Baby Jane Hudson

Baby Jane Hudson is a fictional character, the villain of Henry Farrell's 1960 novel What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? She was portrayed by Bette Davis in the 1962 film adaptation and by Lynn Redgrave in the 1991 made for TV remake.

"Baby" Jane Hudson was a child star in vaudeville in 1917. A spoiled, narcissistic brat, she regularly bullied and abused her older, more talented sister, Blanche.

Years later, however, Blanche became a huge star, while the untalented, alcoholic Jane languished in grade-Z shlock, only receiving attention from the tabloids for her drunken party antics. While the two sisters lived together in the house their father had left to them, their relationship was antagonistic and bitter, with Blanche taking the brunt of Jane's mockery and temper tantrums, often in public. Blanche nevertheless tried to be a good sister and negotiated roles for Jane in her movies, which only made Jane angrier and more abusive.

One night, after returning from a party in which Jane had publicly humiliated her, Blanche was paralyzed from the waist down in an accident involving Jane's car. When the police arrived, Blanche was in a coma, while Jane had disappeared, to be found days later, drunk in a nearby hotel. While it was officially ruled an accident, the unspoken assumption among the public was that Jane had tried to kill her sister. Blanche quit acting and went into seclusion, effectively ending Jane's career as well.

By 1959, Blanche and Jane still lived together, with Jane waiting on her invalid sister hand and foot. Still hating and resenting Blanche, Jane by then had degenerated into a drunken wreck, forgotten by the public and completely out of touch with reality. Blanche, meanwhile, was still a beloved star, but lived in fear of Jane, who would torture and abuse her; among other punishments, Jane would kill her pets and serve them to her as dinner. Jane would also embezzle Blanche's money, cashing forged checks at the bank and using the money to buy more liquor. Blanche was nevertheless completely dependent upon Jane, and powerless to escape. She knew that her sister was a psychopath, but a grudging pity and familial obligation prevented her from calling the police or checking her into a mental institution.

Blanche, isolated and weary of putting up with her sister, decided to sell the house and move in hopes that their relationship would improve. Jane, however, merely became angry at the suggestion, and retaliated by killing her pet parakeet. Blanche's cleaning woman, Elvira Stitt, found Jane's nearly incoherent letters threatening her sister with grisly violence, and tried to persuade Blanche to send her to a hospital. Jane overheard the conversation, however, and became convinced Blanche was out to destroy her. She then fired Stitt, Blanche's only ally, and intensified the cruelty and abuse she visited upon Blanche.

Fearing she would die completely forgotten, Jane decided to revive her childhood act. She had replicas made of her vaudeville costumes and placed an ad in the paper for a musical accompanist. The ad attracted Edwin Flagg, a gigolo who made his living romancing and then swindling old women, who praised her talent as superior to Blanche's. Jane was convinced she would once again be a star.

Upon returning home, she found Blanche out of her wheelchair, crawling down the stairs to reach the phone. Enraged, Jane tied her up, helpless, in a closet, and left her there while she went out with Flagg. When the two returned, however, Flagg saw Blanche, tied up and barely breathing, and fled in horror. Panicked, Jane killed Flagg and drove around aimlessly with her seriously ill sister in tow. By now completely broken off from reality and devolved into her "Baby Jane" vaudeville persona, Jane lay Blanche on the beach and went to get them ice cream. Dying, Blanche confessed to Jane that the accident that paralyzed her had been her own fault because Blanche had tried to kill Jane. (Jane had been too drunk to remember what had happened.) Understanding and empathizing with Blanche for the first time, Jane said, "You mean, all this time, we could have been friends?" Blanche died, and, as a crowd gathered, Jane went into her act for them for the last time.