105 Quotes by Bette Davis
Bette Davis, a legendary actress of the silver screen, captivated audiences with her remarkable talent, versatility, and commanding presence. Known for her intense performances, Davis became one of the most celebrated and respected actresses in Hollywood during the Golden Age of cinema. With her distinctive voice, piercing gaze, and ability to portray complex, multi-dimensional characters, she breathed life into numerous iconic roles.
Davis was known for her strong-willed and often unconventional characters, defying the traditional expectations of women on screen and challenging societal norms. Her range as an actress was showcased in a variety of genres, from melodramas like "Jezebel" and "All About Eve" to psychological thrillers like "Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?" Davis's talent and dedication to her craft earned her critical acclaim, numerous awards, and a lasting legacy as one of the greatest actresses in film history. Bette Davis's indomitable spirit, fearlessness, and commitment to pushing boundaries continue to inspire generations of actors and cement her status as an enduring icon of the silver screen.
Bette Davis Quotes
It's better to be hated for who you are, than to be loved for someone you're not. It's a sign of your worth sometimes, if you're hated by the right people. (Meaning)
You should never say bad things about the dead, you should only say good . . . Joan Crawford is dead. Good.
There comes a time in every woman's life when the only thing that helps is a glass of champagne.
Getting old is not for sissies.
Some young Hollywood starlets remind me of my grandmother's old farmhouse -- all painted up nice on the front side, a big swing on the backside, and nothing whatsoever in the attic.
You will never be happier than you expect. To change your happiness, change your expectation.
If everyone likes you, you're not doing it right.
If you've never been hated by your child, you've never been a parent.
A sure way to lose happiness, I found, is to want it at the expense of everything else.
My passions were all gathered together like fingers that made a fist. Drive is considered aggression today; I knew it then as purpose.
The key to life is accepting challenges. Once someone stops doing this, he's dead.
I'd marry again if I found a man who had fifteen million dollars, would sign over half to me, and guarantee that he'd be dead within a year.
I was thought to be 'stuck up.' I wasn't. I was just sure of myself. This is and always has been an unforgivable quality to the unsure.
There may be a heaven, but if Joan Crawford is there, I'm not going.
It's true we don't know what we've got until its gone, but we don't know what we've been missing until it arrives. Pleasure of love lasts but a moment, Pain of love lasts a lifetime.
Being called very, very difficult is the beginning of success. Until you're called very, very difficult you're really nobody at all.
I want to die with my high heels on, still in action.
Pleasure of love lasts but a moment, Pain of love lasts a lifetime.
I believe the world is a jungle, and if it's not a bit of a jungle in the home, a child cannot possibly be fit to enter the outside world.
Life is the past, the present and the perhaps.
I am a woman meant for a man, but I never found a man who could compete.
If everybody likes you, you're pretty dull.
One begins to realize that one is getting old when the birthday candles weigh more than the cake.
Old age is no place for sissies.
Don't you hate people who drink white wine? I mean, my dear, every alcoholic in town is getting falling-down drunk on white wine. They think they aren't drunks because they only drink wine. Never, never trust anyone who asks for white wine. It means they're phonies.
Good actors I've worked with all started out making faces in a mirror, and you keep making faces all your life.
Attempt the impossible in order to improve your work.
The male ego with few exceptions is elephantine to start with.
You know what I'm going to have on my gravestone? 'She did it the hard way.'
One can make more enemies as a female with a brain, I think.
May each of my grandsons know, at an early age, what his life's ambition is -- and may he be successful in his pursuit of that goal.
Never, never trust anyone who asks for white wine. It means they're phonies.
Once the love bug wears off, as it inevitably does, you are shocked to discover that you really didn't know the object of your affections at all. We know this to be so, even as we repeat the same mistake over and over and over.
It's a rare man who can stand being around an intelligent woman, let alone married to her.
I'm the nicest goddamn dame that ever lived.
You know what nostalgia is, don't you? It's basically a matter of recalling the fun without reliving the pain.
It has been my experience that one cannot, in any shape or form, depend on human relations for lasting reward. It is only work that truly satisfies.
There was more good acting at Hollywood parties than ever appeared on the screen.
To fulfill a dream, to be allowed to sweat over lonely labor, to be given a chance to create, is the meat and potatoes of life. The money is the gravy.
People often become actresses because of something they dislike about themselves: They pretend they are someone else.
Acting should be bigger than life. Scripts should be bigger than life. It should all be bigger than life.
The secret of marriage is: separate bedrooms and separate bathrooms.
There are new words now that excuse everybody. Give me the good old days of heroes and villains, the people you can bravo or hiss. There was a truth to them that all the slick credulity of today cannot touch.
Success is built on disappointment, and disappointment is inherent in all success.
The out-of-work actor wears out more than shoe leather. The very sensibilities that make him an artist are shattered by the disregard he is shown as a human being.
Your luck is how you treat people.
