Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc. Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc. Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc. (also known as Warner Bros. Pictures, or simply Warner Bros.—the shortened form of the former official, sometimes still used, formal corporate name: Warner Brothers
fiction created to romanticize his background, and that he was really born on January 23 1899, a date that appears in many references. However, this story is now considered baseless: although no birth certificate has ever been found, his birth notice did appear in a BostonBoston is the capital and largest city of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts, and is one of the oldest cities in the United States. The largest city in New England, Boston is considered the economic and cultural center of the region and is sometimes regarded as the unofficial "Capital of New England"...
newspaper in early January 1900, which supports the December 1899 date, as do other sources, such as the 1900 census.
Childhood
Bogart's father, Belmont, was a surgeon specializing in heart and lungs. His mother, Maud Humphrey, was a commercial illustrator, who received her art training in New York and FranceFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
, including study with James McNeill WhistlerJames Abbott McNeill Whistler was an American-born, British-based artist. Averse to sentimentality and moral allusion in painting, he was a leading proponent of the credo "art for art's sake". His famous signature for his paintings was in the shape of a stylized butterfly possessing a long stinger...
, and who later became artistic director of the fashion magazine The DelineatorThe Delineator was an American women's magazine that was published from 1873 until 1937. It was published by the Butterick Publishing Company...
. She was a militant suffragetteSuffragette is a term originally coined by the Daily Mail newspaper as a derogatory label for the more radical and militant members of the late-19th and early-20th century movement for women's suffrage in the United Kingdom, in particular members of the Women's Social and Political Union...
. She used a drawing of baby Humphrey in a well-known ad campaign for Mellins Baby Food. In her prime, she made over $50,000 a year, then a vast sum, far more than her husband who made $20,000 per year. The Bogarts lived in a fashionable Upper West SideThe Upper West Side is a neighborhood of the borough of Manhattan in New York City that lies between Central Park and the Hudson River above West 59th Street....
apartment, and had an elegant cottage on a fifty-five acre estate in upstate New York on Canandaigua LakeCanandaigua Lake is the fourth largest of the Finger Lakes, in the U.S. state of New York. It is called the "Chosen Spot" in the Seneca language. The city of Canandaigua is located at the northern shore of the lake and the village of Naples is just a few miles south of the southern end...
. As a youngster, Humphrey's gang of friends at the lake would put on theatricals.
Humphrey was the oldest of three children, his two younger sisters were Frances and Catherine Elizabeth (Kay). His parents were very formal, busy in their careers, and frequently fought—resulting in little emotion directed at the children, "I was brought up very unsentimentally but very straightforwardly. A kiss, in our family, was an event. Our mother and father didn’t glug over my two sisters and me." As a boy, Bogart was teased for his curls, his tidiness, the "cute" pictures his mother had him pose for, the Little Lord FauntleroyLittle Lord Fauntleroy is the first children's novel written by English–American playwright and author Frances Hodgson Burnett. It was originally published as a serial in the St. Nicholas Magazine between November 1885 and October 1886, then as a book by Scribner's in 1886...
clothes she dressed him in—and the name "Humphrey." From his father, Bogart inherited a tendency for needling people, a fondness for fishing, a life-long love of sailing, and an attraction to strong-willed women.
Education
Typical of New York society parents, the Bogarts sent their son to private schools. Humphrey began school at the Delancy school until fifth grade when he was enrolled in Trinity SchoolTrinity School is a private, preparatory, co-educational day school for grades K-12 located in New York City, USA, and a member of both the New York Interschool and the Ivy Preparatory School League...
. He was an indifferent, sullen student who showed no interest in after-school activities either. Later he went to the prestigious preparatory schoolA university-preparatory school or college-preparatory school is a secondary school, usually private, designed to prepare students for a college or university education. Some schools will also include a junior, or elementary, school...
Phillips AcademyPhillips Academy is a co-educational independent boarding high school for boarding and day students in grades 9-12...
, in Andover, MassachusettsAndover is a town in Essex County, Massachusetts, United States. It was incorporated in 1646 and as of the 2000 census population was 31,247. It is part of the Boston-Cambridge-Quincy, Massachusetts-New Hampshire metropolitan statistical area....
, where he was admitted based on family connections. They hoped he would go on to YaleYale University is a private research university in New Haven, Connecticut, and a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1701 in the Colony of Connecticut, the university is the third-oldest institution of higher education in the United States. Yale has produced many notable alumni, including five...
, but in 1918, Bogart was expelled.
The details of his expulsion are disputed: one story claims that he was expelled for throwing the headmaster (alternatively, a groundskeeper) into Rabbit Pond, a man-made lake on campus. Another cites smoking and drinking, combined with poor academic performance and possibly some intemperate comments to the staff. It has also been said that he was actually withdrawn from the school by his father for failing to improve his academics, as opposed to expulsion. In any case, his parents were deeply dismayed by the events and their failed plans for his future.
Navy
Coming up with no other career options, Bogart followed his love for the sea and enlisted in the United States NavyThe United States Navy is the sea branch of the U.S. Armed Forces. It is one of the seven uniformed services of the United States. As of 31 December 2008, the U.S. Navy had about 331,682 personnel on active duty and 124,000 in the Navy Reserve. It operates 283 ships in active service and more than...
in the spring of 1918. He recalled later, “At eighteen, war was great stuff. Paris! French girls! Hot damn!” Bogart is recorded as a model sailor who spent most of his months in the navy after the ArmisticeAn armistice is a situation in a war where the warring parties agree to stop fighting. It is not necessarily the end of a war, but may be just a cessation of hostilities while an attempt is made to negotiate a lasting peace...
was signed, ferrying troops back from Europe.
Trademark scar
It was during his naval stint that Bogart may have gotten his trademark scar and developed his characteristic lisp, though the actual circumstances are unclear. In one account, during a shelling of his ship the , his lip was cut by a piece of shrapnel, although some claim Bogart didn’t make it to sea until after the ArmisticeThe armistice treaty between the Allies and Germany was signed in a railway carriage in Compiègne Forest on 11 November 1918, and marked the end of the First World War on the Western Front...
was signed. Another version, which Bogart's long time friend, author Nathaniel BenchleyNathaniel Benchley was an American author.Born in Newton, Massachusetts to a literary family, he was the son of Gertrude Darling and Robert Benchley , the noted American writer, humorist, critic, actor, and one of the founders of the Algonquin Round Table in New York City.Nathaniel Benchley was...
, claims is the truth, is Bogart was injured while on assignment to take a naval prisoner to Portsmouth Naval PrisonPortsmouth Naval Prison is a former U.S. Navy and Marine Corps prison in Kittery, Maine on Seavey's Island, the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard compound. The building's appearance earned it a nickname, "the Castle." Others called it "Alcatraz of the East" because no inmate ever successfully escaped...
in Kittery, MaineKittery is a town in York County, Maine, United States. The population was 9,543 at the 2000 census. The town declares itself to be the "Gateway to Maine." Home to the Portsmouth Naval Shipyard on Seavey's Island, Kittery includes Badger's Island, the seaside district of Kittery Point, and part of...
. Supposedly, while changing trains in Boston, the handcuffed prisoner asked Bogart for a cigarette and while Bogart looked for a match, the prisoner raised his hands, smashed Bogart across the mouth with his cuffs, cutting Bogart's lip, and fled. The prisoner was eventually taken to Portsmouth. An alternate explanation is in the process of uncuffing an inmate, Bogart was struck in the mouth when the inmate wielded one open, uncuffed bracelet while the other side was still on his wrist. According to Darwin PorterDarwin Porter is known as one of the writers of the Frommer's travel guides and a sensationalist Hollywood biographer known for books whose source material derives from transcription of oral dialogues from living witnesses of not-widely-publicized events and relationships in the entertainment...
's Humphrey Bogart: The Early Years, the scar was caused by his father, Belmont, during a terrible argument.
By the time Bogart was treated by a doctor, the scar had already formed. "Goddamn doctor," Bogart later told David NivenJames David Graham Niven , known as David Niven, was an English actor and novelist, best known for his roles as Phileas Fogg in Around the World in 80 Days and Sir Charles Litton, a.k.a. "the Phantom," in The Pink Panther.-Early life:David Niven was born in London, England...
, "instead of stitching it up, he screwed it up." Niven says that when he asked Bogart about his scar he said it was caused by a childhood accident; Niven claims the stories that Bogart got the scar during wartime were made up by the studios to inject glamour. His post-service physical makes no mention of the lip scar even though it mentions many smaller scars, so the actual cause may have come later. When actress Louise BrooksMary Louise Brooks , generally known by her stage name Louise Brooks, was an American dancer, model, showgirl and silent film actress, famous for pioneering the bobbed haircut. Brooks is best known for her three feature roles including two G. W...
met Bogart in 1924, he had some scarred tissue on his upper lip, which Belmont Bogart may have partially repaired before Bogart went into films in 1930. She believes his scar had nothing to do with his distinctive speech pattern, his "lip wound gave him no speech impediment, either before or after it was mended. Over the years, Bogart practiced all kinds of lip gymnastics, accompanied by nasal tones, snarls, lisps, and slurs. His painful wince, his leer, his fiendish grin were the most accomplished ever seen on film."
Early career
Bogart returned home to find Belmont was suffering from poor health (perhaps aggravated by morphineMorphine is a highly potent opiate analgesic psychoactive drug, is the principal active ingredient in Papaver somniferum , is considered to be the prototypical opioid. Like other opioids, e.g...
addiction), his medical practice was faltering, and he lost much of the family's money on bad investments in timber. During his naval days, Bogart's character and values developed independent of family influence, and he began to rebel somewhat from their values. He came to be a liberal who hated pretensions, phonies, and snobs, and at times he defied conventional behavior and authority, traits he displayed in life and in his movies. On the other hand, he retained their traits of good manners, articulateness, punctuality, modesty, and a dislike of being touched.
After his naval service, Bogart worked as a shipper and then bond salesman. He joined the Naval ReserveThe United States Navy Reserve , until 2005 known as the United States Naval Reserve, is the Reserve Component of the United States Navy. Members of the Navy Reserve, called Reservists, are enrolled in the Selected Reserve , the the Full Time Support , or Retired Reserve program...
. More importantly, he resumed his friendship with boyhood mate Bill Brady, Jr. whose father had show business connections, and eventually Bogart got an office job working for William A. BradyWilliam Aloysius Brady was an American theatre actor, producer, and sports promoter.-Biography:Brady was born to a newspaperman in 1863. His father kidnapped him from San Francisco and brought William to New York City, where his father worked as a writer while William was forced to sell newspapers...
Sr.'s new company World Films. Bogart got to try his hand at screenwritingScreenwriting is the art and craft of writing scripts for film, television or video games.Writing for film is potentially one of the most high-profile and best-paying careers available to a writer and, as such, is also perhaps the most sought after...
, directing, and production, but excelled at none. For a while, he was stage managerStage management is a sub-discipline of stagecraft.Although a somewhat fluid line of work, in essence the stage management team is responsible for organizing the production, communicating across different disciplines Stage management is a sub-discipline of stagecraft.Although a somewhat fluid line...
for Brady's daughter's play A Ruined Lady. A few months later in 1921, Bogart made his stage debut in Drifting as a Japanese butler in another Alice BradyAlice Brady was an American actress who began her career in the silent film era and survived the transition into talkies. She worked up until six months before her death from cancer in...
play, nervously speaking one line of dialog. Several more appearances followed in her subsequent plays. Bogart liked the late hours actors kept, and enjoyed the attention an actor got on stage. He spent a lot of his free time in speakeasiesA speakeasy was an establishment which illegally sold alcoholic beverages during the period of United States history known as Prohibition...
and became a heavy drinker. A bar room brawl during this time might have been the actual cause of Bogart's lip damage, as this coincides better with the Louise BrooksMary Louise Brooks , generally known by her stage name Louise Brooks, was an American dancer, model, showgirl and silent film actress, famous for pioneering the bobbed haircut. Brooks is best known for her three feature roles including two G. W...
account. As he stated, “I was born to be indolent and this was the softest of rackets”.
Bogart was raised to believe acting was beneath a gentleman, but he enjoyed stage acting. He never took acting lessons, but was persistent and worked steadily at his craft. He appeared in at least seventeen Broadway productions between 1922 and 1935. He played juveniles or romantic second-leads in drawing room comedies. He is said to have been the first actor to ask "Tennis, anyone?" on stage. Critic Alexander WoollcottAlexander Humphreys Woollcott was an American critic and commentator for The New Yorker magazine, and a member of the Algonquin Round Table....
wrote of Bogart's early work that he "is what is usually and mercifully described as inadequate." Some reviews were kinder. Heywood BrounHeywood Campbell Broun was an American journalist. He worked as a sportswriter, newspaper columnist, and editor in New York City. He founded the American Newspaper Guild, now known as The Newspaper Guild. Born in Brooklyn, New York, he is best remembered for his writing on social issues and his...
reviewing Nerves wrote, “Humphrey Bogart gives the most effective performance…both dry and fresh, if that be possible”. Bogart loathed the trivial, effeminate parts he had to play early in his career, calling them "White Pants Willie" roles.
