By Myself and Then Some

by Lauren Bacall

  That night Zell cooked dinner on the boat, but Bogie decided he wanted to take me over to the yacht club for a drink. ‘You’re crazy,’ said I, ‘we’ll have nothing but trouble if Mayo finds out.’ ‘She won’t,’ said he, ‘we’ll just go for one – they’re my friends, not hers.’ There seemed to be no choice – if Bogie’s mind was made up, that was that, there was nothing to discuss. So I put on a navy flannel shirt of Bogie’s over my sweater and pants – took a deep breath – put my hand in his and went. He had a little putt-putt – a small boat with an outboard motor – and we traveled across the harbor in that. He took me into a dimly lit room with a bar on one side and an outside deck right on the water. There were only a couple of people who were friends there – it was a quiet night at the club. As he had several pet names for me – Charlie, Chuck, Junior, game names – he introduced me very casually to a couple of his sailor pals. They were slightly mulled – I meant nothing to them anyway. I was just a girl, they didn’t think anything of it. But I was nervous – really wanted to get the hell out. I didn’t want trouble and felt very much an outsider. After a very long hour we left. On the ride back – it was cold and dark – sitting just in front of Bogie, I had to ask the question that had been so much on my mind – I had to get it straight. Did it matter to him that I was Jewish? Hell, no – what mattered to him was me, how I thought, how I felt, what kind of person I was, not my religion. He couldn’t care less – why did I even ask? He couldn’t really understand my anxiety, but he’d never felt it himself – he wasn’t Jewish. Being singled out for such a thing was inconceivable to him. It was a big weight off my shoulders – I was relieved to have it in the open, it had been lurking too long in the unfinished-business department of my mind.

  Bogie stayed on the O’Moore boat that night. The next day he had to go back to his own – Mayo would return sometime during the day. I was going to stay the day and drive home late. Around lunchtime he came over to say goodbye to me – we were always saying goodbye – and suddenly Pat called down, ‘Christ, Mayo’s heading this way.’ I thought I’d drop dead from fright. There was nowhere to go. Bogie shoved me into the head, where I sat holding on to the door with my heart pounding so loudly I was sure it could be heard all over the boat. I could hear them talking – I heard her say, ‘Let’s sit down and have a drink.’ Oh God, don’t let it happen now – I was so scared I was shaking – what a hopeless confrontation that would have been. The O’Moores said they had to go onshore to get something – Bogie said he wanted to go too – at last they left. Pat walked down the dock with Bogie and Mayo – Zelma came down, called to me that the coast was clear. When I could come up on deck, what a relief to be able to breathe the air again! I couldn’t wait to get away. Newport Beach was not the place for me. I hated the hiding. I didn’t want to return until the all-clear was the all-clear for all time.

  Bogie got to a phone the following day: ‘That was a close call – whew!’ He said that Mayo was suspicious – not of specifics, but in general. His Coast Guard duty would be over in a couple of weeks, and he’d be in and out of Balboa getting his business affairs straight. I went down there one more time for one of our trysts. He was not happy. He said Mayo was going to stop drinking, or at least was going to try, and he had to give her that chance. It was the only civilized thing to do. He loved me as much as ever, but felt we should lie low for a few weeks. He’d call me.

  Meanwhile Howard had started to prepare The Big Sleep. I kept busy with singing lessons – Howard wanted me to sing again, ‘Baltimore Oriole,’ he wouldn’t give up that fantasy. Bill Faulkner was working on the screenplay. I saw a lot of Howard at the studio and of Howard and Slim at night as well. But I hadn’t seen Bogie for a few weeks. Maybe Mayo was behaving herself. Maybe they’d stay together. Every negative idea I’d ever had came to the fore. ‘But,’ I kept saying – there was always a but – ‘he does love me – I know he does – you don’t love someone so much one minute and stop the next.’ Oh, I had a hard time of it – I was so unhappy, depressed, worried. How could I work with him again if he didn’t love me? I’d have to – but how could I?

  My Uncle Jack wrote Mother that he and Vera had seen a preview of To Have and Have Not – they were very proud and pleased. He’d been apprehensive because he thought the publicity was building me for straight sex – he was happy there was some humor in it too, for he was convinced, as was my Uncle Charlie, that my forte was going to be comedy. At the end of his letter – dated September 15 – he also said, ‘Mother is not well again and I don’t know how long she is going to last. I would arrange for her to see the preview no matter what it cost if I weren’t convinced she wouldn’t live through it – the emotional strain would be too great.’

  On the sixteenth a box of flowers was delivered to my door. A note inside read, ‘Look who’s twenty – Steve.’ He’d remembered. I was teary-eyed – my first red roses – he did love me, he was just trying to do the right thing by everyone, trying to be fair – he was too good, too kind. But oh, I missed him. Thank God for my friend Carolyn. She could moan to me about Buddy and I could moan to her about Bogie. We had some swell times moaning together.

  Grandma was living with Rosalie and Charlie. When Jack’s letter arrived, Mother and I called her there. She was happy to hear our voices, but she sounded very weak – a shocking sound to me. I wished I could be with her. She had sent me a birthday card – ‘To my darling Bettelein.’ The warm feeling of unjudging, protective family love cannot be equaled. I told her she had to see the movie – I’d have a screening set up for her in New York. Mother said she’d be coming to New York with me soon, so we’d all be together again.

  On the afternoon of Wednesday, September 20, the phone rang. I was alone in the apartment – Mother had gone out with a friend. It was Charlie, telling me that Grandma had died. It had all happened very quickly. Tell Mother there’s no point in her rushing to New York – the services will be tomorrow. Jack got on the phone – Vera – oh, I wanted to be with them. My poor darling Grandma. And how would I tell Mother?

