There’s a Special Place in Hell for Minnie Castevet
Editor’s Note: The following contains major spoilers for Rosemary’s Baby and Apartment 7A.
“There’s a special place in hell for women who don’t support other women.” This quote has generally been attributed to former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, but it makes the rounds whenever toxic moments of feminism arise. The sentiment feels particularly apt when discussing pregnancy horror, that special brand of film that explores the experience of growing one human body inside of another.
The female villains that populate these stories are often sugary sweet on the outside, but conniving and cruel behind the scenes. They lure their victims with compassion and care while selling them out for the use of their bodies. And the grandmother of them all is Minnie Castevet (Ruth Gordon, Dianne Wiest). A flamboyant elderly resident of the Bramford, she dupes the titular mother in the 1968 classic Rosemary’s Baby to give birth to the antichrist as part of a satanic cult. Natalie Erika James’ prequel Apartment 7A explores an earlier attempt at this egregious deception that leaves another intended mother lying dead in the street.
Her Story
We’re introduced to Minnie in Rosemary’s Baby by her deeds and her voice. Rosemary Woodhouse (Mia Farrow) and her husband Guy (John Cassavetes) have just moved into a spacious apartment when they hear an older couple arguing on the other side of the wall. Careful listeners will also hear ominous chanting, foreshadowing the satanic violence to come. During a chance meeting in the laundry room, Rosemary discusses the diminutive woman with a fellow resident named Terry Gionoffrio (Victoria Vetri) who credits Minnie (Gordon) and her husband Roman (Sidney Blackmer) with saving her life. A few days later, Terry falls to her death from one of the building’s upper floors and it’s in the shadow of this tragedy that we finally meet Minnie. On Roman’s arm, she emerges from the night in a psychedelic coat and flowered, white hat, a flamboyant outfit that mirrors her outsized persona.
Minnie begins to work her way into Rosemary’s life, often pushing into the startled young woman’s apartment. Upon learning that Rosemary is pregnant, she arranges an appointment with Dr. Sapirstein (Ralph Bellamy), a well-regarded obstetrician and friend of the family. Minnie also brews a prenatal drink each day, ostensibly filled with healthy vitamins and herbs. Rosemary obliges because it seems easier to comply than deal with Minnie’s disappointment or wrath, though she eventually begins to bristle at the tiny woman’s constant meddling. When a close friend dies after contact with the Castevets, Rosemary discovers that, as part of a secretive satanic cult, Minnie has been grooming her to deliver the antichrist.
The original iteration of Minnie Castevet in Rosemary’s Baby is merely one part of a larger scheme, but James’ prequel draws a clearer picture of the woman’s villainy. Months before the ill-fated couple move into the building, Minnie (Wiest) and Roman (Kevin McNally) find a dejected Terry (Julia Garner) stumbling out of the Bramford’s lobby. With no children of their own, they take the troubled young woman under their wing and offer her free boarding in a luxurious apartment that just happens to be right next to their own. All she has to do is allow them to dote on her. But Terry soon learns the real cost of this generosity. She has been chosen as mother to Satan’s only son, a role Minnie claims she was born to play.
Her Motive
Minnie’s motive is straightforward and simple. She and her fellow Satanists hope to bring a dark savior into the world. Though she rarely espouses her own beliefs, Minnie has married the son of a prominent Satanist and leader of a coven housed in the ornate building. The original Roman does not expand much on his own motivations aside from crying “Hail, Satan!” while declaring it now “Year One.” However, James’ film gives him a bit more pathos. He rails at Christians who fear him simply because he worships a different god and remembers the painful death his father suffered at the hands of an angry mob—punishment for harnessing a force they could not understand. Where Roman is the mouthpiece, Minnie is the hand. She masterminds much of the plot in Rosemary’s Baby and Apartment 7A, keeping close watch over both women and the contents of their wombs.