Early in his career, while playing double roles in the play Drifting at the Playhouse Theatre in 1922, Bogart met Helen MenkenHelen Menken was an American actress, born Helen Meinken to a German-French father, Frederick Meinken, and an Irish-born mother, Mary Madden....
. They were married on May 20, 1926 at the Gramercy Park HotelThe Gramercy Park Hotel in New York City is a luxury hotel located at 2 Lexington Avenue, next to Gramercy Park, one of only a few private parks in the United States.-Hotel history:...
in New York City, divorced on November 18, 1927, and remained friends. Later on April 3, 1928, he married Mary PhilipsMary Philips was an American stage and film actress-Biography:Born in New London, Connecticut, Phillips was educated in a New Haven, Connecticut, at St. Mary's Academy. She was the only child of Anna Hurley and Charles Philips of New Haven, Connecticut.In 1920 she made her stage debut as a chorus...
at her mother's apartment in Hartford, ConnecticutHartford is the capital city of the U.S. state of Connecticut. It is located in Hartford County on the Connecticut River, north of the center of the state, south of Springfield, Massachusetts. Its 2006 population of 124,512 ranks Hartford as the state's second-largest city, after Bridgeport. New...
. She, like Menken, had a fiery temper. He met Mary when they appeared in the play Nerves that had a very brief run at the Comedy Theatre in September 1924.
After the stock market crash of 1929, stage production dropped off sharply, and many of the more photogenic actors headed for Hollywood. Bogart's earliest film role is with Helen HayesHelen Hayes was an American actress whose career spanned almost 70 years. She eventually garnered the nickname "First Lady of the American Theatre" and was one of only ten people who have won an Emmy, a Grammy, an Oscar and a Tony Award...
in the 1928 two-reeler The Dancing Town, of which a complete copy has never been found. He also appeared with Joan BlondellRose Joan Blondell was an American actress.After winning a beauty pageant, Blondell embarked upon a film career. Establishing herself as a sexy wisecracking blonde, she was a pre-Hays Code staple of Warner Brothers and appeared in more than 100 movies and television productions...
in a VitaphoneVitaphone was a sound film process used on features and nearly 2,000 short subjects produced by Warner Bros. and its sister studio First National from 1926 to 1930. This was not the original process. The first process was called Fuchessound. Vitaphone was the last, but most successful, of the...
short in 1930 which was re-discovered in 1963. Bogart then signed a contract with
Fox Film Corporation for $750 a week. Spencer TracySpencer Bonaventure Tracy was an American theatrical and film actor, who appeared in 74 films from 1930 to 1967. In 1999, the American Film Institute named Tracy among the Greatest Male Stars of All Time, ranking 9th on the list...
was a serious Broadway actor whom Bogart liked and admired, and they became good friends and drinking buddies. It was Tracy, in 1930, who first called him "Bogey". (Spelled variously in many sources, Bogart himself spelled his nickname "Bogie".) Tracy and Bogart appeared in their only film together in John FordJohn Ford was an American film director of Irish heritage famous for both his westerns such as Stagecoach and The Searchers and adaptations of such classic 20th-century American novels as The Grapes of Wrath...
's early sound filmA sound film is a motion picture with synchronized sound, or sound technologically coupled to image, as opposed to a silent film. The first known public exhibition of projected sound films took place in Paris in 1900, but decades would pass before reliable synchronization was made commercially...
Up the RiverUp the River is a comedy film about escaped convicts, directed by John Ford and featuring Spencer Tracy and Humphrey Bogart in their feature film debuts.-Plot:...
(1930), with both playing inmates. It was Tracy's film debut. Bogart then performed in The Bad SisterThe Bad Sister is a 1931 American drama film made by Universal Pictures, directed by Hobart Henley, produced byCarl Laemmle Jr. and written by Edwin H. Knopf....
with Bette DavisRuth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis was an American actress of film, television and theatre. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres; from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional...
in 1931, in a minor part.
Bogart shuttled back and forth between Hollywood and the New York stage from 1930 to 1935, suffering long periods without work. His parents were living separately and Belmont died in 1934 in debt, which Bogart eventually paid off. (Bogart inherited his father's gold ring which he always wore, even in many of his films. At his father's deathbed, Bogart finally told Belmont how much he loved him.) Bogart's second marriage was on the rocks, and he was less than happy with his acting career to date; he became depressed, irritable, and drank heavily.
The Petrified Forest
Bogart starred in the Broadway play Invitation to a Murder at the Theatre Masque, now the John Golden TheatreThe John Golden Theatre is a legitimate Broadway theatre located at 252 West 45th Street in midtown-Manhattan. Designed in a Moorish style along with the adjacent Royale Theatre by architect Herbert J. Krapp for Irwin Chanin, it opened as the Theater Masque on February 24 1927 with the play...
in 1934. The producer Arthur HopkinsArthur Hopkins was a Broadway theater director and producer in the early twentieth century. He directed plays by playwrights in American Expressionist theater, including Elmer Rice, Sophie Treadwell, and Eugene O'Neill.-Further reading:...
heard the play from off-stage and sent for Bogart to play escaped murderer Duke Mantee in Robert E. SherwoodRobert Emmet Sherwood American playwright, editor, and screenwriter.-Biography:Born in New Rochelle, New York, he was the son of the prominent American portrait artist Rosina Emmet Sherwood...
's new play, The Petrified ForestThe Petrified Forest is a predecessor to film noir, with an original screenplay by Delmer Daves and Charles Kenyon derived from the 1935 play by Robert E. Sherwood. The movie stars Leslie Howard as Alan Squier, Bette Davis as Gabrielle "Gabby" Maple, and Humphrey Bogart in his career breakthrough...
. Hopkins recalled, “When I saw the actor I was somewhat taken aback, for he was the one I never much admired. He was an antiquated juvenile who spent most of his stage life in white pants swinging a tennis racquet. He seemed as far from a cold-blooded killer as one could get, but the voice (dry and tired) persisted, and the voice was Mantee's”.
The play had 197 performances at the Broadhurst TheatreThe Broadhurst Theatre is a legitimate Broadway theatre located at 235 West 44th Street in midtown Manhattan.It was designed by architect Herbert J. Krapp, a well-known theatre designer who had been working directly with the Shubert brothers; the Broadhurst opened 27 September 1917...
in New York in 1935. Leslie HowardLeslie Howard Steiner , better known by his stage name Leslie Howard, was an English stage and film actor, director, and producer...
though, was the star. A critic for the New York Times Brooks AtkinsonJustin Brooks Atkinson was an American theatre critic. He worked for The New York Times from 1925 to 1960. In his obituary, the Times called him "the most important reviewer of his time."...
said of the play, “a peach… a roaring Western melodrama… Humphrey Bogart does the best work of his career as an actor.” Bogart said the movie, “marked my deliverance from the ranks of the sleek, sybaritic, stiff-shirted, swallow-tailed ‘smoothies’ to which I seemed condemned to life.” However, he was still feeling insecure.
Warner Bros. bought the screen rights to The Petrified Forest. The studio was famous for its socially realistic, urban, low-budget action pictures: the play seemed like the perfect property for them, especially when the public was presently entranced by real life criminals like John DillingerJohn Herbert Dillinger was an American bank robber in the Midwest during the early 1930s. He was considered to be a dangerous criminal who was involved in the deaths of several police officers, robbed at least two dozen banks and four police stations, escaped from jail twice and was idolized by...
and Dutch SchultzDutch Schultz , was a New York City-area gangster of the 1920s and 1930s who made his fortune in organized crime-related activities such as bootlegging alcohol and the numbers racket....
. Bette DavisRuth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis was an American actress of film, television and theatre. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres; from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional...
and Leslie Howard were cast, and Howard, who held production rights, made it clear he wanted Bogart to star with him. The studio tested several Hollywood veterans for the Duke Mantee role, and chose Edward G. RobinsonEdward Goldenberg Robinson, Sr. was an American actor born in Romania...
, who had greater star appeal and was due to make a film to fulfill his expensive contract. Bogart cabled news of this to Howard, who was in ScotlandScotland is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Occupying the northern third of the island of Great Britain, it shares a border with England to the south and is bounded by the North Sea to the east, the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, and the North Channel and Irish Sea to the...
. Howard cabled reply was, “Att: Jack Warner Insist Bogart Play Mantee No Bogart No Deal L.H.”. When Warner Bros. saw that Howard would not budge, they gave in and cast Bogart. Jack Warner, famous for butting heads with his stars, tried to get Bogart to adopt a stage name, but Bogart stubbornly refused. Bogart never forgot Howard's favor, and in 1952 he named his only daughter, Leslie, after Howard, who had died in World War IIWorld War II, or the Second World War , was a global military conflict which involved a majority of the world's nations, including all great powers, organized into two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. Robert E. Sherwood remained a close friend of Bogart's.
Early film career
The film version of The Petrified Forest was released in 1936. His performance was called “brilliant”, “compelling”, and “superb.” Despite his success in an “A movie,” Bogart received a tepid twenty-six week contract at $550 per week and was typecastTypecasting is the process by which a film, TV, or stage actor is strongly identified with a specific character, one or more particular roles, or characters with the same traits or ethnic grouping....
as a gangster in a series of "B movieA B movie is a low-budget commercial motion picture conceived neither as an arthouse film nor as pornography. In its original usage, during the so-called Golden Age of Hollywood, the term more precisely identified a film intended for distribution as the less-publicized, bottom half of a double...
" crime dramas. Bogart was proud of his success, but the fact that it came from playing a gangsterA Gangster is a criminal who is a member of a crime organization, such as a gang. The terms are most commonly used in reference to members of the criminal organizations associated with American prohibition and the American offshoot of the Italian Mafia, such as the Chicago Outfit, the Philadelphia...
weighed on him. He once said, "I can't get in a mild discussion without turning it into an argument. There must be something in my tone of voice, or this arrogant face—something that antagonizes everybody. Nobody likes me on sight. I suppose that's why I'm cast as the heavy."
Bogart's roles were not only repetitive, but physically demanding and draining (studios were not yet air-conditioned), and his regimented, tight-scheduled job at Warners was not exactly the “peachy” actor's life he hoped for. However, he was always professional and generally respected by other actors. In those 'B movie' years, Bogart started developing his lasting film persona — the wounded, stoical, cynical, charming, vulnerable, self-mocking loner with a core of honor.
Bogart's disputes with Warner Brothers over roles and money were similar to those the studio had with other less-than-obedient stars, including Bette DavisRuth Elizabeth "Bette" Davis was an American actress of film, television and theatre. Noted for her willingness to play unsympathetic characters, she was highly regarded for her performances in a range of film genres; from contemporary crime melodramas to historical and period films and occasional...
, James CagneyJames Francis Cagney, Jr. was an American film actor. Although he won acclaim and major awards for a wide variety of roles, he is best remembered for playing "tough guys." In 1999, the American Film Institute ranked him eighth among the Greatest Male Stars of All Time.For his first performing...
, Errol FlynnErrol Leslie Flynn was an Australian film actor, known for his romantic swashbuckler roles in Hollywood films and his flamboyant lifestyle.-Background and early life:...
, and Olivia de HavillandOlivia Mary de Havilland is an actress. She is the elder sister of actress Joan Fontaine. De Havilland is one of the last surviving female stars from 1930s Hollywood. She is also the last living lead from Gone with the Wind....
.
The studio systemThe studio system was a means of film production and distribution dominant in Hollywood from the early 1920s through the 1950s. The term studio system refers to the practice of large motion picture studios producing movies primarily on their own filmmaking lots with creative personnel under often...
, then at its most entrenched, usually restricted actors to one studio, with occasional loan-outs, and Warner Bros. had no interest in making Bogart a top star. Shooting on a new movie might begin days or only hours after shooting on the previous one was completed. Any actor who refused a role could be suspended without pay. Bogart disliked the roles chosen for him, but he worked steadily: between 1936 and 1940, Bogart averaged a movie every two months, sometimes even working on two simultaneously, as movies were not generally shot sequentially. Amenities at Warners were few compared to those for their fellow actors at MGM. Bogart thought that Warner wardrobe department was cheap, and often wore his own suits in his movies. In High Sierra, Bogart used his own pet dog called Zero to play his character's dog "Pard."
The leading men ahead of Bogart at Warner Bros. included not just such classic stars as James CagneyJames Francis Cagney, Jr. was an American film actor. Although he won acclaim and major awards for a wide variety of roles, he is best remembered for playing "tough guys." In 1999, the American Film Institute ranked him eighth among the Greatest Male Stars of All Time.For his first performing...
and Edward G. RobinsonEdward Goldenberg Robinson, Sr. was an American actor born in Romania...
, but also actors far less well-known today, such as Victor McLaglenVictor Andrew de Bier Everleigh McLaglen was an English actor, boxer and World War I veteran.-Early life:...
, George RaftGeorge Raft was an American film actor identified with portrayals of gangsters in crime melodramas of the 1930s and 1940s.-Early life:...
and Paul MuniPaul Muni was an American stage and film actor.-Early life and career:He was born Meshilem Meier Weisenfreund to a Jewish family in Lemberg, Galicia, a province of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, now Lviv, Ukraine....
