Lauren Bacall will always be defined by Humphrey Bogart, said Matt Tyrnauer in Vanity Fair. At 86, Bacall is rarely recognized anymore, but when she is, people always ask about Bogart. “Young people ask me, ‘Were you really married to Humphrey Bogart?’ Well, yes, I think I was.” She recalls seeing him on-screen in Casablanca in 1942, when she was 18. “[My aunt] Rosalie thought he was sexy. I couldn’t understand her thinking at all.” A year later, she was cast with Bogart in To Have and Have Not. “I thought, Humphrey Bogart—yuck!”
Though he was married and 25 years older, he wooed her during the filming, and she fell, hard; they were married the following year. “I was happy being his wife,” she says. “Those were the best years of my life.’’ Bogie, she says, “taught me everything about life and movies and people. I knew everybody because I was married to Bogie. That 25-year difference was the most fantastic thing for me.’’ After Bogie’s death, she went on to marry again, but she knows how she’ll be remembered. “My obit is going to be full of Bogart, I’m sure,” she says. “If that’s the way it is, that’s the way it is.”
Subscribe to The Week
Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.
Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.
-
Why does the U.S. need China's rare earth metals?Today's Big Question Beijing has a 'near monopoly' on tech's raw materials
-
When did divorce begin?The Explaine Couples have always split up, but the institution has undergone major changes over the years
-
What are your retirement savings account options?The explainer The two main types of accounts are 401(k) plans and individual retirement accounts (IRAs)
