Mildred Pierce Mildred Pierce Mildred Pierce is a 1941 hardboiled novel by James M. Cain. It was made into an Academy Award–winning film of the same name in 1945, starring Joan Crawford, and a 2011 Emmy Award–winning miniseries of the same name, starring Kate Winslet. Set in Glendale, California, in the 1930s, the book is the story of a middle-class housewife, Mildred Pierce, and her attempts to maintain her family's social position during the Great Depression. Mildred separates from Bert, her unemployed husband, and sets out to support herself and her children. After a difficult search she finds a job as a
Mildred Pierce (film) 1942, two years earlier, Joan Crawford had been released from Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer due to a mutual agreement. Crawford campaigned for the lead role in "Mildred Pierce", which most lead actresses did not want because of the implied age as mother of a teenage daughter. Warner Bros. and director Michael Curtiz had originally wanted Bette Davis to play the title role, but she declined. Curtiz did not want Crawford to play the part. Curtiz campaigned for Barbara Stanwyck, who was working on "My Reputation" (1946) at the time. When he learned that Stanwyck was not, however, going to be cast, he then