Payment on Demand *** (1951, Bette Davis, Barry Sullivan, Jane Cowl, Kent Taylor) – Classic Movie Review 6468

‘He strayed and he paid… She saw to that!’ Director Curtis Bernhardt’s 1951 divorce drama stars Bette Davis, who is on her best form as a woman who is rich, over-ambitious and facing a divorce from a businessman (Barry Sullivan) after 20 years of marriage.

Ironically, Davis’s own marriage to her third husband William Grant Sherry was breaking up at the time of filming and they divorced on 5 July 1950. She then married actor Gary Merrill on 28 July 1950.

It is skilfully co-written (with Bruce Manning) and directed by Bernhardt, Davis’s director on A Stolen Life (1946). It is told in flashbacks. Davis gives a powerful, nuanced performance in this strong, undeservedly less well-known vehicle.

Bette’s real-life daughter, Barbara Merrill, plays her daughter Diana as a child in flashback.

Also in the cast are Jane Cowl, Kent Taylor, Betty Lynn, John Sutton, Frances Dee, Peggie Castle, Otto Kruger, Walter Sande, Brett King, Richard Anderson, Natalie Schafer, Katherine Emery, Lisa Golm and Kathleen Ellis.

It is Davis’s first film after her triumph in All About Eve (1950).

Barbara Merrill was born on 1 May 1947 as Barbara Davis Sherry. She was adopted by Gary Merrill, fourth husband of Bette Davis, in 1950. On her 16th birthday, she legally changed her name from Barbara Davis Merrill back to Barbara Davis Sherry to cut off all ties from her adopted father, Gary Merrill. She has been married to Jeremy Hyman since 4 January 1964. She wrote a book about her mother Bette Davis called My Mother’s Keeper about her relationship with her mother after childhood.

The book created a rift with Bette Davis who wrote This N That in response to her daughter’s attack. They never reconciled, and Davis cut her out of her will.

Barbara Merrill also appears as Liza Bates in What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962).

© Derek Winnert 2017 Classic Movie Review 6468

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