. Most of the studio's better movie scripts went to these men, and Bogart had to take what was left. He made films like Racket Busters, San QuentinSan Quentin is a 1937 Warner Bros. drama film directed by Lloyd Bacon and starring Pat O'Brien, Humphrey Bogart and Ann Sheridan. It was shot on location at San Quentin State Prison.-Plot summary:...
, and You Can't Get Away With Murder. The only substantial leading role he got during this period was in Dead EndDead End is a 1937 crime drama film. It is an adaptation of the Sidney Kingsley 1935 Broadway play of the same name. It stars Humphrey Bogart, Joel McCrea, and Sylvia Sidney...
(1937), while loaned to Samuel GoldwynSamuel Goldwyn was an American film producer, and founding contributor executive of several motion picture studios.-Biography:...
, where he portrayed a gangster modeled after Baby Face NelsonLester Joseph Gillis , known under the pseudonym George Nelson, was a bank robber and murderer in the 1930s better known as Baby Face Nelson due to his youthful appearance and small stature.-Early years:...
. He did play a variety of interesting supporting roles, such as in Angels with Dirty FacesAngels with Dirty Faces is a Warner Bros. gangster film directed by Michael Curtiz and starring James Cagney, Pat O'Brien, the Dead End Kids and Humphrey Bogart, along with Ann Sheridan and George Bancroft...
(1938) (in which he got shot by James CagneyJames Francis Cagney, Jr. was an American film actor. Although he won acclaim and major awards for a wide variety of roles, he is best remembered for playing "tough guys." In 1999, the American Film Institute ranked him eighth among the Greatest Male Stars of All Time.For his first performing...
). Bogart was gunned down on film repeatedly, by Cagney and Edward G. Robinson, among others. In Black LegionBlack Legion is a 1937 movie, starring Humphrey Bogart and Erin O'Brien-Moore in a fictionalized story about the real-life Black Legion of the 1930s.-Film summary:Bogart plays Frank Taylor, a Detroit factory worker who joins the "pro-American" Black Legion is a 1937 movie, starring Humphrey Bogart...
(1937), for a change, he plays a good man caught up and destroyed by a racist organization, a movie Graham GreeneHenry Graham Greene OM, CH was an English author, playwright and literary critic. His works explore the ambivalent moral and political issues of the modern world...
called “intelligent and exciting, if rather earnest”.
In 1938, Warner Bros. put him in a "hillbillyHillbilly is a term referring to people who dwell in rural, mountainous areas of the United States, primarily Appalachia and the Ozarks. Due to its strongly stereotypical connotations, the term is frequently considered derogatory, and so is usually offensive to those Americans of Ozarkan and...
musical" called Swing Your Lady as a wrestling promoter; he later apparently considered this his worst film performance. In 1939, Bogart played a mad scientist in The Return of Doctor XThe Return of Doctor X is a horror film starring Wayne Morris, Rosemary Lane, and Humphrey Bogart as the title character. It was based on the short story "The Doctor's Secret" by William J. Makin. Despite supposedly being a sequel to Doctor X, the films are unrelated.-Plot:Dr...
. He cracked: "If it'd been Jack WarnerJack Leonard "J.L." Warner , born Jacob Warner in London, Ontario, Canada, was the president and driving force behind the successful development of Warner Bros. Studios in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California...
's blood…I wouldn't have minded so much. The trouble was they were drinking mine and I was making this stinking movie."
Mary Philips, in her own sizzling stage hit A Touch of Brimstone (1935), refused to give up her Broadway career to come to Hollywood with Bogart. After the play closed, however, she went to Hollywood, but insisted on continuing her career (she was still a bigger star than he was) and they decided to divorce in 1937. On August 21, 1938, Bogart entered into a disastrous third marriage, with actress Mayo MethotMayo Methot , also known as Mayo Methot Bogart, was an American film and theater actress.- Biography :Methot was born in Portland, Oregon. A petite brunette, she became a popular actress on Broadway during the 1920s where she was admired for both her acting and singing ability...
, a lively, friendly woman when sober, but paranoidParanoia is a thought process heavily influenced by excessive anxiety or fear, often to the point of irrationality and delusion. Paranoid thinking typically includes persecutory beliefs concerning a perceived threat towards oneself. In the original Greek, παράνοια simply means madness...
when drunk. She was convinced that her husband was cheating on her. The more she and Bogart drifted apart, the more she drank, got furious and threw things at him: plants, crockery, anything close at hand. She even set the house on fire, stabbed him with a knife, and slashed her wrists on several occasions. Bogart for his part needled her mercilessly and seemed to enjoy confrontation. Sometimes he turned violent. The press accurately dubbed them "the Battling Bogarts". "The Bogart-Methot marriage was the sequel to the Civil WarThe American Civil War , also known as the War Between the States and several other names, was a civil war in the United States of America. Eleven Southern slave states declared their secession from the United States and formed the Confederate States of America...
", said their friend Julius EpsteinJulius J. Epstein was an American screenwriter, who had a long career, most noted for the adaptation - in partnership with his twin brother, Philip, and others —- of the unproduced play Everybody Comes to Rick's that became the screenplay for the film Casablanca , for which its team of...
. A wag observed that there was "madness in his Methot". During this time, Bogart bought a motor launch, which he named "Sluggy" after his nickname for his hot-tempered wife. Despite his proclamations that "I like a jealous wife", "we get on so well together (because) we don’t have illusions about each other", and "I wouldn't give you two cents for a dame without a temper", it became a highly destructive relationship.
In California in the 1930s, Bogart bought a sailing yacht, the "Santana", from actor Dick PowellRichard Ewing "Dick" Powell was an American singer, actor, producer, director and studio boss.-Biography:...
. The sea was his sanctuary and he loved to sail around Catalina IslandSanta Catalina Island, often called Catalina Island, or just Catalina, is a rocky island off the coast of the U.S. state of California. The island is 22 miles long and eight miles across at its greatest width. The island is located about 22 miles south-southwest of Los Angeles, California...
. He was a serious sailor, respected by other sailors who had seen too many Hollywood actors and their boats. About 30 weekends a year, he went out on his boat. He once said: "An actor needs something to stabilize his personality, something to nail down what he really is, not what he is currently pretending to be."
He had a lifelong disgust for the pretentious, fake or phony, as his son Stephen told Turner Classic MoviesTurner Classic Movies is a cable television channel featuring commercial-free classic movies, mostly from the Turner Entertainment and MGM, United Artists, RKO and Warner Bros. film libraries...
host Robert OsborneRobert Jolin Osborne is an American actor and film historian best known as the host of the Turner Classic Movies network since its inception in 1994...
in 1999. Sensitive yet caustic, and disgusted by the inferior movies he was performing in, Bogart cultivated the persona of a soured idealist, a man exiled from better things in New York, living by his wits, drinking too much, cursed to live out his life among second-rate people and projects.
Bogart rarely saw his own films and avoided premieres. He did not participate in the Hollywood gossip game or cozy up to the newspaper columnists, nor engage in phony politeness and admiration of his peers or in behind the scenes back-stabbing. He even protected his privacy with invented press releases about his private life to satisfy the curiosity of the newspapers and the public. When he thought an actor, director or a movie studio had done something shoddy, he spoke up about it and was willing to be quoted. He advised Robert MitchumRobert Charles Durman Mitchum was an American film actor, author, composer and singer. Mitchum is largely remembered for his starring roles in several major works of the film noir style, and is considered a forerunner of the anti-heroes prevalent in film during the 1950s and 1960s.-Early life and...
that the only way to stay alive in Hollywood was to be an "againster". As a result, he was not the most popular of actors and some in the Hollywood community shunned him privately to avoid trouble with the studios. But the Hollywood press, unaccustomed to candor, was delighted. Bogart once said, "All over Hollywood, they are continually advising me 'Oh, you mustn't say that. That will get you in a lot of trouble' when I remark that some picture or writer or director or producer is no good. I don't get it. If he isn't any good, why can't you say so? If more people would mention it, pretty soon it might start having some effect."
High Sierra
High Sierra, a 1941 movie directed by Raoul WalshRaoul Walsh was an American film director, actor, founding member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences and the brother of silent screen actor George Walsh...
, had a screenplay written by Bogart's friend and drinking partner, John HustonJohn Marcellus Huston was an American filmmaker, screenwriter and actor. He was known for directing the films The Maltese Falcon , The Treasure of the Sierra Madre , Key Largo , The Asphalt Jungle , The African Queen , Moulin Rouge The Misfits , The Man Who Would Be...
, adapted from the novel by W.R. BurnettWilliam Riley Burnett , often credited as W. R. Burnett, was an American novelist and screenwriter. He is best known for the crime novel, Little Caesar, whose film adaptation is considered the first of the classic American gangster movies.Burnett was born in Springfield, Ohio...
(Little CaesarLittle Caesar is a 1930 crime film made during the Pre-Code era which tells the story of a man who works his way up the ranks of the mob until he reaches its upper heights. It stars Edward G. Robinson, Douglas Fairbanks Jr., and Glenda Farrell. The movie was adapted by Francis Edward Faragoh,...
, etc.). Both Paul MuniPaul Muni was an American stage and film actor.-Early life and career:He was born Meshilem Meier Weisenfreund to a Jewish family in Lemberg, Galicia, a province of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, now Lviv, Ukraine....
and George RaftGeorge Raft was an American film actor identified with portrayals of gangsters in crime melodramas of the 1930s and 1940s.-Early life:...
turned down the lead role, giving Bogart the opportunity to play a character of some depth. The film was Bogart's last major film playing a gangster (his final gangster role was in The Big Shot in 1942). Bogart worked well with Ida LupinoIda Lupino was an English-American film actress and director, and a pioneer among women filmmakers. In her forty-eight year career, she appeared in fifty-nine films, and directed nine others. She also appeared in episodic television fifty-eight times and directed fifty other episodes...
, and her relationship with him was a close one, provoking jealousy from Bogart's wife Mayo.
The film cemented a strong personal and professional connection between Bogart and Huston. Bogart admired and somewhat envied Huston for his skill as a writer. Though a poor student, Bogart was a lifelong reader. He could quote PlatoPlato , was a Classical Greek philosopher, mathematician, writer of philosophical dialogues, and founder of the Academy in Athens, the first institution of higher learning in the Western world...
, PopeAlexander Pope is a famous eighteenth century English poet, best known for his satirical verse and for his translation of Homer. He is the third most frequently quoted writer in The Oxford Dictionary of Quotations, after Shakespeare and Tennyson. Pope is famous for his use of the heroic couplet.-...
, Ralph Waldo EmersonRalph Waldo Emerson was an American essayist, philosopher, and poet, best remembered for leading the Transcendentalist movement of the early 19th century. His teachings directly influenced the growing New Thought movement of the mid 1800s...
and over a thousand lines of ShakespeareWilliam Shakespeare was an English poet and playwright, widely regarded as the greatest writer in the English language and the world's preeminent dramatist. He is often called England's national poet and the "Bard of Avon"...
. He subscribed to the Harvard Law ReviewThe Harvard Law Review is a journal of legal scholarship published by an independent student group at Harvard Law School.-Overview:The Review is one of the most cited law reviews in the United States. It is published monthly from November through June, with the November issue dedicated to covering...
. He admired writers, and some of his best friends were screenwriterScreenwriters or scenarists or scriptwriters are people in a film crew who write/create the screenplays from which films and television programs are made....
s, including Louis BromfieldLouis Bromfield was an American author and conservationist who gained international recognition winning the Pulitzer Prize and pioneering innovative scientific farming concepts.-Biography:...
, Nathaniel BenchleyNathaniel Benchley was an American author.Born in Newton, Massachusetts to a literary family, he was the son of Gertrude Darling and Robert Benchley , the noted American writer, humorist, critic, actor, and one of the founders of the Algonquin Round Table in New York City.Nathaniel Benchley was...
and Nunnally JohnsonNunnally Hunter Johnson was an American filmmaker who wrote, produced, and directed films.Johnson was born in Columbus, Georgia. He began his career as a journalist, writing for the Columbus Enquirer Sun, the Savannah Press, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, and the New York Herald Tribune...
. Bogart enjoyed intense, provocative conversation and stiff drinks, as did Huston. Both were rebellious and liked to play childish pranks. John Huston reported being easily bored during production, and admired Bogart (who also got bored easily off camera) not just for his acting talent but for his intense concentration on the set.
The Maltese Falcon
Raft turned down the male lead in John Huston's directorial debut The Maltese FalconThe Maltese Falcon is a 1941 American Warner Bros. film based on novel of the same name by Dashiell Hammett. Written and directed by John Huston, the movie stars Humphrey Bogart as private investigator Sam Spade, Mary Astor as his femme fatale client, Sydney Greenstreet in his film debut, and Peter...
(1941), due to its being a cleaned up version of the pre-Production CodeThe Motion Picture Production Code was the set of industry censorship guidelines which governed the production of the vast majority of United States motion pictures released by major studios from 1930 to 1968. It was originally popularly known as the Hays Code, after its creator, Will H...
