If what you want out of life is to spend the rest of it bombed out on drugs, and being taken care of by others, then insanity is a great option, for you. And, before I am attacked, no, I am not advocating thousands to feign it for that sake, nor am I callously dismissing the thousands who genuinely need compassion and help for mental disturbance and anguish.
But, consider something we all know and love, darlings--the classic end of "What Ever Happened To Baby Jane?" I am sure you know it by heart.
Jane has gone completely bonkers, to where even Victor Buono, as Edwin Flagg, who is half not there, himself, has her number, and storms outta there. So Jane takes dehydrated Blanche to the beach, tries to bury her in the sand, and, in her mind, at least, has retreated to the place there when she was a child, and admired by those who watched her dancing on the beach.
So, there is the big revelation scene, Jane utters the famous line, "Then, you mean, all this time, we could have been friends?," which still has a poignancy to it. She goes to get the ice cream cones--"Two big strawberries, please."--when the police see her, and follow her, asking where her sister is. Jane sees the crowds, is back in childhood, and begins dancing, as the camera pulls back, to the ominous tones of "I've Written A Letter To Daddy," sealing everyone's fate--Blanche taken to a hospital, where she dies, and Jane put in an asylum.
But, wait! Once upon a time, when I was talking with an acting teacher about "A Streetcar Named Desire," she said, if you look at the ending a certain way, Blanche Du Bois wins. "How?" I asked. "She gets to be Queen Of The Nuthouse," was the answer.
Something of the same might be said for Baby Jane Hudson. I always felt the film, though it ends right on the note of Henry Farrell's novel, should have ended, with a dissolve shot to Baby Jane, on some nameless stage, darkness behind her, performing. As the performance goes on, the camera pulls back, and we see the audience is not just any audience--but the audience in the asylum Jane is at. Jane has become the star on the circuit there. So, she, like Blanche, gets what she wants.
Which is how insanity worked for these two. Now, I am not saying it will not work for everyone this way, (Little Edie came pretty close!!!!!!!!!) though it seems to for highly creative individuals, as Jane and Blanche are.
Insanity can make you the star of your own show, darlings! And no one can upstage it!
But not to worry! Like Kerri, The Sparkle Fairy--"I'm OK! I'm OK!!!!!!!!!!!!!"
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