Mildred Pierce had gorgeous legs, a way with a skillet, and a bone-deep core of toughness and determination. She used those attributes to survive her husband’s desertion in post-Depression America with two children and to claw her way out of poverty, becoming a successful businesswoman. But Mildred also had two weaknesses: a yen for shiftless men and an unreasoning devotion to her monstrous, selfish daughter… Made into a classic film noir starring Joan Crawford in 1945 and revisited as a miniseries in 2011 starring Kate Winslet.