AS SEEN ON TV: JOAN CRAWFORD

Since HBO is about to premiere a new version of "Mildred Pierce" starring Kate Winslet, I thought we'd celebrate the birth of the woman who first played the role. She would have been 106 today.....

JOAN CRAWFORD

AS SEEN ON:
'Saturday Night Live'

AS PLAYED BY:
Jane Curtin

TV DIMENSION:
Skitlandia

From Wikipedia:
Joan Crawford (March 23, 1905 – May 10, 1977), born Lucille Fay LeSueur, was an American actress in film, television and theatre.

Starting as a dancer in traveling theatrical companies before debuting on Broadway, Crawford was signed to a motion picture contract by Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer in 1925. Initially frustrated by the size and quality of her parts, Crawford began a campaign of self-publicity and became nationally known as a flapper by the end of the 1920s. In the 1930s, Crawford's fame rivaled MGM colleagues Norma Shearer and Greta Garbo.

Crawford often played hardworking young women who find romance and financial success. These "rags-to-riches" stories were well-received by Depression-era audiences and were popular with women. Crawford became one of Hollywood's most prominent movie stars and one of the highest paid women in the United States, but her films began losing money and by the end of the 1930s she was labeled "box office poison".

After an absence of nearly two years from the screen, Crawford staged a comeback by starring in Mildred Pierce (1945), for which she won the Academy Award for Best Actress.

Joan Crawford
Spokeswoman for the Face Bank

The new version of "Mildred Pierce" will join Earth Prime-Time as a five-part mini-series beginning on HBO March 27th at 9 PM Eastern Daylight Time......

BCnU!