When we asked four dozen Tinseltown women to name their favorite screen villainess, we didn't expect Cruella De Vil to emerge as the best-loved bad girl. Many of their other choices proved to be surprising, too.
1. Carrie Fisher (actress; When Harry Met Sally...; novelist, screenwriter, Postcards From the Edge) ''My favorite villainess is Barbara Stanwyck. She did tons of those roles but my favorite is The Strange Love of Martha Ivers. She was the perfect one to play a role like that because somehow you liked her. I mean, you always knew Joan Crawford was evil, and I always hated Joan Fontaine. But Stanwyck was so classy and charming; she never played it like a villainess. She played it like a seductress, like she was asking you to do her a favor: 'If you really loved me. you'd do this one little thing. Then we could be together. And we'd have money, too.' She presented it like it was a trip down to the market: 'All you have to do is ... murder him.'"
2. Isabella Rossellini (actress, Death Becomes Her, Immortal Beloved)
"Bette Davis, always an inspiration to me. was so great in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? What a rare character she created--so many other actresses wouldn't have had the nerve."
3. Judy Davis (actress, The Ref, The New Age)
"I'd have to say Gloria Swanson in Sunset Boulevard is a real favorite of mine. And don't tell me that character can't be called a villainess--after all, she did kill William Holden."
4. Margaret Cho (actress. "All-American Girl")
"My favorite is Linda Fiorentino in The Last Seduction, but then I wouldn't necessarily call her a villainess. I mean, to me, she was a heroine. She believed so wholeheartedly in herself, and that what she was doing was right. She was so matter-of-fact about her evil ways, but it wasn't really evil--she was just crafty and an opportunist. I try to emu-late her actions. Daily, I try to kind of harden myself to her example, you know, try to become what she was in that film because I do think that all men should pay."
5. Rosie Perez (actress, White Men Can't Jump. Fearless)
"I laughed and laughed at Faye Dunaway playing Joan Crawford in Mommie Dearest. She was very, very scary--and yet very funny at the same time."
6. Faye Dunaway (actress, Mommie Dearest, Don Juan DeMarco)
"Mary Astor in The Maltese Falcon is the first one that pops into my mind. She had this terrible thing of a woman gone wrong, hopelessly wrong, yet what an allure she had!"
7. Bridget Fonda (actress, Point of No Return, It Could Happen to You)
"There was a nun in Black Narcissus who went insane that I liked a lot. The character, played by Kathleen Byron, wasn't really a villainess initially, but she became one."
8. Denise Di Novi (producer, Tim Burton's The Nightmare Before Christmas, Little Women)
"For me, there's one and only one great female villain, and that's Eve Harrington in All About Eve. She is such a complex, brilliant character that she lives on outside the movie--whenever anyone today tries to describe a villain, they invariably say, 'Oh, she's an Eve Harrington,' I suppose some would see her as antifeminist, a bad stereotype in that she's the cliched female who is seductive, catty and manipulative. But throughout history, I'm interested in those women with ambition and life force who feel stunted, who feel that they have no other recourse than to use their so-called 'feminine wiles' to get what they want--your Emma Bovarys, your Cleopatras, Eve Harrington is especially interesting because, as All About Eve makes clear, she does have talent and therefore might have taken another route than the one she chose. But that's what makes a villain, isn't it? That one other little note that makes them a sociopath."
The De Vil Dolls
Our survey reveals that the most popular movie villainess is, hands down, Cruella De Vil from Disney's 101 Dalmatians. Here's what eight celebrated women have to say about why they love her.
9. Miranda Richardson (actress, The Crying Game, Tom & Viv)
"When I was five. I had to be carried screaming from the theater that was playing 101 Dalmatians. I was absolutely terrified by Cruella De Vil. The film is coming back to England this summer, so maybe I'll try seeing it again."
10. Sharon Stone (actress, The Quick and the Dead, Casino)
"I loved Cruella De Vil because she had the best cheekbones."
11. Rose Troche (director, co-screen-writer, co-producer, Go Fish)
"Cruella De Vil is my special favorite because she's the skinniest villainess in movie history--and she's got her own theme song, too."
12. Jane March (actress, The Lover, Color of Night)
"Cruella De Vil is utterly cool--and her makeup is always perfect."
13. Caroline Thompson (screenwriter, The Secret Garden, screenwriter-director, Black Beauty)
"Cruelia De Vil changed my life--she became my role model. She was so awful she was great, and I especially loved that hair!"
14. Helena Bonham Carter (actress, A Room with a View, Mary Shelley's Frankenstein)
"I saw 101 Dalmatians when I was very young. Cruella De Vil didn't really scare me--I don't scare that easily, really--but I thought she was a marvelously evil character."
