What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? Weaponizing Palatability

Warning: HARK! There are spoilers here, traveler. Take the road less littered with thought.

The 1962 psychological horror film, What Ever Happened to Baby Jane (dir. John Aldrich), has not only some of Hollywood's golden best (Betty Davis, Joan Crawford, Maidie Norman, etc) and notorious rumors (I.e. Joan Crawford's campaign against Betty's Oscar nom, the filling of rocks in her pockets, the kicking, etc.) but a museum of some of the most beautiful, god damn eyes! The McDonald's arching eyebrows. The crescent underbellies of white, dangling under Davis's dark pupils. The beauty is almost as rampant as the milk-curdling cringefest of what it's like to be washed up on the shores, abandoned now and forever, by the promise of eternal love and devotion and their cruel, cycling tides; a promise, or a delusion, held commonly, in fact. Fame is not the only vessel that boils the kettling wants of others, buried deep in the nodes of always being desired, but actually, this is seen in "ordinary" unordinary existences all the time; able-bodied and neuro-conformists believe that they are frozen in their status of normalcy. Unable to see that their place in the status quo was never anything to build a life on, let alone entire moral existence, non-disabled peoples cling to this temporary favoritism as if they were entitled to it, all along. And not having the practice (or rather, falling "out" of practice, while still considering other marginalizing factors) of being aware of your unloved-ness by the world, there involves self-made, preserving use of self-imposed hierarchies, dealt and spelt within the fabric of an already marginalized group. Worsening the conditions of the group's most vulnerable, while only selfishly and only slightly improving the "top dog's" conditions; pennies considered when looking at the outsider's gain.

So what does it mean to enforce "palatability"? Well for starters, I think a great way to even explore what it even means to be "palatable" and its examples of weaponization is by witnessing the sinister sister dynamic between Baby Jane and Blanche. For context, Blanche has become physically disabled from a car accident, thus is forced to use a wheelchair and unfortunately live in an unaccessible home, unclearly purchased by either she or Mr. Hudson, their deceased and utterly cruel father. This also requires Jane to be the caretaker of Blanche's mobility needs like running errands, bringing meals into her studio/bedroom, located upstairs, and allowing guests, like her housekeeper, Elvira, into the house. Very quickly, the movie wants us to notice the ironic nature of who's-taking-care-of-whom, by showing us Jane's relationship with addiction, melancholia, trauma-infused paranoia (though truthfully, paranoia is insufficient way to describe Jane's thoughts, but rather both sisters act on somewhat correct hunches, intuitional kicks, and personal theories.) and very quickly want us to sympathize with Blanche, who they themselves choose to have their own over-arching narratives about Jane and persistently insist to Elvira that Jane is not dangerous to her or the outside world. Since the start of the film, the audience is aware of the "red flags" connected to Jane's jealousy, but to be honest with you, I think anyone could make a case for Blanche's questionable ignorance as somewhat sinister, whether she consciously de-valued the life of Elvira, a woman who was under-the-thumb and eventually demised by (in my opinion) both Jane and Blanche or in a psychically defensive way, chooses to look away, there is no denying that Blanche's somewhat quiet, passive attitude toward her capture, is something to look at.

In a lot of ways, I think the jealousy, rage, contempt, and unhappiness we watch the sisters fling at both each other (and toward themselves) is really a manifestation of their most true and human fear: What if the outside world sees how *unwell* I am and takes away the house? It's every disabled person's worst nightmare. And It would make sense that two 20th-century women, traumatized their entire childhood, would do anything to still hold onto their homeowner status, which would ensure a shelter for them and also make them "appear" as competent, stable-able-bodied people. And yet, instead of working together to find a care system, perhaps calling in more people like their neighbor for additional aid, unfortunately, the sisters, but mostly Blanche, pull up the dirt on the other in an attempt to individually escape the inventible. Hoping to appear as "the better one" will save her, sharpening her palatability.

But there is no "better one", is there? We learn that in the end. And surely Jane, a woman who is not at all ignorant to the ways of "masking" in neuro-conformist light, moonlighting herself as an acceptable and "sane" passing woman to the surveilling eyes of the bank, newsroom, and doctor, unfortunately, understands that innocence is deception, as a means of protection and control, and is how to make the money! The difference between Blanche and Jane, however, is that Blanche continues the bit, ending her *gasps* and shocks in ways of genuinely being surprised/concerned by Jane's behavior, while Jane, instead of using melodramatic, gothic cries and screams, chooses to use physical and comedic mockery. Examples of this would be when we see Jane use exaggerated and clown-like expressions when she's not only trying to appear as Blanche on their phone to the doctor but giggles at the absurd levels of Blanche's serious commitment to the gag - a trick, a performance. Begging for scraps of dignity from the same people who couldn't give a damn if disabled people like Blanche and Jane were alive.

Side Note: I just wanted to encourage the readers of this blog to look into Maidie Norman, Elvira's, contribution to theater, academia, and black history! She was someone who refused to play false depictions of black women and challenged a lot of white writers on their use of stereotypes and racist dialogue. She taught at UCLA and was fucking incredible.