Discipline is a symbol of caring to a child. He needs guidance. If there is love, there is no such thing as being too tough with a child. A parent must also not be afraid to hang himself. If you have never been hated by your child, you have never been a parent.
Men become much more attractive when they start looking older. But it doesn't do much for women, though we do have an advantage: make-up.
Oh, don't let's ask for the moon. We've already got the stars.
You mustn't miss the moment. There's only one first sailing into Rio harbor.
It's a very independent male creature that lives alone, and a lot of independent females who live alone. It's all very sad but it's much easier for both sexes to do it this way nowadays.
The act of sex, gratifying as it may be, is God's joke on humanity. It is man's last desperate stand at superintendency.
Home is where you go to when you've nowhere to go.
One can be respected with the truth in Hollywood just as much as anywhere else you know or else I wouldn't have had a career.
Fasten your seat belts, it's going to be a bumpy night! - As Margo Channing in All About Eve
If everybody likes you, you are not a very interesting person.
Without discipline and detachment, an actor is an emotional slob, spilling his insides out. This abandonment is having an unfortunate vogue. It is tasteless, formless, absurd. Without containment there is no art. All this vomiting and wheezing and bursting at the seams is no more great acting than the convulsions of raving maniacs.
An affair now and then is good for a marriage. It adds spice, stops it from getting boring. I ought to know.
Among the reasons marriages fail, sex ranks no higher than fourth, behind money, having only one bathroom, and an inability to communicate, reasons one, two and three.
In this business, until you're known as a monster you're not a star.
If Hollywood didn't work out, I was prepared to be the best secretary in the world.
If you want a thing done well, get a couple of old broads to do it.
Locations are all tough, all miserable. I never left the sound stage for 18 years at Warners. We never went outside the studio, not even for big scenes.
Everybody has a heart. Except some people.
Yes, burn your bridges.
The world's all full of thoughts about wars and space, and tragedies to the world. That's what writers are thinking about because that's what the world is thinking about.
We movie stars all end up by ourselves. Who knows? Maybe we want to.
The only way you can become a legend is in your coffin
Hollywood always wanted me to be pretty, but I fought for realism.
Sex is God's joke on human beings.
She did it the hard way.
Without wonder and insight, acting is just a trade. With it, it becomes creation.
I've been lucky. I'll be lucky again.
I've always liked men better than women.
I've lost my faith in science.
There is a certain ecstasy in wanting things you can't get.
She's the original good time who was had by all.
Success only breeds a new goal
Almost as many inhumanities are committed in the name of love as in the name of religion.
With the newspaper strike on, I wouldn't consider dying.
Strong women only marry weak men.
Pray to God and say the lines.
Temperament is something that is an integral part of the artist. Not temper, temperament. There is a vast difference.
You can lose everything but you can't lose your talent!
Evil people you never forget them. And that's the aim of any actress-never to be forgotten.
If men found out how to give birth to children they'll never propose again.
Today everyone is a star - they're all billed as 'starring' or 'also starring'. In my day, we earned that recognition.
Brought up to respect the conventions, love had to end in marriage. I'm afraid it did.
You've got to know someone pretty well to hate them.
Technicolor makes me look like death warmed over.
The real female should be partly male and the real male should be partly female anyway.
The only reason anyone goes to Broadway is because they can't get work in the movies.
Women are the essential part of the theater but the writers are not writing about women. I think they're too perplexed about the whole female situation probably.
As a female I think it's a terrible hindrance in business. I think it's a terrible hindrance for any female to have a lot of intelligence in private life, but I think in business sometimes it's even worse because there's deep resentment.
I wanted to be the first to win three Oscars, but Miss Hepburn has done it. Actually it hasn't been done. Miss Hepburn only won half an Oscar. If they'd given me half an Oscar I would have thrown it back in their faces. You see, I'm an Aries. I never lose.
Dramatic art in her opinion is knowing how to fill a sweater.
Psychoanalysis. Almost went three times - almost. Then I decided what was peculiar about me was probably what made me successful. I've seen some very talented actors go into analysis and really lose it.
In this rat-race everybody's guilty till proved innocent!
It is my last wish to be burried sitting up.
I think business women are better women at home, if you want to know the truth because you do understand what goes into a day's work out in the world, a very nerve-racking affair.
Wave after wave of love flooded the stage and washed over me, the beginning of the one great durable romance of my life.
There's only one way to work - like hell.
The real actor - like any real artist- has a direct line to the collective heart.
To look back is to relax one's vigil.
Joan Crawford is a movie star. I am an actress.
Old age ain't for sissies.
― Bette Davis Quotes
Chief Editor
Tal Gur is an author, founder, and impact-driven entrepreneur at heart. After trading his daily grind for a life of his own daring design, he spent a decade pursuing 100 major life goals around the globe. His journey and most recent book, The Art of Fully Living, has led him to found Elevate Society.
