Why did so many female actress from the 1940-50's have so many mental problems? Viven Leigh or Judy Garland all seemed to have nervous breakdowns or were manic depressive or etc. Why was this very common for female actresses in this time period?
Or is it just common for all actors? But we don't hear about it today because we have the right institutions and resources to take care of this sort of thing?
You think they don't now or? Actress is a known mentally ill whore profession, acting as a profession started as being a literal traveling whore, which is why it was practiced by gays and women.
all actors
It's sad when you see the interviews after the actresses careers are over. They just seem void of life as they smoke their cigarettes and converse with whoever is conducting the interview. Just really joyless.
The articles I read about them on wikipedia makes them sound like they were entitled children on movie sets, but that might have just been the way it was written by the people of the era. These women might have had real reasons to be like that, but the journalists wrote it off as "women being women". I don't know, there are two sides toe verything.
>But we don't hear about it today because we have the right institutions and resources to take care of this sort of thing?
Definitely this. They get medicated and don't fall apart.
There's something about these women who were valued so highly for their beauty losing it, and then losing everything that came with it, that makes it so sad. It's just aging in general. If they can fall so far so can you, in time.
The movies of that time were complete fantasy, and 9 times out of 10 reading about what happened to these women after is a brutal dose of reality.
the patriarchy was stronger and made them sick
Drugs and alcohol to cope with being abused (sexually / non-sexually) on the reg
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>Why did so many female actress from the 1940-50's have so many mental problems?
As if they don't today?
It's a brutal, soul-crushing industry they're in, and success is no balm for the hurts it inflicts, because it's so fleeting and only brings new stresses.
>Why did so many female actress from the 1940-50's have so many mental problems?
You listed two.
I'm not sure, but the business was pretty different back then.
I think it must have been exposure to all that toxic masculinity I keep hearing about
>>It's a brutal, soul-crushing industry they're in
Haha yeah must be the worst thing in the world to get enough money to buy a literal country for playing pretend.
18+
If you look into their bios almost all of them were either abused as children or teenagers (Rita Hayworth, Monroe) or beaten by their husbands/boyfriends (Ava Gardner, Elizabeth Taylor, Lana Turner). Not to mention how they were basically pimped out and had to play by studio rules/the press.
lots of actresses didn't even get paid that much in that era, and no amount of money in the world can undue what they had to do to get there if they ever did
It's a tough industry, especially as a young woman I would imagine
Watch pic related and Valley of the Dolls
It's easier to name a famous actress from that era that didn't have at least a drinking problem than to name any that didn't. On top of all their other problems, not that being an actress was so much worse (in terms of sexual abuse, terrible husbands, job politics, not to even get into how much worse it was if you were a lesbian, a non-white lady and/or born into poverty).
Ask Olivia de Havilland. She's still alive. I think she's 100 now.
This is off the top of my head:
Monroe: was put into foster care, abused, casting couch, drugs and alcohol, ripped apart by press, seen as a stupid bimbo
Hayworth: racism, abused by father, painful surgeries, crippling self esteem (this applies to most of them)
Audrey Hepburn: living through WWII, had to literally eat plants and roots outside to live, possible eating disorder, anxiety- and she was one of the most stable
Gene Tierney: baby was born deaf and mentally disabled from rubella and had to live in care for their whole life-caught it while pregnant from a fan who broke quaratine to see her, mental illness
Hedy Lamarr: had an abusive and powerful Nazi husband she had to literally flee Europe to escape
not even mentioning everyone who died young like Jean Harlowe
>Hedy Lamarr: had an abusive and powerful Nazi husband she had to literally flee Europe to escape
Haha yeah those horrible forced marriages. Oh wait.
yeah all controlling and abusive men are forced to give their girlfriends a little index card declaring them as such right after the proposal so they can go in with their eyes clear
believe it or not women were treated like hell back then, especially in hollywood where they were used like whores figuratively and literally.
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Why do so many actors have mental problems?
Maybe mental illness is high in general, but we only hear about it with actors because no one gives a fuck about plumbers or teachers
Because they were isolated from most of society and didn't have much control over their own lives. Also this
They were basically sex toys for their employers.
Because women who disagreed with men were diagnosed with mental disorders they didn't have.
Becauae Hollywood is a fucked up place. Not only the culture that we see, which is fame obsessed, but what goes one behind the curtain too. Read Hollywood Babylon, a book by director Kenneth Anger who was a child actor in the golden era of Hollywood. He knows what's up.
because they all got sexually exploited, but you're not allowed to say that since it was mostly jews doing it
Watch All About Eve and Sunset Blvd, and you will get a good idea. Things really haven't changed much since the days of old Hollywood.
A lot of creative people in general tend to have mental problems. Painting, acting, writing, singing, etc are the only ways they can get their mind off their problems aside from drugs. That's why all that stuff seems to go together.