A surprising element of this overall plan is that several members of the coven are women. James’ Minnie tells us that she and Roman tried for years to get pregnant, seemingly explaining why she doesn’t bear the sinister baby herself. But is this the case for all female members? Why do they need an outsider to conceive the devil’s child? Perhaps Satan does not want a willing victim. Part of the ritual involves restraining both Terry and Rosemary and it’s possible that their dark magic will only work on a woman who is taken by force. Regardless of the details, Minnie is signing them up for a hellish fate she personally rejects. This outwardly helpful woman orchestrates two hellacious assaults and offers their bodies to her chosen dark father.
To be clear, there is nothing wrong with diverse religious beliefs. Roman is right to be outraged over his father’s persecution and murder. But he is doing a version of the same by forcibly impregnating Rosemary and Terry. Should a willing member of the coven volunteer to mother the antichrist, she should have every right to live out her faith. The problem arises when religious practitioners seek to force their values onto others without their consent. Neither woman has agreed to this parentage, but Minnie cares only for the contents of their wombs. They have ceased to be human beings in her eyes and serve only as vessels for her devious plan.
Her Weapons
In both Rosemary’s Baby and Apartment 7A, Minnie wields a variety of weapons to control her prey, but the strongest is her harsh personality. She is brash and bold, inviting herself over along with a friend, completely derailing Rosemary’s quiet plans. It’s difficult to get a word in edgewise let alone argue and usually easier to just do what she wants. Minnie uses this to her advantage and employs a startling lack of shame to move the two women around like chess pieces on a satanic board.
Seemingly generous, Minnie also showers both women with lavish gifts and kind gestures. When she and Roman enter Terry’s apartment uninvited, it’s difficult to argue that they’ve done anything wrong—after all, they do pay the rent. When Terry questions her new leading role, Minnie snipes that she’s ungrateful while viciously cutting off Terry’s long hair. Well aware of societal expectations for women, she uses her victims’ need to be seen as pleasant and accommodating to guide them into her awful trap.
Various members of the coven provide other weapons Minnie includes in her arsenal. A prominent director offers Terry a place in his show and Dr. Sapirstein lends his obstetric care. But it’s primarily through herbs and surveillance that Minnie enacts her plans. An elderly neighbor named Mrs. Gardenia (Tina Gray), currently occupying Rosemary’s future apartment, maintains a spice garden filled with powerful herbs including Tannis root, the coven’s signature scent. She places the smelly substance in an ornate silver bauble that she gifts to both women as a good luck charm.
A homemade salve miraculously heals Terry’s wounded foot and Minnie provides Rosemary with a prenatal drink filled with these herbs to benefit her growing baby. When Mrs. Gardenia expresses disapproval of the plot against Terry and tries to murder her in the night, the elderly woman suddenly falls ill and dies, conveniently creating a vacancy for a young married couple hoping to start a family.
For the night of conception, Minnie drugs both women. We don’t find out exactly what these substances are, but Rosemary describes a chalky undertaste in a bowl of chocolate “mousse” Minnie offers for the couple’s fancy dinner. She similarly arranges for drugs to be placed in Terry’s drink on a casual date. Both leave the women incapacitated and they are bound and raped in a satanic ritual.
Her Victims
Minnie’s primary victims sit on opposite ends of the feminine spectrum. Rosemary is a young and idealistic housewife who desperately wants to have children. Despite the uncertainty with Guy’s professional future, they plan to begin expanding their family as soon as they settle into their new home. She believes that Guy is the father of her baby, conceived after a romantic dinner capped by Minnie’s famous dessert. In the night, Rosemary dreams of being assaulted by a demonic figure surrounded by chanting observers in long cloaks. Believing this to be a dream, she’s overjoyed to be pregnant regardless of some distressing complications. Soon after, Guy lands a coveted role and begins to see a promising future in Hollywood, payment for delivering Rosemary’s captive body to the coven.
Terry Gionnofrio couldn’t be more different. This Broadway hopeful has come to New York from the rural midwest with dreams of seeing her name in lights. When a devastating ankle injury causes a setback, Terry fears she will have to give up her ambitions and return home to work at her family’s slaughterhouse. She meets the Castevets at her lowest point. After a bombed audition, she follows the director back to the Branford before falling apart on the sidewalk outside. The offer to stay in the titular apartment seems too good to be true and Terry finds she cannot say no.
