Bette and Joan

Whether fact or fabrication - and most likely both - the rivalry between and is one of the most famed feuds in Hollywood history, surviving in the minds of contemporary audiences perhaps as much as their on-screen achievements.

A battle of considerable wills and a war of barbed words, their infamous dispute has been the subject of articles, books, industry gossip and now a television series. As Bette and Joan grab headlines once again, we take a look at two exclamation points in their fraught history.

Davis and Crawford's feud had been the storied stuff of Hollywood legend for years prior to What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? The pair had competed for roles, acclaim and men, and had duked it out in public, in private and, of course, in the press.

By the 1960s, their respective stars had began to fade, but Baby Jane would prove to be a late revival for both the actresses - and their mutual antipathy. An over-the-top thriller about two sisters competing for fame steered into even more hysterical territory by nihilistic genre master Robert Aldrich, the film was the perfect forum to showcase its stars' amplified acting styles and their equally volatile exchanges.

Studio execs and audiences both took the bait; one gleefully inflating stories of behind-the-scenes fracas, the other wholehearted buying into the pantomime rivalry played out on-set and on-screen. Things were cranked up a notch further with the announcement of the Academy Awards - Davis received the nod for Best Actress, but it was Crawford who took to the stage at the Santa Monica Civic Auditorium on the big night, she had engineered to up-stage her co-star and collect the statuette on behalf of for The Miracle Worker.

Ever the pulpy pragmatist, Aldrich tried to recapture the magic of Baby Jane just 2 years later with Hush… Hush, Sweet Charlotte. The set-up was familiar - familial tensions and a troubled past combining in an explosion of psychosis and violence - and the main players would return, but with one major change: Davis' faded Southern Belle would be living under the thumb of Crawford's vindictive, manipulative cousin, not the other way around.

Things were not to be, however. Galled by Crawford's stunt at the Oscars, Davis began a campaign to undermine her co-star. After a series of incidents, Crawford checked herself into hospital and production stuttered. She was eventually removed from the picture, only to be replaced by , Davis' friend and frequent collaborator.

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