Q 01/05

Bette Davis was born in 1908 in which Massachusetts city?

A) Boston

B) Lowell

C) Worcester

D) Salem

Answer · why

B) Lowell

Her father Harlow was a law student who became a patent attorney; her younger sister was Barbara, known as Bobby.

Q 02/05

Davis changed the spelling of her name from Betty to Bette after a character by which novelist?

A) Charles Dickens

B) Gustave Flaubert

C) Honoré de Balzac

D) Jane Austen

Answer · why

C) Honoré de Balzac

The character was Bette Fischer of La Cousine Bette.

Q 03/05

Which studio gave Davis her film debut in Bad Sister (1931), before nearly dropping her?

A) Warner Bros.

B) Universal

C) RKO

D) MGM

Answer · why

B) Universal

Studio boss Carl Laemmle wanted her out, but cinematographer Karl Freund said she had 'lovely eyes'.

Q 04/05

Bette Davis signed a seven-year Warner Bros. contract in 1932. How long did she actually stay?

A) 7 years

B) 18 years

C) 10 years

D) 25 years

Answer · why

B) 18 years

George Arliss had picked her for the female lead in The Man Who Played God.

Q 05/05

Davis broke through as waitress Mildred Rogers in a 1934 adaptation of which Maugham novel?

A) The Razor's Edge

B) The Painted Veil

C) Of Human Bondage

D) The Moon and Sixpence

Answer · why

C) Of Human Bondage

She insisted on looking convincingly ravaged in her death scene: 'the last stages of consumption, poverty, and neglect are not pretty'.