EVE BITES THE BIG APPLE

ALTHOUGH HOLLYWOOD was at its postwar peak in 1950, raking in $1.4 billion annually, the industry still had an inferiority complex, and much of the theater community insisted that true art happened only on the ''legitimate'' stage. But on Oct. 13, 1950, Hollywood showed signs of new self-esteem with the premiere of Joseph L. Mankiewicz's divinely bitchy attack on Broadway, All About Eve.

Winning critical raves (The New York Times called it ''dazzling and devastating mockery'') and eventually a record 14 Oscar nominations, Eve was a big hit. The story swirls about Eve Harrington (Anne Baxter), a stagestruck naif who ingratiates herself with the grandest of Broadway's grandes dames, the aging Margo Channing (Bette Davis). The trusted protagee turns out to be a ruthless schemer, supplants Margo as queen of the Great White Way, wins a coveted theater award, and ends up with Margo's acid congratulations: ''You can always put that award where your heart ought to be.''

As Eve shows, the thriving American Theatuh of 1950 looked down its elitist, pancaked nose at Hollywood's happy endings, and Eve urbanely turned the tables. Eely critic Addison De Witt (George Sanders) corrosively sums up theater folk: ''We all have abnormality in common. We're a breed apart from the rest of humanity.'' Eve herself revels in intra-theater back stabbing, while glamorously gloved, chain-smoking Margo trashes theater snobs. Ironically, the movie bolstered Hollywood star mythology, creating a rabid cult all its own.

Most spectacularly, Eve rescued Davis, whose career had been foundering. She said the movie ''resurrected me from the dead.'' A classic Davis broad, Margo became the star's doppelganger -- smart, brittle, tempestuous, but softhearted. Eve also featured a radiant unknown named Marilyn Monroe as Miss Casswell, a talentless, pliable ''graduate of the Copacabana school of acting'' -- just the sort of actress Broadway loathed. Within three years, Monroe was Hollywood's newest sensation. And on Oscar night Eve won six statuettes, including those for Best Picture, Director and Screenplay (Mankiewicz), and Supporting Actor (Sanders).

Forty-five years later, Hollywood is over its ego problems, Disney has invaded a struggling Broadway, and Eve's movie/theater rivalry seems dated. But its catty characters remain a staple of film classes, imitated by drag divas like Lypsinka and recycled by Melrose Place; a musical version, Applause, starring Lauren Bacall, was a hit on, yes, Broadway in 1970. Imitation isn't always the sublimest form of flattery, however: The latest work to lift Eve's plot is the trashy, ferociously panned Showgirls.