She was a different woman, perhaps too daring for the 1940s, when to be an actress it was enough to be beautiful and obedient, Frances Farmer dared to be stubborn and they called her hysterical, dared to have a voice and that is why they called her naive. When the actress wanted to escape this world, it was too late, that’s when they called her “crazy. “
It is very likely that today few people will remember the name Frances Farmer; rather, it is a female figure that has been lost in time, behind this dusty curtain in which interesting and always ruthless stories are often hidden, which often reflect a certain era, which remain as a cry for help from content that deserves to be remembered.
“The only good thing is that I get used to suffering. -Frida Kahlo-
However, in the world of psychiatry, the name of this actress is well known for several reasons: the psychological treatments to which this woman has been subjected for several years reflect a time as dark as it is terrible, in which women, curiously, were the most direct victims.
Currently, we have a complete documentation on the life of Frances Farmer. Her own sister published the book “Look Back in Love”, in which she recounts each of the young actress’ cruel experiences during her years in various psychiatric hospitals. In turn, thanks to the research entitled “Will there really be a morning?We also reflect on his personality, his family environment and whether he really suffered, as has been said, paranoid schizophrenia.
In any case, as always happens in these cases of great complexity, certain factors cannot be ignored: education and historical context, if at the beginning of this article we affirm that Frances was a very daring woman for her time, it is mainly for a very specific reason: her mother taught her from a very young age the obligation to have a voice, to know how to opinion and to always assume a critical attitude towards the things in which she was involved.
As a teenager, she even appeared in local Seattle newspapers for making vindictive speeches on the female issue or for not believing in God from Nietzsche’s legacy. Later, her mother enrolled her in drama classes with a specific goal, linked to the realization. Of a personal will, a frustrated desire of his own youth: to become famous in cinema. A goal he achieved while Frances was in college and had one of his main passions: writing critical articles about the society of his time.
In 1935, when she had already played one or the other role in film, Frances Farmer achieved her main goal: to graduate in journalism, however, before she began projecting her life in this field, her mother convinced her to temporarily postpone her career. personal goals and focus on the world of fame. Frances agreed and her agent did a test at Paramount Pictures.
The test couldn’t be easier: wear a nice dress, sit down and look at the camera. Frances Farmer had a classic beauty, in which boldness and daring seduction appeared in a few moments, these factors being more than enough for the film industry, they offered him a 7-year contract, in which all he had to do was obey, learn scripts and occasionally attend directors’ parties, as well as keep secrets about what might happen at those events.
Frances rebelled against this world. She hated the naive woman roles offered to her. He hated the press and, above all, hated having to follow another stage in his life, in which everything had to be immersed in glamour and exquisite lies. However, she relented, convinced by her mother and agents, even marrying another actor to further strengthen her emerging star role.
The decline of Frances Farmer’s career began prematurely, she refused to record certain scenes, rejected the scripts and did not respect the contracts signed with her agents, at night hunting with the desire to escape everything, including herself, stepped on the accelerator in an impossible. escape that usually doesn’t end well. She was well known to the Santa Monica Police Department for accumulating endless fines for driving dangerously and under the influence of alcohol.
“Sometimes I think my heart is carved in stone. -Frances Farmer-
However, things got complicated when she beat one of the Hollywood directors, after that, she ran away again, but she didn’t get very far, the police chased Frances and, between screams, kicks and vanos attempts to get rid of all those shadows. of authority that fell upon her, an agreement was reached: she would be hired in an asylum to alleviate her rebellion, her nature and her reactionary personality.
Doctors diagnosed him with paranoid schizophrenia. She was treated with conventional electroshock therapy and also with insulin therapy for sakel’s coma or cure. After a few months in the hospital, she left and it was at this point that she decided to break completely with her. life as an actress and move away forever from this oppressive and degrading world.
However, Lillian Farmer, Frances’ mother, felt that her daughter was not cured, that she was not in her perfect judgment, and so, with the help of Hollywood directors, she was able to determine her daughter’s mental inability to put her back into a psychiatric facility.
Frances Farmer entered Washington’s Steilacoom Hospital, where she spent five years, which her sister would later give a voice to through a book, and the strict treatment adds up to the most terrible of all: sexual abuse and repeated rape. , as one of the hospital nurses revealed, Frances Farmer had a lobotomy without the family’s permission. Soften your personality, your bad temper, your hysterical?
After that, after 5 years of confinement, abuse and trauma, Frances never became herself again, appearing in one interview or another, in a play, in a television show, in which her mere presence generated a cry and a lot of audience. However, his attitude was no longer, his strength had been lost, his character had evaporated and his beauty, which defined the real Frances Farmer, had been stolen.