15. Suzy Amis (actress, The Ballad of Little Jo, Blown Away)
"Cruella De Vil is the kind of villainess you love to hate. I have a four-year-old daughter, however, who doesn't like her.
16. Lysette Anthony (actress, Husbands and Wives, The Advocate)
"How could anyone not pick Cruella? She's so camp!"
17. Juliette Lewis (actress, What's Eating Gilbert Grape, Natural Born Killers)
"I like Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction because she was so cool."
18. Lili Fini Zanuck (director, Rush. producer, Wild Bill)
"My choice would have to be Sharon Stone in Basic Instinct. She's a totally empowered villainess, in complete control, and clearly enjoy-ing herself. We're given no justification what-ever for her behavior--we don't know that she had an unhappy childhood; we don't know her dysfunction or whether she's even got one. I think that's great. Also, her villainy is not resolved for us--there's no price to pay for what she's done."
19. Kathy Najimy (actress, Sister Act, Hocus Pocus)
"The villainesses I'm drawn to are the ones who have a reason. There was a movie called Ms. 45, about a gorgeous mute woman who'd been raped and abused so much that she'd just had it. So when a guy breaks into her apartment, she kills him and then cuts him up and puts pieces of him in garbage bags. She was very cool, plus, she was ecologically minded because she used plastic garbage bags. I always like a good murderess who has a con-science about recycling. The only thing we're missing is a place to turn it in for five cents."
20. Winona Ryder (actress, Little Women, Boys)
"I was overwhelmed by Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity. I guess the reason I remember her so vividly is because I liked her and hated her at the same time."
21. Anna Hamilton Phelan (screenwriter, Gorillas in the Mist, Mask)
"Hollywood puts out lots of images of bitches, whether it's Sylvia Fowler in The Women or Alexis Carrington on 'Dynasty,' but a villainess is more than just that. For me, the Muhammad Ali of villainy is Bette Davis as Regina in The Little Foxes. Think of that scene where she stands by as her husband is dying; he tells her to get his medicine but she doesn't make a move. She just stands there, watching, until he collapses and then dies. That's a truly supreme villainess."
22. Lauren Holly (actress, "Picket Fences," Dumb and Dumber)
"Although she wasn't exactly a villainess, I liked Kathleen Turner in The War of the Roses. She spewed such delicious venom!"
23. Guinevere Turner (actress, co-screen-writer, co-producer, Go Fish)
"Hedy, the character Jennifer Jason Leigh played in Single White Female, is my favorite because she's so damn psycho under the guise of being so damn pathetic."
24. Trini Alvarado (actress, Stella, Little Women)
"Bette Davis played great villainesses on the screen. I especially liked Davis in Of Human Bondage, and not just because she was so mean. The character sort of drifted over into Davis's own life--the strong decisions she made against her own studio and so forth. It felt its if Davis, like the character in Of Human Bandage, just didn't care what anybody thought."
25. Valeria Golino (actress, Rain Man, Immortal Beloved)
"I'd have to name Body Heat, because Kathleen Turner was terrific in that--so cool, so calculating, so evil."
26. Lauren Lloyd (VP of Production, Hollywood Pictures; producer, Mermaids, Drop Zone)
"I just loved that little girl in The Bad Seed, because you never expected to see someone her age killing people. And she had no remorse, none, so you can't forget her."
27. Cameron Diaz (actress, The Mask, The Last Supper)
"I loved Faye Dunaway as Joan Crawford in Mommie Dearest--especially when she says, 'No more wire hangers!"'
28. Sandra Bullock (actress, Demolition Man, Speed)
"I thought Bette Davis in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? was great. I saw it just the other night, and she was frightening. Those amazing eyes! She could just walk into a room and command attention."
29. Gillian Armstrong (director, Mrs. Soffel, Link Women)
"Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity comes to mind. She was a brilliant schemer, unrelenting in her evil."
30. Tyra Banks (actress, Higher Learning)
"I loved Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. I think what made her so effective was that they always dressed her in white, her apartment was white: her hair was blonde, her skin was very fair. So that made you think that she was very nice, but she was really very evil."
31. Shannen Doherty (actress, "Beverly Hills, 90210," Burning Passion: The Margaret Mitchell Story)
"I loved Faye Dunaway in Mommie Dearest--and in anything else, really. She just sort of had that evil quality to her."
32. Joanne Whalley-Kilmer (actress, Trial By Jury, Scarlett)
"I'd pick Bette Davis in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane?, though perhaps she was more tragic than a villainess. Yes, Baby Jane did terrible things, but Davis made you understand her--that's why she was such a great actress."
