, the horror isn’t just in the decaying mansions or psychological torment- it’s in the spectacle of greatness scorned, of icons forced to gnaw at the scraps of their own pasts. These films, in their audacious bleakness, became a perverse tribute to resilience, proving that even in exile, these women could still command the screen, their talent burning through the demeaning labels like acid.
Both What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? and Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte owes much of their psychological complexity and Gothic atmosphere to the powerful collaboration between screenwriter Lukas Heller and novelist Henry Farrell. For Baby Jane?, Robert Aldrich commissioned Heller to adapt Farrell’s 1960 novel, trusting Heller’s sharp sense for character and suspense to translate the book’s twisted sibling rivalry and decaying Hollywood glamour to the screen.
Heller’s screenplay was praised for its ability to balance horror, dark humor, and pathos, giving Bette Davis and Joan Crawford material rich enough to fuel their legendary performances and seemed to stoke their off-screen rivalry.
When Aldrich set out to capture lightning in a bottle with Baby Jane? with Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte, he once again turned to Heller and Farrell. This time, the screenplay was adapted from Farrell’s own unpublished short story “What Ever Happened to Cousin Charlotte?”
Heller initially wrote the adaptation, but Farrell himself later contributed to the script, ensuring that the Southern Gothic elements and labyrinthine betrayals remained true to his vision. The result was a screenplay that blended psychological horror with melodrama, allowing Davis, Crawford, Olivia de Havilland, Mary Astor and the rest of the cast to inhabit characters haunted by secrets.
Lukas Heller, a German-born screenwriter whose credits include other Adlrich films like The Dirty Dozen 1967 and Flight of the Phoenix 1965, was known for his ability to craft tense, character-driven narratives.
His partnership with Aldrich produced some of the most memorable psychological thrillers of the 1960s. Henry Farrell, meanwhile, specialized in stories of twisted domesticity and repressed violence, his work forming the backbone of both films’ enduring appeal. Together, Heller and Farrell’s scripts provided Aldrich with a foundation for his explorations of aging, madness, and the grotesque, and their work remains central to the films’ lasting critical and cultural impact.
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962)
The film opens with the glittering artifice of 1917 vaudeville, where “Baby” Jane Hudson, a child star performed by Julie Allred, basks in adoration, her doll-like persona masking a toxic narcissism. By the 1930s, Jane’s career has crumbled, eclipsed by her sister Blanche (Joan Crawford), who transitions from onstage understudy to a luminous film star. A car accident leaves Blanche paralyzed, and the sisters retreat into a dilapidated Hollywood mansion, their lives frozen in mutual resentment. Jane (Bette Davis), now a bloated, alcoholic relic, clings to delusions of revival, while Blanche, confined to a wheelchair, schemes to sell the house and commit Jane to an institution.
Aldrich’s direction thrives on claustrophobia. Ernest Haller’s black-and-white cinematography traps the sisters in a labyrinth of shadows, their mansion’s crumbling interiors reflecting their fractured psyches. Key scenes- Jane serving Blanche a dead pet bird under a silver cloche, or her grotesque attempt to revive her Baby Jane persona in a Malibu beachside performance- are studies in escalating madness. Davis’s Jane, caked in garish makeup, oscillates between infantile whimsy and venomous rage, while Crawford’s Blanche, all restrained calculation, becomes a prisoner of her own body. The film’s infamous twist- Blanche confessing she caused her own accident to frame Jane- culminates in a bleak reconciliation on the beach, where Jane’s final dance under police arrest underscores the tragedy of lives devoured by fame’s aftermath.
Critics initially dismissed Baby Jane? as lurid melodrama, but its $9 million box office (against an $800,000 budget) signaled a cultural shift. The New York Times called it “a horror film with a sense of humor,” while Pauline Kael noted Davis’s performance as “a masterpiece of camp malevolence.” The film’s legacy lies in its unflinching portrait of aging, its critique of Hollywood’s disposability of women, and its revival of Davis and Crawford as icons of resilience. Aldrich’s decision to cast the famously feuding actresses, their off-screen tensions bleeding into scenes of mutual loathing, added a meta-layer of cruelty, turning the film into a spectacle of performing the slow extinguishing of light.
Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte (1964)
Conceived as a reunion for Davis and Crawford, Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte instead became a vehicle for Davis and Olivia de Havilland after Crawford’s departure (officially due to illness, though rumors of on-set clashes with Davis persist). The film opens in 1927 Louisiana, where Charlotte Hollis (Davis), a naive Southern belle, witnesses the brutal murder of her married lover, John Mayhew (Bruce Dern), by an unseen assailant. Decades later, Charlotte, now a reclusive eccentric, battles the state’s attempt to seize her ancestral home for a highway. Her cousin Miriam (de Havilland) and Dr. Drew Bayliss (Joseph Cotten) arrive, ostensibly to aid her, but their plot to gaslight Charlotte into surrendering her inheritance unveils a web of betrayal.
