Joan Crawford (Jessica Lange) and Bette Davis (Susan Sarandon)...A quest to remain relevant in an era that has refused to 'acknowledge' old women in Hollywood.The pain behind the fame as well as the battles fought to remain relevant. How Crawford schemed to collect the Oscar statue for another actress even though she herself wasn't nominated for the Oscars.How she (Crawford) refused to take care of her dental health because of the film industry. Also, how she deliberately put filming on hold because she wanted to feel important - an act she ended up parting with her hard earned $100 000.Feud reminds us of pain and indeed as the saying goes: "never meet your heroes".Ryan Murphy did a great job. However, I'm not happy that we won't get to see the Prince Charles and Princess Diana divorce on screen.Fingers crossed...

This is so perfect and wonderful to watch. It's captivating and opens up lots of discussions and insights to the world of film/tv production and Hollywood in general. Fantastic all around.

Ryan Murphy's latest creation takes on a classic Hollywood rivalry between to stars of the silver screen. Joan Crawford (Jessica Lange) and Bette Davis (Susan Sarandon) are cast alongside each other in the film Whatever Happened to Baby Jane directed by Robert Aldrich (Alfred Molina). As stars struggling to stay relevant in a male-dominated world, they make their demands and create a tense environment on set. Gossip columnist Hedda Hopper (Judy Davis) strives to find out all the juicy details of their conflict as she stokes the controversy and spreads the rumors. The ruthless and crude producer Jack Warner (Stanley Tucci) loathes the stars and treats them with utter contempt and total disrespect.The scheming continues throughout the production as both stars vie for the spotlight at the expense of the other, spreading increasingly vicious lies about each other. Witnessing this fight is Joan's servant Mamacita (Jackie Hoffman) who is cleverer than her position shows. She puts up with Joan's histrionics throughout must of the show but even she has her limits. As the film wraps, the women find it hard to field other offers as prestigious even though the film becomes a massive success at the box office. Davis is nominated for her role but Crawford schemes to have her revenge.Check out more of this review and others at swilliky.com

What a nice surprise this mini-series was to watch. Susan Sarandon as Bette Davis, and Jessica Lange as Joan Crawford were just incredible performances. Mrs. Shullivan and I truly believed as the film rolled to and from a series of historical black and white silver screen images and then back to color images that we were witnessing the many personal exchanges between these two famous actresses.There is also a long list of terrific supporting performances such as Alfred Molina as the two Hollywood stars' director Bob Aldrich who in 1962 filmed "What Ever Happened To Baby Jane?" and Aldrich's difficult relationship with the relentless studio boss Jack Warner (Warner Brothers Pictures) also played to perfection by Stanley Tucci. Oh, but we cannot forget the superb performance by Ms. Crawford's able assistant/confidant/housekeeper "Mamacita" played to absolute perfection by actress Jackie Hoffman. The relationship between Mamacita and Joan Crawford was more than endearing, it was more reflective of two sisters who were so close knit that nothing could keep them apart, not even Joan Crawford's habitual drinking nor her sometimes explosive temper. Their relationship was not one of a Hollywood film star and her housekeeper but it was exposed in this mini series as one in which one sister (Joan Crawford) was allowed to behave as a spoiled little brat until such time that her mother-like sister Mamacita would pull in those reigns with just a few sharp words and Joan would once again calm down and begin to behave...well Joan would at least behave until the next time she was in front of the camera with Bette Davis.Other great performances were achieved by the beautiful Catherine Zeta-Jones as Bette Davis's friend who was also an established actress in her own right Olivia de Havilland, Dominic Burgess as the plump but young up and coming homosexual stage actor Victor Buono, Kathy Bates as Joan Blondell and another perfect casting of Hedda Hopper played by Judy Davis.This mini-series is very deserving of a number of Emmy's for so many of the film stars as well as for categories such as for the magnificent period style costume design, set design (we loved seeing all that plastic covering Joan's living room furniture...even her pillows!) the excellent screen writing, and even for the episode(s) brilliant opening musical score which was a high grade animation credit role depicting some of the scenes from their only film together What Ever Happened To Baby Jane? The opening credit animation musical score was such a powerful opening credit score that we felt that we were watching an Academy Award best film and not just another TV mini-series.Mrs Shullivan and I truly enjoyed each and every episode which provided valuable insight into what initially may have caused the highly documented FEUD (thus the movie title) between these two A rated Hollywood actresses whose careers were winding down before they agreed in 1962 to co- star in the film classic What Ever Happened To Baby Jane?Both Joan Crawford and Bette Davis displayed those unacceptable and ugly characteristics of a Diva, a spoiled actress who was prepared to damage their own picture(s) to get what they individually wanted, to "one- up" each other at any cost. Pity they did not realize early enough that they were being played by both movie mogul Jack Warner and by their own Director Bob Aldrich. This is a story that was well worth telling, and even a better story due to so many outstanding performances not only by Susan Sarandon, Jessica Lange, Stanley Tucci, Alfred Molina, Catherine Zeta-Jones, and my favorite Mamacita played by Jackie Hoffman, but this mini-series was so well done because of the entire cast and because of a well written script whose interest never waned as the characters were all brought to life in period costumes and period set designs with the utmost sincerity and with great dialogue.We loved every last minute of FEUD. A perfect 10 out of 10 score!