Christina Crawford

About Christina Crawford

Christina Crawford (born June 11, 1939) is an American writer and actress, best known as the author of Mommie Dearest, an exposé of the systematic child abuse allegedly committed by her mother, actress Joan Crawford.

She was born in Los Angeles, California in 1939 to unwed teenage parents (her father was in the Navy at the time) and adopted out-of-state in 1940 by Joan Crawford, one of five children adopted by the actress. (One of the children was reclaimed by his birth mother early on.)

By her own account Christina Crawford endured a childhood shaped by her adopted mother's violent mood swings, one minute buying her party dresses, the next spanking her so hard with a hairbrush that it broke in two. At the age of ten she was sent to a California boarding school, but things remained difficult throughout the holidays. Crawford later moved from California to the East Coast to attend Carnegie Mellon School of Drama and then studied at The Neighborhood Playhouse in New York City. She earned a B.A. degree, magna cum laude, from UCLA and a Master's Degree in Communications Management from USC.