Aldrich’s Southern Gothic is suffused with decay. Joseph Biroc’s Oscar-nominated cinematography drapes the Hollis mansion in mossy shadows, while Frank De Vol’s haunting score, centered on the titular ballad, echoes Charlotte’s fractured mind. The film’s most chilling sequences- a disembodied hand and head appearing in Charlotte’s bedroom, or Miriam’s murder of the loyal housekeeper Velma (Agnes Moorehead)-blend psychological horror with Grand Guignol excess. The climax, where Charlotte pushes a stone urn onto Miriam and Drew, is a cathartic release of decades of manipulation, though her final moments, cradling a confession from Mayhew’s widow, leave her salvation ambiguous.
Cecil Kellaway and Mary Astor, both seasoned and beloved Hollywood veterans, play pivotal supporting roles in Hush…Hush, Sweet Charlotte, bringing gravitas and subtlety to the film’s Southern Gothic tapestry. Kellaway appears as Harry Willis, the genial yet sharp-witted Lloyds of London insurance investigator from England who arrives in Louisiana still fascinated by the decades-old murder of John Mayhew. With his characteristic warmth and “old guy charm,” Kellaway’s Willis is a gentle outsider, quietly piecing together the truth as the drama within the Hollis mansion spirals toward madness and violence. He is not directly involved in the machinations against Charlotte, but instead serves as a moral anchor and a catalyst for the film’s resolution. Willis’s investigation and his interactions with other characters, especially his poignant scene with Mary Astor’s Jewel Mayhew, help tie up the narrative’s loose ends and ultimately deliver Charlotte a measure of closure.
Mary Astor, in her final film role, appears as Jewel Mayhew, the widow of Charlotte’s murdered lover, John. Though her screen time is limited, Astor’s presence is haunting and essential. She plays Jewel as a woman worn down by years of sorrow and secrets, her performance understated yet deeply affecting. In a key scene, Jewel entrusts Willis with an envelope containing her posthumous confession—a revelation that she, not Charlotte, killed her husband John. This act, delivered with Astor’s quiet dignity, is crucial to the film’s denouement. It not only exonerates Charlotte but also brings the story full circle, allowing us to see the emotional toll of the crime on all involved. Astor’s scenes, particularly her exchanges with Kellaway and de Havilland, are marked by a restrained melancholy that contrasts with the film’s more operatic moments, and critics have noted how she “makes every moment count,” lending Jewel a tragic grace that lingers long after her departure from the story.
Together, Kellaway and Astor embody the film’s themes of compassion, justice, regret, and the corrosive power of secrets. Their performances, though supporting, are essential to the film’s emotional and narrative resolution, and both actors are remembered for bringing a touch of classic Hollywood humanity to Aldrich’s brooding Southern nightmare.
Critics praised the film’s operatic grandeur, with Variety calling it “a superior shocker,” though some found its 133-minute runtime excessive. Davis’s performance, oscillating between vulnerability and ferocity, earned her a Golden Globe nomination, while Moorehead’s turn as the sardonic Velma became a camp touchstone. The film’s seven Oscar nominations, including Best Supporting Actress for Moorehead, underscored its technical mastery, though it won none. Where Baby Jane? thrived on intimate malice, Charlotte expanded into epic tragedy, its themes of patriarchal control (embodied by Charlotte’s incestuously possessive father – Victor Buono) and female solidarity subverted by greed.
Legacy and Cultural Impact:
Both films emerged from Aldrich’s fascination with societal marginalization. Baby Jane? and Charlotte interrogate the cultural erasure of aging women, their mansions metaphors for bodies and minds left to rot. Aldrich’s collaboration with screenwriter Lukas Heller sharpened these themes, blending noir cynicism with Gothic excess. The films also revived the careers of their stars: Davis, Crawford, and de Havilland, once box-office queens, embraced roles that weaponized their fading glamour, cementing their status as icons of resilience.
Cinematographically, the films diverged. Baby Jane’s stark, claustrophobic interiors mirrored its psychological confinement, while Charlotte’s lush Southern decay evoked a dying aristocracy. Both, however, used light and shadow to externalize inner turmoil- Jane’s garish makeup under harsh key lights, Charlotte’s ghostly pallor in moonlit halls.
Critics like David Thomson have since reappraised these films as feminist texts, their horrors rooted in systemic misogyny. The “Hag Cinema” label, once derisive, now signifies a subgenre reclaiming the power of women discarded by Hollywood. Aldrich’s willingness to center complex, unlikable female protagonists-and to amplify their rage-remains revolutionary.
In the decades since, both films have influenced works from Whatever Happened to Aunt Alice? (1969) to Ryan Murphy’s Feud (2017), which, accurate or not, dramatized or sensationalized the Davis-Crawford rivalry. Their endurance lies in their audacity: to stare unflinchingly at the wreckage of fame, to find horror not in monsters but in the human capacity for cruelty, and to showcase aging women, once Hollywood’s forgotten, reign supreme in all their grotesque grandeur or radiant as ever, empowered by agency and courage.