The Maltese FalconThe Maltese Falcon is a 1931 Warner Bros. crime film based on the novel of the same name by Dashiell Hammett. It was directed by Roy Del Ruth and stars Ricardo Cortez as private detective Sam Spade and Bebe Daniels in the role of Ruth Wonderly/ Brigid O'Shaughnessy. Also featured are Thelma Todd,...
(1931), his contract stipulating that he did not have to appear in remakes. The original novel, written by Dashiell HammettSamuel Dashiell Hammett was an American author of hard-boiled detective novels and short stories. Among the enduring characters he created are Sam Spade , Nick and Nora Charles , the newspaper comic strip Secret Agent X-9 and the Continental Op...
, was first published in the pulp magazine Black Mask in 1929. It was also the basis for another movie version, Satan Met a LadySatan Met a Lady is a 1936 Warner Bros. comedy/detective film loosely based on Dashiell Hammett's The Maltese Falcon, and starring Bette Davis – who reportedly considered it one of the worst films of her career – and Warren William...
(1936). Complementing Bogart were co-stars Sydney GreenstreetSydney Hughes Greenstreet was an English actor, best known for his work with Humphrey Bogart and Peter Lorre in the 1940s.-Biography:...
, Peter LorrePeter Lorre was an Austrian-American actor frequently typecast as a sinister foreigner.He made an international sensation in 1931 with his portrayal of a serial killer who preys on little girls in the German film M...
, Elisha Cook, Jr., and Mary AstorMary Astor was an American actress. Most remembered for her role as Brigid O'Shaughnessy in The Maltese Falcon with Humphrey Bogart, Astor began her long motion picture career as a teenager in the silent movies of the early 1920s.She eventually made a successful transition to talkies, but almost...
as the treacherous female foil.
Bogart's sharp timing as private detective Sam SpadeSam Spade is a fictional character who is the protagonist of Dashiell Hammett's novel The Maltese Falcon and the various films and adaptations based on it, as well as in three lesser known books by Hammett....
was praised by the cast and director as vital to the quick action and rapid-fire dialog. The film was a huge hit and for Huston, a triumphant directorial debut. Bogart was unusually happy with it, remarking, "it is practically a masterpiece. I don’t have many things I’m proud of… but that's one".
Casablanca
Bogart gained his first real romantic lead in 1942's CasablancaCasablanca is a 1942 American romantic drama film directed by Michael Curtiz, starring Humphrey Bogart, Ingrid Bergman and Paul Henreid and featuring Claude Rains, Conrad Veidt, Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre. Set during World War II, it focuses on a man torn between, in the words of one...
, playing Rick Blaine, the hard-pressed expatriateAn expatriate is a person temporarily or permanently residing in a country and culture other than that of the person's upbringing or legal residence...
nightclub owner, hiding from the past and negotiating a fine line between Nazis, the French undergroundThe French Resistance is the collective name used for the French resistance movements which fought against the Nazi German occupation of France and the collaborationist Vichy Regime during World War II...
, the Vichy prefect and unresolved feelings for his ex-girlfriend. The film was directed by Michael CurtizMichael Curtiz was a Hungarian-American filmmaker. He directed more than fifty films in Europe and more than one hundred in the United States. The best-known were The Adventures of Robin Hood, Angels with Dirty Faces, Casablanca, Yankee Doodle Dandy, and White Christmas. He thrived in the heyday...
, produced by Hal Wallis and featured a strong cast, including Ingrid BergmanIngrid Bergman was a Swedish actress. She won three Academy Awards, two Emmy Awards, and the Tony Award for Best Actress in the first Tony Award ceremony in 1947. She is ranked as the fourth greatest female star of American cinema of all time by the American Film Institute...
, Claude RainsClaude Rains was an English stage and film actor whose career spanned 47 years; he later held American citizenship. He was known for many roles in Hollywood films, among them The Invisible Man, the corrupt senator in Mr...
, Sydney GreenstreetSydney Hughes Greenstreet was an English actor, best known for his work with Humphrey Bogart and Peter Lorre in the 1940s.-Biography:...
, Paul HenreidPaul Henreid , whose birthname was Paul Georg Julius Hernreid Ritter von Wassel-Waldingau, was an Austrian actor and film director.-Early life:...
, Conrad VeidtConrad Veidt was a German actor best remembered for his films roles, such as The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari , The Thief of Bagdad and Casablanca...
, Peter LorrePeter Lorre was an Austrian-American actor frequently typecast as a sinister foreigner.He made an international sensation in 1931 with his portrayal of a serial killer who preys on little girls in the German film M...
and Dooley WilsonArthur "Dooley" Wilson was an African American actor and singer. He was born in Tyler, Texas, and is most famous for playing "Sam" in the 1942 film Casablanca.-Career:...
.
In real life, Bogart played tournament chessChess is a board game played between two players. The current form of the game emerged in Southern Europe during the second half of the 15th century after evolving from a similar, much older game of Indian origin...
, one level below master level and often played with crew members and cast off the set. It was reportedly his idea that Rick Blaine be portrayed as a chess player, which also served as a metaphor for the sparring relationship of the characters played by Bogart and Rains in the movie. However, Paul Henreid proved to be the best player.
The on-screen magic of Bogart and Bergman was the result of two actors doing their very best work, not any real-life sparks, though Bogart's perennially jealous wife assumed otherwise. Off the set, the co-stars hardly spoke during the filming, where normally she had a reputation for affairs with her leading men. Because Bergman was taller than her leading man, Bogart had blocks attached to his shoes in certain scenes. She reportedly said later, "I kissed him but I never knew him." Years later, after Bergman had taken up with Italian director Roberto RosselliniRoberto Rossellini was an Italian film director. Rossellini was one of the directors of the Italian neorealist cinema, contributing films such as Roma città aperta to the movement.-Early life:...
, and bore him a child, Bogart confronted her. "You used to be a great star", he said, "What are you now?" "A happy woman," she replied.
Casablanca won the 1943 Academy Award for Best PictureThe Academy Award for Best Motion Picture is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to artists working in the motion picture industry. The Best Picture category is the only category in which every member of the Academy is eligible...
. Bogart was nominated for the Best Actor in a Leading RolePerformance by an Actor in a Leading Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry...
, but lost out to Paul LukasPaul Lukas was a Hungarian-born actor.Born Pál Lukács in Budapest, he arrived in Hollywood in 1927 after a successful stage and film career in Hungary, Germany and Austria where he worked with Max Reinhardt. He made his stage debut in Budapest in 1916 and his film debut in 1917...
for his performance in Watch on the RhineWatch on the Rhine is a 1943 drama film that was adapted by Dashiell Hammett and Lillian Hellman from Hellman's play. The film stars Bette Davis, Paul Lukas and Geraldine Fitzgerald and was directed by Herman Shumlin and Hal Mohr .-Plot:...
. Still, for Bogart, it was a huge triumph. The film vaulted him from fourth place to first in the studio's roster, finally exceeding James CagneyJames Francis Cagney, Jr. was an American film actor. Although he won acclaim and major awards for a wide variety of roles, he is best remembered for playing "tough guys." In 1999, the American Film Institute ranked him eighth among the Greatest Male Stars of All Time.For his first performing...
, and more than doubling his salary to over $460,000 per year by 1946, making him the highest paid actor in the world.
Bogart and Bacall
Bogart met Lauren BacallLauren Bacall is an American film and stage actress and model, known for her husky voice and sultry looks....
while filming To Have and Have NotTo Have and Have Not is a thriller romance war adventure film directed by Howard Hawks and starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall that is nominally based on the novel To Have and Have Not by Ernest Hemingway.-Plot:...
(1944), a very loose adaptation of the Ernest HemingwayErnest Miller Hemingway was an American writer and journalist. He was part of the 1920s expatriate community in Paris, and one of the veterans of World War I later known as "the Lost Generation." He received the Pulitzer Prize in 1953 for The Old Man and the Sea, and the Nobel Prize in Literature...
novel. The movie has many similarities with Casablanca — the same enemies, the same kind of hero, even a piano player sidekick (this time Hoagy CarmichaelHoagland Howard "Hoagy" Carmichael was an American composer, pianist, singer, actor, and bandleader. He is best known for writing "Stardust" , "Georgia On My Mind," and "Heart and Soul", three of the most-recorded American songs of all time.Alec Wilder, in his study of the American popular song,...
).
When they met, Bacall was nineteen and Bogart was forty-five. He nicknamed her "Baby." She had been a model since she was sixteen and had acted in two failed plays. Bogart was drawn to Bacall's high cheekbones, green eyes, tawny blond hair, and lean body, as well as her poise and earthy, outspoken honesty. Reportedly he said, “I just saw your test. We’ll have a lot of fun together”. Their physical and emotional rapport was very strong from the start, and the age difference and different acting experience also created the additional dimension of a mentor-student relationship. Quite contrary to the Hollywood norm, it was his first affair with a leading lady. Bogart was still miserably married and his early meetings with Bacall were discreet and brief, their separations bridged by ardent love letters. The relationship made it much easier for the newcomer to make her first film, and Bogart did his best to put her at ease by joking with her and quietly coaching her. He let her steal scenes and even encouraged it. Howard HawksHoward Winchester Hawks was an influential American film director, producer and screenwriter of the classic Hollywood era...
, for his part, also did his best to boost her performance and her role, and found Bogart easy to direct.
Hawks at some point began to disapprove of the pair. Hawks considered himself her protector and mentor, and Bogart was usurping that role. Hawks fell for Bacall as well (normally he avoided his starlets, and he was married). Hawks told her that she meant nothing to Bogart and even threatened to send her to MonogramMonogram Pictures Corporation was a Hollywood studio that produced and released films, most on low budgets, between 1931 and 1953, when the firm completed a transition to the name Allied Artists. Monogram is considered a leader among the smaller studios sometimes referred to collectively as Poverty...
, the worst studio in Hollywood. Bogart calmed her down and then went after Hawks. Jack Warner settled the dispute and filming resumed. Out of jealousy, Hawks said of Bacall: "Bogie fell in love with the character she played, so she had to keep playing it the rest of her life."
The Big Sleep
Just months after wrapping the film, Bogart and Bacall were re-united for their second movie together, the film noirFilm noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as stretching from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...
masterpiece The Big SleepThe Big Sleep is a film noir directed by Howard Hawks, the first film version of Raymond Chandler's novel of the same name. It stars Humphrey Bogart as detective Philip Marlowe and Lauren Bacall as the female lead. The Big Sleep is a prime example of the film noir genre. William Faulkner, Leigh...
, based on the novel by Raymond ChandlerRaymond Thornton Chandler was an Anglo-American novelist and screenwriter who had an immense stylistic influence upon the modern private detective story, especially in the style of the writing and the attitudes now characteristic of the genre...
, again with script help from William FaulknerWilliam Faulkner was a Nobel Prize-winning American author. One of the most influential writers of the 20th century, his reputation is based on his novels, novellas and short stories. He was also a published poet and an occasional screenwriter.Most of Faulkner's works are set in his native state...
. Chandler thoroughly admired Bogart's performance: "Bogart can be tough without a gun. Also, he has a sense of humor that contains that grating undertone of contempt."
Bogart was still torn between his new love and his sense of duty to his marriage. The mood on the set was tense, the actors both emotionally exhausted as Bogart tried to find a way out of his dilemma. Once again, the dialogue was full of sexual innuendoAn innuendo is, according to the Advanced Oxford Learner's Dictionary, "an indirect remark about somebody or something, usually suggesting something bad or rude; the use of remarks like this: innuendoes about her private life or The song is full of sexual innuendo." The word is often used to...
supplied by Hawks, and Bogart is convincing and enduring as private detective Philip MarlowePhilip Marlowe is a fictional character created by Raymond Chandler in a series of novels including The Big Sleep and The Long Goodbye. Marlowe first appeared, under that name, in The Big Sleep, published in 1939...
. In the end, the film was very successful, though some critics point out that the plot is confusing and overly complicated.
Marriage
Divorce proceedings were initiated by February 1945. Bogart and Bacall then married in a small ceremony at the country home of Bogart's close friend, Pulitzer PrizeThe Pulitzer Prize is a U.S. award for achievements in newspaper journalism, literature and musical composition. It was established by Hungarian-American publisher Joseph Pulitzer and is administered by Columbia University in New York City....
-winning author Louis BromfieldLouis Bromfield was an American author and conservationist who gained international recognition winning the Pulitzer Prize and pioneering innovative scientific farming concepts.-Biography:...
at Malabar FarmMalabar Farm State Park is a state park in Richland County, Ohio, United States, located near Lucas and the Mohican State Park.Malabar Farm was built in 1939 by Pulitzer Prize-winning author Louis Bromfield and was his home until his death in 1956...
in Lucas, OhioLucas is a village in Richland County, Ohio, United States. Lucas was founded in 1836, and is part of the Mansfield, Ohio Metropolitan Statistical Area. The population was 620 at the 2000 census.-Geography:...
on May 21, 1945.
