the first lie


I don't get the discussion between bette davis and mary astor when she asks for the baby. right before that, she accused mary of lying about being pregnant, then mary admits lying. next thing, bette asks for the baby. i felt like i'd left the room and re-entered (except that i didn't).
can someone explain?

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Yeah, the whole scene was done poorly. She lies about the first encounter and then lies again when confronted. Then when the letter is presented, which Maggie hadn't even actually read, the truth kinda comes out, but we just go into the arrangement instead of discussing the last few moments.

It says that the two ladies had to rewrite much of the script, so I wonder if the original writers should have even gotten paid. Another mistake was Pete said they had about 20 acres of land. They live in a mansion, so having just a little patch of land doesn't make much sense.

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[deleted]

When Maggie visited Sandra after Pete's crash, Sandra initially said she lied about being pregnant, but Maggie had an unopened letter that Sandra had sent to Pete that he never received. Maggie assumed that Sandra had written Pete that she was pregnant and after seeing the letter, Sandra admitted it. Maggie correctly assumed that Sandra, pregnant, unmarried, and very focused on her career, would not be happy about having a baby. Maggie wanted the baby because he was a part of Pete, who she truly loved. So she asked Sandra for the baby and Sandra agreed.

I agree that such decisions normally wouldn't be made in just a few lines of dialogue but it is the movies. :)

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There is a scene in a night club where Sandra tells Maggie that she is pregnant. Maggie says "You're Lying"
Sandra says "Time will take care of that".

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oh. ok. thanks.
(confusing movie at times, eh?).

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It seems she initially disbelieves Astor when she tells her she is pregnant because she knows she is perfectly capable of telling such a scheming lie for effect; when she sees the letter Astor has written to Brent she notes it seems rather thick and surmising that she would not have written to him such a long letter unless she was divulging the news that she was indeed with child .

Davis goes to see her in the hope she might be right; when confronted Astor denies the pregnancy and there seems to be the understanding between Astor and Davis that she is going to get rid of the baby as she is an unmarried mother without the means or desire to support a child and because the baby can no longer be used as a weapon to steal away the affections of Brent. At which point Davis offers her money and a way for her avoid terminating the pregnancy and avoiding scandal, by taking her away and raising the child as her own.

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Totally confusing scene and I came here to ask the same question as the OP. First Astor admits to lying about the pregnancy, then she is shown the letter she wrote to Pete telling him about the forthcoming child and she admits that she lied in that too. Right, the audience has now been assured not once but twice that there was no real pregnancy.

Without skipping a beat the ladies now start discussing the future of this non-existent child, leaving the viewer absolutely baffled. I actually wondered for a moment if they were planning to get Sandra knocked up by some Arizona cowhand to pass the kid off as Pete's and this would be the Great Lie.

The whole scene needed fixing and it's astonishing that it didn't get picked up by editing.

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It was also clear to me that the thickness of the letter proves that Astor was not lying. However until I read the post above I never thought that she would be getting an abortion. I actually assumed she'd have the baby.

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