Falling in love again ...

Press, 16 April 1988, Page 18

Falling in love again ...

Many thought Bette Davieswould never survive her daughter’s critical book “My Mother’s Keeper.” Published in 1983, she was portrayed as a monstdr and as evil as any of the parts she played so well on the screen. But; the old war horse fought back and in her own biography she included an iopen letter to her daughter giving mother’s side of the story.

The root of her strained relationship; with her daughter seems to have sprung from the curious attitudes of her English son-in-law, I Jeremy Hyman. For instance, when her daughter, B. D. Hyman, had her first baby in 1969, her son-in-law made it clear that grandma was not wanted at the hospital.

"On another occasion, when I had dinner at their home; I praised B. D. for the delightful meal,” recalled the actress. "The'[next day she asked me never to compliment her again in front of! her husband — it offended him. “I could never figure

out why this should be so. Perhaps it is fear or jealousy that makes a son-in-law feel threatened if his wife and her mother have a close relationship. 11 managed to recover after my stroke —- but I will never recover from B. D.’s book.

Her son, Michael, has remained loyal ■to her. There is also | another daughter, Margot. Tragically, she is brain damaged and now I in her thirties. . I . ' "If I had not had such high morals when I was younger I woiild have avoided my disastrous four marriages. If my parents had brought, me up differently I j probably would have had affairs with the men I married and maybe would never have married ( any of them. Nowadays I thoroughly approve of living with a man you love before marriage.

"Most women ; have a special sexual [ fantasy. Mine was to make love on a bed covered with gardenias. Once I was (involved with a man famous in the music world. We were

I both married, not very happily. At the height of o'ur romance, he reserved a] suite at the Waldorf /jstoria in New York. To my delight and amazement, the bed (was covered in gardenias., “I have always wondered what the maids thought when they Cleared the room the next day and found a waste Basket filled with crushed and wilted gardenias. To this day, whenever I see a gardenia I think of him.” | Twenty years ago, she fell in love with a very puch younger man. Bette says she could never have married him —' he was too young. But she. enjoyed his company. It was a tactless shopkeeper; who lended the relationship. [The woman was thrilled [when the Hollywood star visited her antique shop with her young lover. “Would you and (your son like a drink?” she asked. “lit was one of the most embarrassing momerits in my whole life,” declared Bette Davis. ( ’((

—Copyright DUO.