Bogart and Bacall moved into a $160,000 white brick mansion in an exclusive neighborhood in Holmby HillsHolmby Hills is an affluent neighborhood in the district of Westwood in western Los Angeles. It is bordered by the city of Beverly Hills on the east, Wilshire Boulevard on the south, Westwood on the west, and Bel Air on the north. Sunset Boulevard is the area's principal thoroughfare which divides...
.The marriage proved to be a happy one, though there were the normal tensions due to their differences. He was a homebody and she liked nightlife. He loved the sea; it made her sick. Bacall allowed Bogart lots of weekend time on his boat as she got seasick. Bogart's drinking sometimes inflamed tensions.
Lauren Bacall gave birth to Stephen Humphrey Bogart on January 6, 1949. Stephen was named after Bogart's character's nickname in To Have and Have Not, making Bogart a father at 49. Stephen would go on to become a best-selling author and biographer, later hosting a television special about his father on Turner Classic MoviesTurner Classic Movies is a cable television channel featuring commercial-free classic movies, mostly from the Turner Entertainment and MGM, United Artists, RKO and Warner Bros. film libraries...
. They had their second child, Leslie Howard Bogart on August 23, 1952, a girl named after British actor Leslie HowardLeslie Howard Steiner , better known by his stage name Leslie Howard, was an English stage and film actor, director, and producer...
, who had been killed in World War II.
Later career
The enormous success of Casablanca redefined Bogart's career. For the first time, Bogart could be cast successfully as a tough, strong man and, at the same time, as a vulnerable love interest. Despite Bogart's elevated standing, he did not yet have a contractual right of script refusal, so when he got weak scripts, he dug in his heels, and locked horns again with the front office, as he did on the film Conflict (1943). Though he submitted to Jack Warner on that picture, he successfully turned down God is My Co-PilotGod Is My Co-Pilot may refer to:*God is My Co-Pilot a book by Gen. Robert Lee Scott Jr., USAF *God is My Co-Pilot a 1945 film based on the above book*God Is My Co-Pilot a band from New York City...
(1945). During part of 1943 and 1944, Bogart went on USO and War BondWar bonds are debt securities issued by a government for the purpose of financing military operations during times of war. War bonds generate capital for the government and make civilians feel involved in their national militaries...
tours accompanied by Mayo, enduring arduous travels to ItalyItaly , officially the Italian Republic , is a country located on the Italian Peninsula in Southern Europe and on the two largest islands in the Mediterranean Sea, Sicily and Sardinia. Italy shares its northern, Alpine boundary with France, Switzerland, Austria and Slovenia...
and North Africa, including Casablanca.
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre
Riding high in 1947 with a new contract which provided some script refusal rights and the right to form his own separate production company, Bogart reunited with John Huston for The Treasure of the Sierra MadreThe Treasure of the Sierra Madre is a 1927 novel by the mysterious German-English bilingual author B. Traven, in which two penurious Americans of the 1920s join with an old-timer, in Mexico, to prospect for gold...
, a stark tale of greed involving three gold prospectors played out in the dusty back country of MexicoThe United Mexican States , commonly known as Mexico , is a federal constitutional republic in North America. It is bordered on the north by the United States; on the south and west by the Pacific Ocean; on the southeast by Guatemala, Belize, and the Caribbean Sea; and on the east by the Gulf of...
. Absent any love story or a happy ending, it was deemed a risky project. Bogart later said of co-star (and John Huston's father) Walter HustonWalter Huston was a Canadian-born American actor. He was the father of director John Huston and the grandfather of actress Anjelica Huston and actor Danny Huston.-Career:...
, "He's probably the only performer in Hollywood to whom I’d gladly lost a scene".
The film was grueling to make, and was done in summer for greater realism and atmosphere. James AgeeJames Rufus Agee was an American author, journalist, poet, screenwriter and film critic. In the 1940s, he was one of the most influential film critics in the U.S...
wrote, "Bogart does a wonderful job with this character…miles ahead of the very good work he has done before”. John Huston won the Academy Award for direction and screenplay and his father won Best Supporting ActorPerformance by an Actor in a Supporting Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry. Since its inception, however, the...
, but the film had mediocre box office results. Bogart complained, “An intelligent script, beautifully directed—something different—and the public turned a cold shoulder on it".
The House Un-American Activities Committee
Bogart, a liberal DemocratThe Democratic Party is one of the two major contemporary political parties in the United States, along with the Republican Party. It is the oldest political party in continuous operation in the United States and it is one of the oldest parties in the world. In the U.S...
, organized a delegation to Washington, D.C.Washington, D.C. , formally the District of Columbia and commonly referred to as Washington, the District, or simply D.C., is the capital of the United States, founded on July 16, 1790...
, called the Committee for the First AmendmentThe Committee for the First Amendment was an action group formed in September 1947 by actors in support of the Hollywood Ten during the hearings of the House Un-American Activities Committee. It was founded by screenwriter Philip Dunne, actress Myrna Loy, and film directors John Huston and William...
during the height of McCarthyismMcCarthyism is the politically motivated practice of making accusations of disloyalty, subversion, or treason without proper regard for evidence...
, against the House Un-American Activities CommitteeThe House Committee on Un-American Activities was an investigative committee of the United States House of Representatives. In 1969, the House changed the committee's name to "House Committee on Internal Security"...
's harassment of Hollywood screenwriters and actors. He subsequently wrote an article "I'm No Communist" in the March 1948 edition of PhotoplayPhotoplay was one of the first film fan magazines. It was founded in 1911 in Chicago, the same year that J. Stuart Blackton founded a similar magazine entitled Motion Picture Story....
magazine in which he distanced himself from The Hollywood TenThe Hollywood blacklist—more precisely the entertainment industry blacklist, into which it expanded—was the mid-twentieth-century list of screenwriters, actors, directors, musicians, and other U.S. entertainment professionals who were denied employment in the field because of their political...
in order to counter the negative publicity that resulted from his appearance. Bogart wrote: "The ten men cited for contempt by the House Un-American Activities Committee were not defended by us."
Santana Productions
In addition to being offered better, more diverse roles, he started his own production company in 1948, Santana Productions, named after his private sailing yacht. (Santana was also the name of the yacht featured in the 1948 film Key Largo). Jack WarnerJack Leonard "J.L." Warner , born Jacob Warner in London, Ontario, Canada, was the president and driving force behind the successful development of Warner Bros. Studios in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California...
was reportedly furious at this, even though it was in Bogart's contract, fearing that other stars would do the same and major studios would lose their power. The studios, however, were already under a lot of pressure, not just from free-lancing actors like Bogart, James StewartJames Maitland "Jimmy" Stewart was an American film and stage actor, best known for his self-effacing persona. Over the course of his career, he starred in many films widely considered classics and was nominated for five Academy Awards, winning one in competition and receiving one Lifetime...
, Henry FondaHenry Jaynes Fonda was an American film and stage actor, best known for his roles as plain-speaking idealists. Fonda's subtle, naturalistic acting style preceded by many years the popularization of method acting....
and others (who also saved taxes as independents), but also from the eroding impact of television and from anti-trust laws which were breaking up theater chains.
Under Bogart's Santana Productions, which released through Columbia PicturesColumbia Pictures Industries, Inc. is an American film production and distribution company. Columbia Pictures now forms part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, owned by Sony Pictures Entertainment, a subsidiary of the Japanese conglomerate Sony. It is one of the leading film companies...
, Bogart starred in Knock on Any DoorKnock on Any Door is an American court-room trial film noir directed by Nicholas Ray and starring Humphrey Bogart. The picture introduced John Derek to film and was based on the novel of the same name by Willard Motley.-Plot:...
(1949), Tokyo JoeFor the Japanese-American mobster and FBI informant, see Ken Eto.Tokyo Joe is a 1949 film directed by Stuart Heisler and starring Humphrey Bogart, Florence Marly and Sessue Hayakawa...
(1949), In a Lonely PlaceIn a Lonely Place is a film noir directed by Nicholas Ray, and starring Humphrey Bogart and Gloria Grahame, produced for Bogart's Santana Productions. The script was adapted by Edmund North from the 1947 novel In a Lonely Place by Dorothy B. Hughes.Bogart stars in the film as Dixon Steele, a...
(1950), SiroccoSirocco is an American film noir directed by Curtis Bernhardt and written by A.I. Bezzerides and Hans Jacoby. It is based on the novel Coup de Grace written by Joseph Kessel. The drama features Humphrey Bogart, Märta Torén, Lee J. Cobb, among others.-Plot:In 1925 Damascus, the natives engage in a...
(1951) and Beat the DevilBeat the Devil is a 1953 film directed by John Huston and starring Humphrey Bogart. It was co-authored by Huston and Truman Capote, and loosely based upon a novel of the same name by British journalist and critic Claud Cockburn, writing under the pseudonym James Helvick...
(1954). While the majority of his films lost money at the box office (the main reason for Santana's end), at least two of them are still remembered today; In a Lonely Place is now recognized as a masterpiece of film noirFilm noir is a cinematic term used primarily to describe stylish Hollywood crime dramas, particularly those that emphasize cynical attitudes and sexual motivations. Hollywood's classic film noir period is generally regarded as stretching from the early 1940s to the late 1950s...
. Bogart plays embittered writer Dixon Steele, who has a history of violence and becomes a suspect in a murder case at the same time that he falls in love with a failed actress, played by Gloria GrahameGloria Grahame was an American actress.Grahame began her acting career in theatre, and in 1944 she made her first film for MGM. Despite a featured role in It's a Wonderful Life , MGM did not believe she had the potential for major success, and sold her contract to RKO Studios...
. Many Bogart biographers and actress/writer Louise BrooksMary Louise Brooks , generally known by her stage name Louise Brooks, was an American dancer, model, showgirl and silent film actress, famous for pioneering the bobbed haircut. Brooks is best known for her three feature roles including two G. W...
agree that the role is the closest to Bogart's real selfThe Real self theory in politics and philosophy proposes that people often have a private "real will" , that is different from their public "expressed will".-References:...
and is considered among his best performances. She wrote that the film “gave him a role that he could play with complexity, because the film character's pride in his art, his selfishness, drunkenness, lack of energy stabbed with lightning strokes of violence were shared by the real Bogart”. The character even mimics some of Bogart's personal habits, including twice ordering Bogart's favorite meal of ham and eggs.
Beat the Devil, his last film with his close friend and favorite director John HustonJohn Marcellus Huston was an American filmmaker, screenwriter and actor. He was known for directing the films The Maltese Falcon , The Treasure of the Sierra Madre , Key Largo , The Asphalt Jungle , The African Queen , Moulin Rouge The Misfits , The Man Who Would Be...
, also enjoys a cult following. Co-written by Truman CapoteTruman Garcia Capote , born Truman Streckfus Persons, was an American writer, many of whose short stories, novels, plays, and nonfiction are recognized literary classics, including the novella Breakfast at Tiffany's and In Cold Blood , which he labeled a "nonfiction novel"...
, the movie is a parody of The Maltese Falcon, and is a tale of an amoral group of rogues chasing an unattainable treasure, in this instance uraniumUranium is a silvery-white metallic chemical element in the actinide series of the periodic table that has the symbol U and atomic number 92. Besides its 92 protons, a uranium nucleus can have between 141 and 146 neutrons. The most common uranium isotopes are U-238 and U-235 . A uranium atom has...
.
Bogart sold his interest in Santana to Columbia for over $1 million in 1955.
The panda incident
Bogart and his friend Bill Seeman arrived at the El MoroccoEl Morocco was a 20th century Manhattan nightclub frequented by the rich and famous in the 1930s and 1950s. It was famous for its blue zebra-stripe motif and its official photographer, Jerome Zerbe.-History:In 1931, John Perona , an Italian...
Club in New York City after midnight in 1950. Bogart and Seeman sent someone to buy two 22-pound stuffed pandas because, in a drunken state, they thought the pandas would be good company. They propped up the bears in separate chairs, and began to drink. Two young women saw the stuffed animals. When one woman picked one up, she quickly ended up on the floor. The other woman tried to do the same and wound up in the same position.
The next morning Bogart was awakened by a city official who served him a summons for assault. Knowing a media frenzy was imminent, he met the media unshaven and in pajamas. He told the press he remembered grabbing the panda and "this screaming, squawking young lady. Nobody got hurt, I didn't sock anybody; if girls were falling on the floor, I guess it was because they couldn't stand up." At the same time TimeTime is an American newsmagazine. A European edition is published from London. Time Europe covers the Middle East, Africa and, since 2003, Latin America. An Asian edition is based in Hong Kong. As of 2009, Time no longer publishes a Canadian advertiser edition...
reported the alleged victim had three marks from the alleged assault and "she explained that they were swelling and contusions." Club spokesperson Leonard MacBain stated, "No blows were exchanged, it was just one of those things."
The following Friday, after the woman admitted to touching the panda, "Magistrate John R. Starkey ruled that Bogart had been defending his property, said he suspected the actor had been mousetrapped in the cause of club publicity, and dismissed the case."
