Hollywood is a rough industry, even for the strongest of performers. Every actor in the business is constantly competing over who is more talented or who is more conventionally attractive. Such insecurities plagued even the best of actors, including Bette Davis.

In Bette Davis Speaks, the actor confessed that when she was younger, she was insecure in her looks.

“I was beautiful, but not a beauty,” said Davis, according to the book, written by Boze Hadleigh. “There’s a difference there...Today, I do think I was beautiful. Then I didn’t, and I always wanted to look like someone else.”

Strangely enough, Davis’s skewed viewpoint allowed her to be more exploratory in her acting roles.

“Because I was dissatisfied, I was ready to experiment as an actress. I was very ready to look awful. Or plain or older. I sometimes did my best to look my worst!”

It was a lifestyle that separated Davis from other actors in the industry and helped set her on the path to success.

“[Other actors] cared so desperately what the public thought,” said Davis. “I didn’t. I cared more about what my peers thought - not of me as a person, as a performer. As an artist.”

Davis’s willingness to set herself apart earned her the role that would jumpstart her career: that of Jane Hudson of Whatever Happened to Baby Jane?

Sometimes I even outdid myself, and it hurt,” said Davis. “Naturally, it was worse when I was older. When I first saw myself as Baby Jane, I cried.”