33. Jaclyn Smith (actress, "Charlie's Angels," Nightkill)
"I hated Gene Tierney in Leave Her to Heaven, How could anybody be like that? She let that little boy drown, remember? Then she threw herself down the stairs to kill her own baby. Come on, that's the devil incarnate, They wanted me to star in a remake of that story. I said no way."
34. Kylie Travis (actress, "Models Inc.") "No one played evil the way Bette Davis did, and in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? she was at her most villainous. Her cold, men-acing behavior combined with her childlike qualities gripped my attention--after all, innocence combined with bitchiness is the only way to be! Although she tortured her sister, and was calculating and manipulative, you still rooted for her."
35. Bonnie Bruckheimer (producer, Gypsy, Man of the House)
"I loved the villainesses in All About Eve and The Last Seduction, but I remember that, as a small child, it was Patty McCormack in The Bad Seed who scared me to death. I'd never seen another child behave that way. and I was mesmerized: even though she could kill people, no one could see through her act. It was the first movie to make me appreciate that movies could thrill you in a different--adult--way."
36. Teri Garr (actress, Tootsie, Dumb and Dumber)
"Mercedes McCambridge was terrific in Giant. She never showed her good side to James Dean when she was alive, but she left him the land, which had oil under it Not that it made him happy."
37. Penelope Ann Miller (actress, Carlito's Way, The Shadow)
"I loved Bette Davis in The Little Foxes. She was such a great actress, she could make you believe that a woman would stand by and let her husband die despite his pleas for help."
38. Michelle Phillips (actress, Scissors, "Knots Landing")
"My absolute all-time favorite is Linda Fiorentino in The Last Seduction. She's my gal--evil incarnate! I love that her part didn't get softened into a 'woman's role,' in the sense that she didn't have to be good, heroic, someone who 'came through' in a pinch. She was an evil, neurotic, sick bitch--which is wonderful, because mostly what you get in movies is the good wife, the nice mother, the girlfriend. I tell you, I would have stumbled over myself to get that role."
39. Joan Plowright (actress, Dennis the Menace, Widows' Peak)
"There is something so uncompromising about Bette Davis in The Little Foxes--she doesn't seek sympathy at all. She plays it to the hilt, without indicating to the audience, 'I'm not really like this.' She wasn't like those stars who had to think of their 'image,' She would go from A to Z instead of from A to B."
40. Samantha Mathis (actress, Pump Up the Volume, Little Women)
"Sunset Boulevard is one of my favorite films, and I've always been taken by Gloria Swanson's performance as Norma Desmond. She's a tragic figure--but you know, she can be quite mean at times."
41. Rita Wilson (actress, Sleepless in Seattle, Mixed Nuts)
"I loved Anne Baxter in All About Eve. She wasn't exactly evil, but she was so Machiavellian that she was absolutely wonderful to watch."
42. Teresa Hill (actress. "Models Inc.")
"I thought Jennifer Jason Leigh was a great villainess in Single White Female, because she felt no remorse for her sins."
43. Debra Martin Chase (executive producer, Hank Aaron: Chasing she Dream)
"My favorite film villain is Anne Baxter's character in All About Eve, Eve Harrington. She represents the most dangerous type of villain: smiling in your face, ostensibly your most devoted friend and protector, and yet all the while surreptitiously working to destroy your life. Furthermore, she carries out her mission with style, grace and elegance in the best Hollywood tradition. Eve is truly a wicked woman."
44. Jo Anderson (actress, "Sisters," Dead Again)
"My favorite was Barbara Stanwyck in Double Indemnity---I loved her character because she was so smooth, so classy, and had no shame."
45. Emma Samms (actress, "Models Inc.")
"I loved Glenn Close in Fatal Attraction. Not only was it a riveting performance, but it also had such an impact that it kept men monogamous for a long time after the film came out."
46. Phyllis Diller (actress, Silence of the Hams, The Boneyard)
"The evil woman I love best is Bette Davis in Dead Ringer. The guts of that woman, to kill her twin sister--and then try to vamp the sister's lover!"
47. Claire Danes (actress, Little Women, "My So-Called Life")
"I love the evil Queen who becomes a witch in Snow White and the Seven Dwarfs, and I love Margaret Hamilton as the Wicked Witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz, I don't know, maybe I'm just hung up on witches. I'd love to play one someday."
48. Zsa Zsa Gabor (actress, Moulin Rouge, Picture Mommy Dead)
"Oh that's easy, honey--Barbara Stanwyck in Double indemnity because her eyes were so cold and calculating. Imagine arranging to have your husband killed for his money-- that's so terrible. You have to marry for love and when it's over you get rid of him, but you don't kill him! You remain friends with him, that's what I've done with all my husbands. I've married for love, not money-- and I've never killed any of them."
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Bob Thomas wrote "52 Pick-Up" for the July '94 Movieline