The African Queen
Bogart starred with Katharine HepburnKatharine Houghton Hepburn was an American actress of film, television and stage.Hepburn holds the record for the most Best Actress Oscar wins with four, from 12 nominations. Hepburn won an Emmy Award in 1976 for her lead role in Love Among the Ruins, and was nominated for four other Emmys, two...
in the movie The African QueenThe African Queen is an American drama film adapted from the 1935 novel by C. S. Forester. The film was directed by John Huston and produced by Sam Spiegel and John Woolf. The screenplay was adapted by James Agee, John Huston, John Collier and Peter Viertel. It was photographed in Technicolor by...
in 1951, again directed by his friend John Huston. The novel was overlooked and left undeveloped for fifteen years until producer Sam SpiegelSam Spiegel was an independent Academy Award-winning film producer.-Life and career:Spiegel was born in Jaroslau, Austria as Samuel P. Spiegel to a German-Jewish father and Polish mother and educated at the University of Vienna. His brother was Shalom Spiegel, a professor of medieval Hebrew poetry...
and Huston bought the rights. Spiegel sent Katharine Hepburn the book and she suggested Bogart for the male lead, firmly believing that “he was the only man who could have played that part”. Huston's love of adventure, a chance to work with Hepburn, and Bogart's earlier successes with Huston convinced Bogart to leave the comfortable confines of Hollywood for a difficult shoot on location in the Belgian CongoThe Belgian Congo was the formal title of present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo between King Leopold II's formal relinquishment of personal control over the state to Belgium on 15 November 1908, and the dawn of Congolese independence on 30 June 1960.-Background: 1884-1908:Until the later...
in Africa. Bogart was to get 30 percent of the profits and Hepburn 10 percent, plus a relatively small salary for both. The stars met up in London[]London is the capital of England and the United Kingdom. It has been a major settlement for two millennia, and the history of London goes back to its founding by the Romans, when it was named Londinium. London's core, the ancient City of London, the 'square mile', retains its medieval boundaries...
and announced the happy prospect of working together.
Bacall came for the duration (over four months), leaving their young child behind, but the Bogarts started the trip with a junket through Europe, including a visit with Pope Pius XIIPope Pius XII , born Eugenio Maria Giuseppe Giovanni Pacelli , reigned as the 260th Pope, head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of Vatican City, from 2 March 1939 until his death in 1958....
. Later, the glamor would be gone and she would make herself useful as a cook, nurse, and clothes washer, for which Bogart praised her, “I don’t know what we’d have done without her. She Luxed my undies in darkest Africa”. Just about everyone in the cast came down with dysenteryDysentery is an inflammatory disorder of the intestine, especially of the colon, that results in severe diarrhea containing mucus and/or blood in the feces. If left untreated, dysentery can be fatal....
except Bogart and John Huston, who subsisted on canned food and alcohol. Bogart explained: "All I ate was baked beans, canned asparagusAsparagus officinalis is a flowering plant species in the genus Asparagus from which the vegetable known as asparagus is obtained. It is native to most of Europe, northern Africa and western Asia...
and Scotch whiskyScotch whisky is whisky made in Scotland. In Britain, the term whisky is usually taken to mean Scotch unless otherwise specified. In other English-speaking countries, it is often referred to as "Scotch"....
. Whenever a fly bit Huston or me, it dropped dead." The teetotaling Hepburn, in and out of character, fared worse in the difficult conditions, losing weight, and at one time, getting very ill. Bogart resisted Huston's insistence on using real leeches in a key scene where Bogart has to drag the boat through a shallow marsh, until reasonable fakes were employed. In the end, the crew overcame illness, soldier ant invasions, leaking boats, poor food, attacking hipposThe hippopotamus or hippo is a large, mostly plant-eating mammal in sub-Saharan Africa, and one of only two extant species in the family Hippopotamidae...
, bad water filters, fierce heat, isolation, and a boat fire to complete a memorable film.
The African Queen was the first TechnicolorTechnicolor is the trademark for a series of color film processes pioneered by Technicolor Motion Picture Corporation , now a division of Thomson SA. Technicolor was the second major color film process, after Britain's Kinemacolor, and the most widely used color motion picture process in Hollywood...
film in which Bogart appeared. Remarkably, he appeared in relatively few color films during the rest of his career, which continued for another five years. (His other color films included The Caine MutinyThe Caine Mutiny is a drama film set during World War II, directed by Edward Dmytryk and produced by Stanley Kramer. It stars Humphrey Bogart, Jose Ferrer, Van Johnson and Fred MacMurray, and is based on the 1951 Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Herman Wouk The Caine Mutiny. The film depicts a...
, The Barefoot ContessaThe Barefoot Contessa is a 1954 film about the life and loves of fictional Spanish sex symbol Maria Vargas. It was written and directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and stars Humphrey Bogart, Ava Gardner and Edmond O'Brien....
, We're No Angels, and The Left Hand of GodThe Left Hand of God is a 1955 drama film made by 20th Century Fox. It was directed by Edward Dmytryk and produced by Buddy Adler, from a screenplay by Alfred Hayes, based on the novel The Left Hand of God by William Edmund Barrett. It stars Humphrey Bogart and Gene Tierney, with a supporting cast...
.)
The role of Charlie Allnutt won Bogart his only Academy AwardThe Academy Awards, popularly known as the Oscars, are presented annually by the American Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize excellence of professionals in the film industry, including directors, actors, and writers. The formal ceremony at which the awards are presented is...
for Best Actor in a Leading RolePerformance by an Actor in a Leading Role is one of the Academy Awards of Merit presented annually by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to recognize an actor who has delivered an outstanding performance while working within the film industry...
in 1951. Bogart considered his performance to be the best of his film career. He had vowed to friends that if he won, his speech would break the convention of thanking everyone in sight. He advised Claire TrevorClaire Trevor was an American actress. She was nicknamed the "Queen of Film Noir" because of her many appearances in "bad girl” roles in film noir and other black-and-white thrillers...
when she had been nominated for Key LargoKey Largo is a 1948 crime film starring Humphrey Bogart, Edward G. Robinson, Lauren Bacall, Lionel Barrymore, and Claire Trevor. This was the fourth and final film pairing of married actors Bogart and Bacall...
to “just say you did all yourself and don’t thank anyone”. But when Bogart won the Academy Award, which he truly coveted despite his well-advertised disdain for Hollywood, he said “It's a long way from the Belgian Congo to the stage of this theatre. It's nicer to be here. Thank you very much…No one does it alone. As in tennis, you need a good opponent or partner to bring out the best in you. John and Katie helped me to be where I am now”. Despite the thrilling win and the recognition, Bogart later commented, “The way to survive an Oscar is never to try to win another one...too many stars…win it and then figure they have to top themselves...they become afraid to take chances. The result: A lot of dull performances in dull pictures”.
Final roles
Bogart dropped his asking price to get the role of Captain Queeg in Edward DmytrykEdward Dmytryk was an American film director who was amongst the Hollywood Ten, a group of blacklisted film industry professionals who served time in prison for being in contempt of Congress during the McCarthy-era 'red scare'.Although born in Grand Forks, British Columbia, Canada, Dmytryk grew up...
's The Caine MutinyThe Caine Mutiny is a drama film set during World War II, directed by Edward Dmytryk and produced by Stanley Kramer. It stars Humphrey Bogart, Jose Ferrer, Van Johnson and Fred MacMurray, and is based on the 1951 Pulitzer Prize winning novel by Herman Wouk The Caine Mutiny. The film depicts a...
, then griped with some of his old bitterness about it. For all his success, he was still his melancholy old self, grumbling and feuding with the studio, while his health was beginning to deteriorate.
Bogart gave a bravura performance as Captain QueegLieutenant Commander Philip Francis Queeg, USN, is a fictional character in Herman Wouk's 1951 novel The Caine Mutiny. He is also a character in the identically titled 1954 film adaptation of the novel and in The Caine Mutiny Court Martial, the Broadway theatre adaptation of the novel that opened...
, an unstable naval officer, in many ways an extension of the character he had played in The Maltese Falcon, Casablanca, and The Big Sleep—the wary loner who trusts no one—but with none of the warmth or humor that made those characters so appealing. Like his portrayal of Fred C. Dobbs in The Treasure of the Sierra MadreThe Treasure of the Sierra Madre is John Huston's American feature film adaptation of B. Traven's novel of the same name, in which two penurious Americans during 1920s in Mexico join with an old-timer to prospect for gold. The old-timer accurately predicts trouble, but is willing to go anyway...
, Bogart played a paranoid, self-pitying character whose small-mindedness eventually destroyed him. Three months before the film's release, Bogart as Queeg appeared on the cover of TimeTime is a component of the measuring system used to sequence events, to compare the durations of events and the intervals between them, and to quantify the motions of objects...
magazine, while on Broadway Henry FondaHenry Jaynes Fonda was an American film and stage actor, best known for his roles as plain-speaking idealists. Fonda's subtle, naturalistic acting style preceded by many years the popularization of method acting....
was starring in the stage version (in a different role), both of which generated strong publicity for the film.
In SabrinaSabrina is a 1954 film directed by Billy Wilder, adapted for the screen by Wilder, Samuel A. Taylor, and Ernest Lehman from Taylor's play Sabrina Fair...
, Billy WilderBilly Wilder was an Austrian-American journalist, filmmaker, screenwriter and producer, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age...
, unable to secure Cary GrantArchibald Alexander Leach , better known by his stage name Cary Grant, was a British-American actor...
, chose Bogart for the role of the older, conservative brother who competes with his younger playboy sibling (William HoldenWilliam Holden was an American film actor.Holden won the Academy Award for Best Actor in 1954, and the Emmy Award for Best Actor in 1974....
) for the affection of the Cinderella-like Sabrina (Audrey HepburnAudrey Hepburn was a British actress and humanitarian.Born in Ixelles as Audrey Kathleen Ruston, Hepburn spent her childhood chiefly in the Netherlands, including German-occupied Arnhem, Netherlands, during the Second World War...
). Bogart was lukewarm about the part, but agreed to it on a handshake with Wilder, without a finished script, and with the director's assurances to take good care of Bogart during the filming. But Bogart got on poorly with his director and co-stars. He also complained about the script, which was written on a last-minute, daily basis, and that Wilder favored Hepburn and Holden on and off the set. The main problem was that Wilder was the opposite of his ideal director, John Huston, in both style and personality. Bogart told the press that Wilder was “overbearing” and “is the kind of Prussian German with a riding crop. He is the type of director I don’t like to work with…the picture is a crock of crap. I got sick and tired of who gets Sabrina”. Wilder said, “We parted as enemies but finally made up”. Despite the acrimony, the film was successful. The New York TimesThe New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded in 1851 and published in New York City. The largest metropolitan newspaper in the United States, "The Gray Lady"—named for its staid appearance and style—is regarded as a national newspaper of record...
said of Bogart, “he is incredibly adroit...the skill with which this old rock-ribbed actor blend the gags and such duplicities with a manly manner of melting is one of the incalculable joys of the show”.
The Barefoot ContessaThe Barefoot Contessa is a 1954 film about the life and loves of fictional Spanish sex symbol Maria Vargas. It was written and directed by Joseph L. Mankiewicz and stars Humphrey Bogart, Ava Gardner and Edmond O'Brien....
, directed by Joseph Mankiewicz in 1954 and filmed in Rome, Italy, gave Bogart one of his subtlest roles. In this Hollywood back-story movie, Bogart again is the broken-down man, this time the cynical director-narrator who saves his career by making a star of a flamencoFlamenco is a Spanish musical genre with origins in Andalusia. It can be both a musical form, known for its intricate rapid passages, and a dance characterized by audible footwork. The origins of the term are unclear...
dancer Ava GardnerAva Lavinia Gardner was an American actress.She was signed to a contract by MGM Studios in 1941 and appeared in supporting roles until she drew attention with her performance in The Killers . She became one of Hollywood's leading actresses, admired for her beauty, and highly regarded for her...
, modeled on the real life of Rita HayworthRita Hayworth was an American film actress and dancer who attained fame during the 1940s not only as one of the era's top stars, but also as the era's greatest sex symbol, most notably in Gilda...
. Bogart was uneasy with Gardner because she had just split from “rat-pack” buddy Frank SinatraFrancis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became a successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, being the idol of the "bobby soxers." His professional career had stalled by the...
and was carrying on with a bullfighter. Bogart told her, “Half the world's female population would throw themselves at Frank's feet and here you are flouncing around with guys who wear capes and little ballerina slippers”. He was also annoyed by her inexperienced performance. Later, she credited him with helping her. Bogart's performance was generally praised as the strongest part of the film. During the filming, while Bacall was home, Bogart resumed his discreet affair with Verita Peterson, his long-time studio assistant whom he took sailing and enjoyed drinking with. But when Bacall suddenly arrived on the scene discovering them together, Bacall took it quite well. She extracted an expensive shopping spree from him and the three traveled together after the shooting.
