Gothic fiction whose best-known work was the 1960 Hollywood horror novel "What Ever Happened To Baby Jane?" Farrell's novels spawned a subgenre of "Grande Dame Guignol" in the cinema, represented by such films as the 1962 film based on Farrell's novel, which starred Bette Davis versus Joan Crawford; this subgenre of films was dubbed the "psycho-biddy" genre. Many modern writers of horror (or indeed other types of fiction) exhibit considerable Gothic sensibilities—examples include the works of Anne Rice, Stella Coulson, Susan Hill, Poppy Z. Brite and Neil Gaiman as well as some of the sensationalist works of Stephen King Thomas M. Disch's
What Ever Happened to Baby Jane? (1962 film) from Blanche's bedroom, cutting her off from the outside world. Jane begins denying her food, until she serves Blanche's dead pet parakeet—and, at a later meal, a dead rat—to her on a dinner platter. Although Jane is well into middle age, she dresses like "Baby Jane" and wears caked-on layers of makeup and childlike curls and ribbons in her hair. Jane becomes obsessed with recapturing her childhood stardom and posts a newspaper advertisement for a pianist to accompany her vocal act. When Jane leaves the house, Blanche tries to get the attention of her neighbor, Mrs. Bates (Anna Lee), by