Once at the Bramford, Terry’s fortunes improve. Not only has she made the chorus of a prominent show, but she’s also landed a date with its powerful director. This evening involves a similar horror as a sedated Terry dreams of being assaulted by a glittering devil. She awakens with no other memory of a sexual encounter but writes the incident off as an embarrassing mistake.
With a bright future on the horizon, Terry is devastated to learn that she is pregnant. A baby could destroy everything she’s worked so hard to build. Desperate to rid herself of the unwanted child, Terry considers drinking bleach or throwing herself down a flight of stairs, horrific solutions women sought out before gaining the right to safe reproductive care. Her friend arranges an abortion, but Terry is unable to go through with the procedure. She may be confident in her decision, but her body reacts and kicks the doctor away before she can perform the D&C. Having discovered the truth, she decides to end the pregnancy on her own terms. Terry feigns acceptance of the coven’s beliefs before throwing herself out a window and falling to her death.
Though their stories are dramatically different, both women find themselves abandoned by a system they believe will protect them. Terry attempts to confide in Dr. Sapirstein (Patrick Lyster), telling him she believes something is wrong, only to be met with vague threats of being committed to an asylum. If she continues with these outlandish claims, she could be locked away in a psychiatric hospital—a danger to the baby she does not want.
She has no choice but to turn to a backdoor abortionist who performs the procedure in a dirty kitchen. Rosemary faces a similar threat when she tries to reach out for a second opinion. An ostensibly kind doctor listens to her story and offers her a place to rest, then immediately calls Dr. Sapirstein. Thinking she’s going to the safety of a hospital, Rosemary walks out the door and right into the arms of the enemy. This doctor sworn to protect his patient has betrayed her by prioritizing the fetus’s safety over the life of its mother.
Her Legacy
Though it takes several tries, Minnie eventually gets what she wants. In Rosemary’s Baby, Rosemary gives birth to an unsettling baby and succumbs to the group’s pleas to serve as his mother. Though Terry’s conception ultimately proves fruitless, her death wraps the failed plot up in a neat package. Minnie becomes a sympathetic figure in the eyes of her new neighbors and immediately begins plotting the next attack. She and Roman will continue to rule over the Branford and its horrific coven, raising the antichrist to one day take over the world.
When Terry discovers the plot against her, Minnie claims it’s a role the young woman was destined to play: a supremely reductive understanding of motherhood. The Minnies of the world view women as vessels, disposable actresses simply filling a role until they can be cast off in favor of the next viable womb. Like so many pro-life women, she does not see Terry and Rosemary as human beings, but as incubators whose lives cease to matter the moment they conceive.
Perhaps Rosemary will join the coven, but more likely, she will be discarded like Terry, Mrs. Gardenia, and anyone else who stands in her way. Though Minnie is horrific, her eventual honesty actually feels refreshing in light of women who support draconian abortion bans in the name of Christian love. Minnie readily admits that she has used Rosemary and Terry, offering incalculable riches in return, whereas pro-lifers shame other women for not devaluing their own bodies and lives in service to someone else’s religious beliefs.
Gordon’s Oscar-winning performance in Rosemary’s Baby has stood the test of time, recreated in chilling form by Dianne Wiest. Perhaps we find Minnie so frightening because she feels so familiar. In a polarized political world, we see similar women grow bolder each day, lobbying for control over everyone else’s lives. Apartment 7A and its sinister grande dame follows a string of pregnancy horror films, likely reactions to the 2022 Dobbs decision which stripped US women of the right to bodily autonomy.
We all know a woman a little like Minnie, who will push and manipulate to get her way, often bolstered by religious beliefs. With a smile and a nod, she uses her femininity to project an aura of trustworthiness setting up an unconscionable betrayal. There’s a special place in hell for the Minnies of the world, who intentionally betray and harm other women. Of course, as a Satanist, that’s exactly what she wants.
Categorized:Editorials Fatal Femmes