Bogart could be generous with actors, particularly those who were blacklisted, down on their luck, or having personal problems. During the filming of The Left Hand of GodThe Left Hand of God is a 1955 drama film made by 20th Century Fox. It was directed by Edward Dmytryk and produced by Buddy Adler, from a screenplay by Alfred Hayes, based on the novel The Left Hand of God by William Edmund Barrett. It stars Humphrey Bogart and Gene Tierney, with a supporting cast...
(1955), he noticed his co-star Gene TierneyGene Tierney was an American film and stage actress. Acclaimed as one of the great beauties of her day, she is best-remembered for her performance in the title role of Laura and her Academy Award-nominated performance for Best Actress in Leave Her to Heaven...
having a hard time remembering her lines and also behaving oddly. He coached Tierney, feeding her lines. He was familiar with mental illness (his sister had bouts of depression), and Bogart encouraged Tierney to seek treatment, which she did. He also stood behind Joan BennettJoan Geraldine Bennett was an American stage, film and television actress. Besides acting on the stage, Bennett appeared in more than 70 motion pictures from the era of silent movies through half a century of the sound era...
and insisted on her as his co-star in We're No Angels when a scandal made her persona non grataPersona non grata , literally meaning "an unwelcome person," is a term used in diplomacy with a specialized and legally defined meaning...
with Jack Warner.
In 1955, he made three films: We're No Angels (dir. Michael CurtizMichael Curtiz was a Hungarian-American filmmaker. He directed more than fifty films in Europe and more than one hundred in the United States. The best-known were The Adventures of Robin Hood, Angels with Dirty Faces, Casablanca, Yankee Doodle Dandy, and White Christmas. He thrived in the heyday...
), The Left Hand of God (dir. Edward DmytrykEdward Dmytryk was an American film director who was amongst the Hollywood Ten, a group of blacklisted film industry professionals who served time in prison for being in contempt of Congress during the McCarthy-era 'red scare'.Although born in Grand Forks, British Columbia, Canada, Dmytryk grew up...
) and The Desperate HoursThe Desperate Hours is a 1955 film from Paramount Pictures starring Humphrey Bogart and Fredric March. The movie was produced and directed by William Wyler and based on a novel and play written by Joseph Hayes which were loosely based on actual events....
(dir. William WylerWilliam Wyler was a motion picture director.-Early life:Wyler was born Wilhelm Weiller to a Swiss father and a German mother, in Mulhouse in the French region of Alsace...
). Mark RobsonMark Robson was a Canadian-born film editor, film director and producer in Hollywood.-Career:Born in Montreal, Quebec, he moved to the United States at a young age. He studied at the University of California, Los Angeles then found work in the prop department at 20th Century Fox studios...
's The Harder They FallThe Harder They Fall is a film noir directed by Mark Robson. It features Humphrey Bogart in his final movie role. The character Eddie Willis is based on the career of boxing writer and event promoter Harold Conrad...
(1956) was his last film.
Television work
Bogart rarely appeared on television. However, he and Lauren Bacall appeared on Edward R. MurrowEdward R. Murrow, KBE was an American broadcast journalist. He first came to prominence with a series of radio news broadcasts during World War II, which were followed by millions of listeners in the United States and Canada.Fellow journalists Eric Sevareid, Ed Bliss and Alex Kendrick considered...
's Person to PersonPerson to Person was a popular television program in the United States that ran from 1953 to 1961. Well-respected news reporter Edward R. Murrow hosted it until 1959, interviewing celebrities in their homes from a comfortable chair in his New York studio Person to Person was a popular television...
. Bogart was also featured on The Jack Benny Show. The surviving kinescopeKinescope – kine for short, also known as telerecording, is a recording of a television program made by filming the picture from a video monitor....
of the live Benny telecast features Bogart in his only TV sketch comedy outing. Bogart and Bacall also worked together on an early color telecast, in 1955, an NBCThe National Broadcasting Company is an American television network and former radio network headquartered in the GE Building in New York City's Rockefeller Center with additional major offices in Burbank,California...
adaptation of The Petrified Forest for Producers' ShowcaseProducers' Showcase, an Emmy Award-winning American anthology television series, was telecast live during the 1950s in compatible color by NBC. With top talent, the 90-minute episodes, covering a wide variety of genres, aired under the title every fourth Monday at 8pm ET for three seasons,...
; only a black and white kinescopeKinescope – kine for short, also known as telerecording, is a recording of a television program made by filming the picture from a video monitor....
of the live telecast has survived.
Radio work
Bogart performed radio adaptations of some of his best known films, such as Casablanca and The Maltese Falcon. He also recorded a long-running radio series called Bold VentureBold Venture is a 1951-1952 syndicated radio series starring Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall. Morton Fine and David Friedkin scripted the taped series for Bogart's Santana Productions....
with Lauren Bacall.
The Rat Pack
Bogart was a founding member of the Rat PackThe Rat Pack was a group of popular entertainers originally centered on Humphrey Bogart. In the mid-1960s it was the name used by the press and the general public to refer to a group that called itself "the summit" or "the clan," featuring Frank Sinatra, Dean Martin, Sammy Davis, Jr., Peter...
. In the spring of 1955, after a long party in Las VegasLas Vegas is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Nevada, the seat of Clark County, and an internationally renowned major resort city for gambling, shopping, fine dining, and entertainment. Las Vegas, which bills itself as The Entertainment Capital of the World, is famous for the number of...
with Frank SinatraFrancis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became a successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, being the idol of the "bobby soxers." His professional career had stalled by the...
, Judy GarlandJudy Garland was an American actress and singer. Through a career that spanned 45 of her 47 years, Garland attained international stardom as an actress in musical and dramatic roles, as a recording artist, and on the concert stage. Respected for her versatility, she received a Juvenile Academy...
, her husband, Sid Luft, Mike Romanoff and wife Gloria, David NivenJames David Graham Niven , known as David Niven, was an English actor and novelist, best known for his roles as Phileas Fogg in Around the World in 80 Days and Sir Charles Litton, a.k.a. "the Phantom," in The Pink Panther.-Early life:David Niven was born in London, England...
, Angie DickinsonAngie Dickinson is a Golden Globe-winning American actress who has appeared in more than 50 films and starred on television as Sergeant Leann "Pepper" Anderson in the successful 1970s crime series Police Woman.-Early life:...
and others, "Lauren Bacall surveyed the wreckage of the party" and declared, "You look like a god damn rat pack."
Romanoff's in Beverly Hills was where the Rat Pack became "official". "Sinatra was named Pack Leader. Betty [Bacall] was named Den Mother, Bogie was Director of Public Relations, and Sid Luft was Acting Cage Manager." When asked by columnist Earl WilsonEarl Wilson was an American journalist, gossip columnist and author, perhaps best known for his nationally syndicated column, It Happened Last Night....
what the purpose of the group was, Bacall responded "to drink a lot of bourbon and stay up late."
Chess
Bogart was an excellent chess player, almost of master strengthA chess master is a chess player of such skill that he/she can usually beat chess experts, who themselves typically can nearly always prevail against most amateurs...
. Before he made any money from acting, he would hustle players for dimes and quarters, playing in New York parks and at Coney Island. The chess scenes in Casablanca had not been in the original script, but were put in at his insistence. A chess position from one of his correspondence games appears in the movie, although the image is a little blurred. He achieved a draw in a simultaneous exhibitionA simultaneous exhibition or simultaneous display is a chess exhibition in which one player plays multiple chess games at a time with a number of other players. Such an exhibition is often referred to simply as a "simul".In a regular simul, no chess clocks are used...
given in 1955 at Beverly Hills by the famous chess Grandmaster Samuel ReshevskySamuel "Sammy" Herman Reshevsky was a famous chess prodigy and later a leading American chess Grandmaster...
and also played against George KoltanowskiGeorge Koltanowski was a Belgian-born American chess player, promoter, and writer. He was informally known as "Kolty". Koltanowski set the world's blindfold record on September 20, 1937, in Edinburgh, by playing 34 chess games simultaneously while blindfolded, making headline news around the world...
in San Francisco in 1952 (Koltanowski played blindfolded but still won in 41 moves).
Bogart was a United States Chess FederationThe United States Chess Federation is a non-profit organization, the governing chess organization within the United States, and one of the federations of the FIDE. The USCF was founded in 1939 from the merger of two regional chess organizations, and grew gradually until 1972, when membership...
tournament director and active in the California State Chess Association, and a frequent visitor to the Hollywood chess club. In 1945, the cover of the June-July issue of Chess ReviewChess Review is a U.S. chess magazine that was published from January 1933 until October 1969 . Published in New York, it began on a schedule of at least ten issues a year but later became a monthly. Isaac Kashdan was the editor for the first year, with Al Horowitz and Fred Reinfeld as associate...
showed Bogart playing with Charles BoyerCharles Boyer was a French actor, who had appeared in more than 80 films between 1920 and 1976. After having a dramatic education, Boyer started on the stage, but he found his success in European and Hollywood movies during the 1930s. Although moving to the U.S., he kept up the connection with...
, as Lauren Bacall (who also played) looks on. In June 1945, in an interview in the magazine Silver ScreenSilver Screen Cinemas is a multiplex cinema operator in Poland.It operates three cinemas in Warsaw, one in Gdynia and Łódź under the brand of Silver Screen. The third cinema in Warsaw was opened in the beginning of 2004, in the Targówek district...
, when asked what things in life mattered most to him, he replied that chess was one of his main interests. He added that he played chess almost daily, especially between film shootings. He loved the game all his life.
Death
By the mid-1950s, Bogart's health was failing. Once, after signing a long-term deal with Warner Bros., Bogart predicted with glee that his teeth and hair would fall out before the contract ended. That sent a fuming Jack Warner to his lawyers. Bogart had formed a new production company and had plans for a new film Melville Goodwin, U.S.A., in which he would play a general and Bacall a press magnate. His persistent cough and difficulty eating became too serious to ignore and he dropped the project. The film was re-named Top Secret AffairTop Secret Affair is a 1957 romantic comedy film made by Carrollton Inc. and distributed by Warner Bros.. It was directed by H.C. Potter and produced by Martin Rackin and Milton Sperling from a screenplay by Roland Kibbee and Allan Scott....
and made with Kirk DouglasKirk Douglas is an American actor and film producer recognized for his prominent cleft chin, his gravelly voice and his recurring roles as the kinds of characters Douglas himself once described as "sons of bitches". He is the father of Hollywood actor and producer Michael Douglas...
and Susan HaywardSusan Hayward was an American actress.After working as a fashion model in New York, Hayward travelled to Hollywood in 1937 in the hope of playing the role of Scarlett O'Hara in Gone With the Wind . Although she was not selected, she secured a film contract, and played several small supporting...
.
Bogart, a heavy smoker and drinker, contracted cancer of the esophagusEsophageal cancer is malignancy of the esophagus. There are various subtypes, primarily squamous cell cancer and adenocarcinoma. Squamous cell cancer arises from the cells that line the upper part of the esophagus. Adenocarcinoma arises from glandular cells that are present at the junction of the...
. He almost never spoke of his failing health and refused to see a doctor until January 1956. A diagnosis was made several weeks later and by then removal of his esophagusThe esophagus or oesophagus , sometimes known as the gullet, is an organ in vertebrates which consists of a muscular tube through which food passes from the pharynx to the stomach. The word esophagus is derived from the Latin œsophagus, which derives from the Greek word oisophagos , lit...
, two lymph nodeA lymph node is an organ consisting of many types of cells, and is a part of the lymphatic system. Lymph nodes are found all through the body, and act as filters or traps for foreign particles. They contain white blood cells that use oxygen to process. Thus they are important in the proper...
s and a rib on March 1, 1956 was too late to halt the disease, even with chemotherapyChemotherapy, in its most general sense, is the treatment of disease by chemicals especially by killing micro-organisms or cancerous cells. In popular usage, it refers to antineoplastic drugs used to treat cancer or the combination of these drugs into a cytotoxic standardized treatment regimen...
. He underwent corrective surgery in November 1956 after the cancer had spread.
Katharine HepburnKatharine Houghton Hepburn was an American actress of film, television and stage.Hepburn holds the record for the most Best Actress Oscar wins with four, from 12 nominations. Hepburn won an Emmy Award in 1976 for her lead role in Love Among the Ruins, and was nominated for four other Emmys, two...
and Spencer TracySpencer Bonaventure Tracy was an American theatrical and film actor, who appeared in 74 films from 1930 to 1967. In 1999, the American Film Institute named Tracy among the Greatest Male Stars of All Time, ranking 9th on the list...
came to see him. Frank SinatraFrancis Albert "Frank" Sinatra was an American singer and actor.Beginning his musical career in the swing era with Harry James and Tommy Dorsey, Sinatra became a successful solo artist in the early to mid-1940s, being the idol of the "bobby soxers." His professional career had stalled by the...
was also a frequent visitor. Bogart was too weak to walk up and down stairs. He valiantly fought the pain and tried to joke about his immobility: "Put me in the dumbwaiter and I'll ride down to the first floor in style." Hepburn, in an interview, described the last time she and Spencer Tracy saw Bogart (the night before he died):
Spence patted him on the shoulder and said, "Goodnight, Bogie." Bogie turned his eyes to Spence very quietly and with a sweet smile covered Spence's hand with his own and said, "Goodbye, Spence." Spence's heart stood still. He understood.
Bogart had just turned 57 and weighed 80 pounds (36 kg) when he died on January 14, 1957 after falling into a coma. He died at 2:25 a.m. at his home at 232 Mapleton Drive in Holmby Hills, California. His simple funeral was held at All Saints Episcopal Church with musical selections played from Bogart's favorite composers, Johann Sebastian BachJohann Sebastian Bach was a German composer and organist whose ecclesiastical and secular works for choir, orchestra, and solo instruments drew together the strands of the Baroque period and brought it to its ultimate maturity...
and Claude DebussyAchille-Claude Debussy was a French composer. Along with Maurice Ravel, he was one of the most prominent figures working within the field of Impressionist music, though he himself intensely disliked the term when applied to his compositions...
. It was attended by some of Hollywood's biggest stars including: Katharine Hepburn, Spencer Tracy, David Niven, Ronald ReaganRonald Wilson Reagan was the 40th President of the United States and the 33rd Governor of California .Born in Tampico, Illinois, Reagan moved to Los Angeles, California in the 1930s...
, James MasonJames Neville Mason was a British actor who attained stardom in both British and American films. Throughout his career, Mason remained a powerful figure in the industry and he is now regarded as one of the finest film actors of the 20th century...
, Danny KayeDanny Kaye was an American award-winning actor, singer and comedian.-Early years:Born David Daniel Kaminsky to Jewish Ukrainian immigrants in Brooklyn, Kaye became one of the world's best-known comedians...
, Joan FontaineJoan Fontaine is a British American actress. She became an American citizen in April 1943. She is the younger sister of actress Olivia de Havilland, also an Academy Award winner. Along with Luise Rainer, Gloria Stuart, Shirley Temple, Deanna Durbin and Olivia de Havilland, Fontaine is one of the...
, Marlene DietrichMarlene Dietrich was a German-born American actress and singer.Dietrich remained popular throughout her long career by continually re-inventing herself. In 1920s Berlin, she acted on the stage and in silent films...
, Errol FlynnErrol Leslie Flynn was an Australian film actor, known for his romantic swashbuckler roles in Hollywood films and his flamboyant lifestyle.-Background and early life:...
, Gregory PeckGregory Peck was an American actor.One of 20th Century Fox's most popular film stars from the 1940s to the 1960s, Peck continued to play important roles well into the 1990s...
, and Gary CooperFrank James “Gary” Cooper was an American film actor. He was renowned for his quiet, understated acting style and his stoic, individualistic, emotionally restrained, but at times intense screen persona, which was particularly well suited to the many Westerns he made...
, as well as Billy WilderBilly Wilder was an Austrian-American journalist, filmmaker, screenwriter and producer, whose career spanned more than 50 years and 60 films. He is regarded as one of the most brilliant and versatile filmmakers of Hollywood's golden age...
and Jack WarnerJack Leonard "J.L." Warner , born Jacob Warner in London, Ontario, Canada, was the president and driving force behind the successful development of Warner Bros. Studios in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California...
. Bacall had asked Spencer Tracy to give the eulogy, but Tracy was too upset, so John Huston gave the eulogy instead, and reminded the gathered mourners that while Bogart's life had ended far too soon, it had been a rich one.
Himself, he never took too seriously—his work most seriously. He regarded the somewhat gaudy figure of Bogart, the star, with an amused cynicism; Bogart, the actor, he held in deep respect…In each of the fountains at VersaillesVersailles , a city renowned for its château, the Palace of Versailles, was the de facto capital of the kingdom of France for over a century, from 1682 to 1789. It is now a wealthy suburb of Paris and remains an important administrative and judicial center...
there is a pikeEsox is a genus of freshwater fish, the only living genus in the family Esocidae — the esocids which were endemic to North America, Europe and Eurasia during the Paleogene through present from 65—0 mya, existing for approximately ....
which keeps all the carp active; otherwise they would grow overfat and die. Bogie took rare delight in performing a similar duty in the fountains of Hollywood. Yet his victims seldom bore him any malice, and when they did, not for long. His shafts were fashioned only to stick into the outer layer of complacency, and not to penetrate through to the regions of the spirit where real injuries are done...He is quite irreplaceable. There will never be another like him."
Katharine Hepburn said:
He was one of the biggest guys I've ever met. He walked straight down the center of the road. No maybes. Yes or no. He liked to drink. He drank. He liked to sail a boat. He sailed a boat. He was an actor. He was happy and proud to be an actor. He'd say to me, "Are you comfortable? Everything okay?" He was looking out for me.
His cremated remains are interred in Forest Lawn Memorial Park Cemetery, Glendale, CaliforniaGlendale is a city in Los Angeles County, California, United States. It lies at the eastern end of the San Fernando Valley, is bisected by the Verdugo Mountains, and is a suburb in the Greater Los Angeles Area...
. Buried with him is a small gold whistle, which he had given to his future wife, Lauren Bacall, before they married. In reference to their first movie together, it was inscribed: "If you want anything, just whistle."
Humphrey Bogart's hand and foot prints are immortalized in the forecourt of Grauman's Chinese Theater and he has a star on the Hollywood Walk of FameThe Hollywood Walk of Fame is a sidewalk along Hollywood Boulevard and Vine Street in Hollywood, Los Angeles, California, USA, that serves as an entertainment museum...
at 6322 Hollywood Boulevard in Hollywood.
Tributes
After his death, a "Bogie Cult" formed at the Brattle TheatreThe Brattle Theatre is a repertory movie theater located in Harvard Square in Cambridge, Massachusetts in the United States of America. The theatre is a small movie house with one screen. It is one of the few remaining movie theaters, if not the only one, that use a rear-projection system; the...
in Cambridge, MassachusettsCambridge is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States, in the Greater Boston area. It was named in honor of the University of Cambridge in England, a nexus of the Puritan theology embraced by the town's founders. Notably, Cambridge is home to two internationally prominent...
, as well as Greenwich Village, New York and in FranceFrance , officially the French Republic , is a country located in Western Europe, with several overseas islands and territories located on other continents. Metropolitan France extends from the Mediterranean Sea to the English Channel and the North Sea, and from the Rhine to the Atlantic Ocean...
, which contributed to his spike in popularity in the late 1950s and 1960s.
Jean-Luc GodardJean-Luc Godard is a French and Swiss filmmaker and one of the founding members of the Nouvelle Vague, or "French New Wave"....
's Breathless (1960) was the first film to pay tribute to Bogart. Later, in Woody AllenWoody Allen is an American screenwriter, film director, actor, comedian, writer, musician, and playwright....
's comic tribute to Bogart Play It Again, Sam (1972), Bogart's ghost comes to the aid of Allen's bumbling character, a movie critic with woman troubles and whose "sex life has turned into the 'Petrified Forest'".
In 1997, the United States Postal ServiceThe United States Postal Service is an independent agency of the United States government responsible for providing postal service in the United States. It is one of the few government agencies explicitly authorized by the United States Constitution. Within the United States, it is commonly...
featured Bogart in its "Legends of Hollywood" series.
Quotations
Bogart is credited with five of the American Film Institute's top 100 quotations in American cinemaPart of the AFI 100 Years... series, AFI's 100 Years... 100 Movie Quotes is a list of the top 100 movie quotations in American cinema. The American Film Institute revealed the list in June of 2005 in a three-hour television program on CBS...
, the most by any actor:
- 5th - "Here's looking at you, kid" - Casablanca
- 14th - "The stuff that dreams are made of." - The Maltese Falcon
- 20th - "Louis, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship." - Casablanca
- 43rd - "We'll always have Paris." - Casablanca
- 67th - "Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine." - Casablanca
In popular culture
Humphrey Bogart's life has spurred the imaginations of many writers and others:
- The Fedora
A fedora is a felt hat that is creased lengthwise down the crown and pinched in the front on both sides. Similar hats with a C-crown are occasionally called fedoras. The brim goes all the way around, and often there will be a hat band as well...
variation the "Bogart" was named for the actor, who was also the hat's first wearer.
- The film Friday the 13th (1980 film) features Mark Nelson as Ned who does an impression of Bogart, uttering the line "You know, you're beautiful when you're angry, sweetheart," at approximately 00:18:55 in the film.
- Two Bugs Bunny
Bugs Bunny is a fictional character who appears in the Looney Tunes and Merrie Melodies series of animated films produced by Leon Schlesinger Productions, which became Warner Bros. Cartoons in 1945. In 2002, he was named by TV Guide as the greatest cartoon character of all time, an honor he shares...
cartoons featured Humphrey Bogart:
- In Slick Hare
"Slick Hare" is a 1947 Merrie Melodies Bugs Bunny cartoon, directed by Friz Freleng. It parodies the Mocambo club in Los Angeles—in the cartoon referred to as "The Mocrumbo". Mel Blanc plays Bugs, Arthur Q. Bryan is Elmer Fudd, and impressionist Dave Barry provides the voice of Humphrey Bogart...
, Bogart orders rabbit in a Hollywood restaurant. Told that they don't have rabbit, he becomes insistent, leading waiter Elmer FuddElmer J. Fudd is a fictional cartoon character and one of the most famous Looney Tunes characters. He has one of the more disputed origins in the Warner Bros. cartoon pantheon . His aim is to shoot Bugs, but he usually ends up seriously injuring himself and other antagonizing characters. He has a...
to try (unsuccessfully as usual) to serve Bugs as the meal. Bogart finally gives up, saying: "Baby will just have to have a ham sandwich." – "Baby" being Bacall's nickname. Bugs, upon hearing the name, immediately presents himself and goes completely ga-ga over Bacall, who looks on with amusement.
- Bugs decides to take a baby penguin back to the South Pole in 8 Ball Bunny
8 Ball Bunny is a Looney Tunes cartoon directed by Chuck Jones and written by Michael Maltese where Bugs Bunny travels around the world with Playboy Penguin to take him back home to the South Pole...
. At intervals, "Fred C. Dobbs" (Bogart's character in Treasure of the Sierra Madre) appears and asks Bugs to "help a poor American down on his luck" – a line Bogart says a number of times in the film to John Huston, playing an American "gringo".
- In V. S. Naipaul
Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul Kt. TC , commonly known as V. S. Naipaul, is a British novelist and essayist of Indo-Trinidadian descent. He is widely considered to be one of the masters of modern English prose...
's Miguel StreetMiguel Street is a semi-autobiographical novel by V. S. Naipaul set in wartime Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago. Naipaul wrote it while employed at the BBC using a BBC typewriter and "rustle-free paper."...
(1959), a character renames himself "Bogart" after Casablanca is shown in Trinidad.
- Bogart is featured in one of Woody Allen
Woody Allen is an American screenwriter, film director, actor, comedian, writer, musician, and playwright....
's comic movies, Play It Again, Sam (1972), which relates the story of a young man obsessed by his persona.
- Issue #70 of the US The Phantom
The Phantom is an American adventure comic strip created by Lee Falk, also creator of Mandrake the Magician. A popular feature adapted into many forms of media, including television and film, it stars a costumed crimefighter operating from the African jungle...
(1977) comic book is known as the "Bogart" issue, as the story stars Humphrey Bogart, Lauren BacallLauren Bacall is an American film and stage actress and model, known for her husky voice and sultry looks....
, Sydney GreenstreetSydney Hughes Greenstreet was an English actor, best known for his work with Humphrey Bogart and Peter Lorre in the 1940s.-Biography:...
, Peter LorrePeter Lorre was an Austrian-American actor frequently typecast as a sinister foreigner.He made an international sensation in 1931 with his portrayal of a serial killer who preys on little girls in the German film M...
and Claude RainsClaude Rains was an English stage and film actor whose career spanned 47 years; he later held American citizenship. He was known for many roles in Hollywood films, among them The Invisible Man, the corrupt senator in Mr...
and is a mixture of Casablanca, The African Queen, The Maltese Falcon and The Treasure of the Sierra Madre.
- The Man With Bogart's Face (1981
-Events:*January 19 - Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer acquires beleaguered concurrent United Artists. UA was humiliated by the astronomical losses on the $40,000,000 movie Heaven's Gate, a major factor in the decision of owner Transamerica to sell it....
) movie starred Bogart lookalike Robert SacchiRobert Sacchi an American character actor who, since the 1970s, has been known for his close resemblance to Humphrey Bogart. Sacchi has appeared in many films and TV shows playing either Bogart or a character who happens to look and sound like him...
.
- The comic book series The Bogie Man
The Bogie Man is a comic book series created by writers John Wagner and Alan Grant and artist Robin Smith. The main character is Francis Forbes Clunie, a Scottish mental patient who suffers from the unusual delusion that he is Humphrey Bogart, or rather a composite of the characters he played in...
features a mental patient who believes that he's an amalgam of various Bogart film characters.
- The slang term "bogarting" refers to taking an unfairly long time with a cigarette, drink, et cetera, that is supposed to be shared (e.g., "Don't bogart that joint!"). It derives from Bogart's style of cigarette smoking, with which he left his cigarette dangling from his mouth rather than withdrawing it between puffs.
External links