  I was destroyed when I hung up. My Grandma, I’d never see her again – the first time I’d lost anyone I loved. It all seemed impossible – how could there be a world without Grandma? She was so much a part of my life, I couldn’t conceive of it. I tried to pull myself together – I looked awful. I listened for Mother, heard her coming up the stairs. She knew something was wrong the minute I opened the door. I was shaking – I couldn’t stop, I couldn’t help it – how do you tell your mother that her mother is dead? That was the beginning of a traumatic pattern in my life.

  I told her Rosalie and Charlie had called. She immediately said, ‘Grandma.’ Yes, I said – put my arms around her and as gently as I could told her what they had told me. She cried, but tried to hold herself in check for me. She was strong in that way, used to not giving in to her emotions. She told me – it was too queer – she had gone with her friend to a palm reader. The woman had said she was going to have some bad news – the letter M was prominent in her palm.

  Why is it that on the eve of great success disaster always strikes? Grandma knew that good things were happening to me, that I was on my way, but she could not live long enough for me to share it all with her.

  Mother and I spent the next several days on the phone to New York. She needed very much to talk to her brothers and sisters who were all gathered at Rosalie and Charlie’s. She needed to talk about her mother. So she and I talked a lot about Grandma – it was very sad on Reeves Drive that week.

  Jack wrote us about Grandma’s services and how happy our many cheery letters and my impending success had made her. He also told us of passing the Broadway theatre where To Have and Have Not was to open in three weeks – to see what photographs and ads had been put up. He was satisfied with all he’d seen – Walter Brennan and I were the only ones featured, with Bogart starring. He would check the coming attractions so he could see the kind of build-up Warners were giving me. They had sent out a release on my
life, largely put together by Howard, stating that I was the child of American parents of several generations and implying that I was from Society. Jack knew there was nothing to be done about it, but neither he nor Charlie liked it. He couldn’t know that it would all be set straight before long – not intentionally, but because I could never lie for long. I lied too badly.

  I was frenzied over what might happen when the picture opened in New York. My imagination had a field day. I couldn’t stop thinking and talking about To Have and Have Not – even though it had been finished six months earlier, it was the only tangible thing in my life at that point. I hadn’t seen Bogie or spoken to him for weeks – and was very unhappy. I knew he had agreed to be in The Big Sleep, which was to start shooting in early October.

  I was at the studio one afternoon, sitting outside Howard’s bungalow getting some sun while waiting for him, when I heard a car draw up and a door slam. It was Bogie. I started to shake uncontrollably. He walked up to me, said, ‘Hello, how are you, Slim? I didn’t expect to see you here today.’ He was nervous – I was monosyllabic – we were both so unnerved by the meeting that we couldn’t say anything personal. There was too much to say, so it became nothing to say. Bogie said, ‘I have a new car – come take a look at it.’ After all we’d been through together, that was all we could talk about. I looked at the car – a blue Cadillac, his first – said something brilliant like ‘Pretty color,’ and then ‘I have to go to wardrobe.’ He was going to see Howard for a minute about the picture. After he went in, I went to the nearest ladies’ room and just trembled. There was so much I didn’t know – didn’t understand. Was he really going to stay with Mayo? I refused to believe it. But when would I have the answer? I’d have to pull myself together before the picture started, that was for sure. I waited for about fifteen minutes, then headed back for Howard’s bungalow. The blue Cadillac was gone – Bogie was gone. I went to Howard’s office. He was looking at wardrobe sketches for me – told me which he liked – his taste was impeccable, and I wouldn’t have disagreed with him anyway. He also wanted to try me with my hair up for one scene. Everything would be tested as usual. Had I seen Bogie? ‘Yes,’ I replied. ‘He looks good – a summer at Newport agreed with him.’ ‘If you only knew, Howard,’ thought I.

  To Have and Have Not had opened in New York and my entire family had gone to the first evening show. They’d been to a preview, but of course had to go into a regular theatre and hear the audience reactions. Uncle Bill wrote me that he loved everything I did in the film – he saw so much of the me he knew. They all knew I was a great mimic, so there was no surprise for them when I mimicked Dolores Moran. Uncle Bill was a scholarly, imposing man – difficult in that he expected a great deal from you. He wrote,

  We are all very happy at your instantaneous success. We hope that it will not change your basic character. If anything, it ought to make you more devoted, thoughtful and generous to your mother. She made the opportunities for you long, long ago – and at no small sacrifice to herself.

  Funnily enough, on that same day Charlie wrote to me:

  My darling, it is not easy to put into words my emotions and mental impressions since you leaped from obscurity to fame. It’s all great fun and excitement. I’m happy for you but I’m a little afraid because I worry about your personal happiness. Success is an important part but only a part of happiness. You must make no important, irrevocable decisions until we have talked them over preferably face to face or at least by mail. Feel free to write and confide in me because I believe I can help you. Experience is an important factor in dealing with life and 20 is too young for experience.

  He went on to describe how they had sat in the loge, $1.60 apiece – how they’d laughed – how the audience had laughed – how I was a perfect foil for Bogart. ‘This means Warners, Hawks and Feldman need you as much as you need them. This means you can maintain your faith and personal integrity and individuality regardless of their prejudice.’ I must be grateful – eternally grateful to them, but the press had leaped overboard because of me, not them. My forte was comedy.

  Your voice, its timbre, its low register, its rare quality, is ideally suited for Bogart roles. But all this just increases the gap between 20 and 45. Remember the precious quality of youth which makes you vital, young and vibrant is out, extinct in 45 and plus. Don’t miss the lesson of this simple arithmetic. You see, I cannot see you professionally apart from your personal life because more than anything else in this world I am intent that they blend into a mixture of wild, ecstatic happiness and permanence. Remember, you need no one. As long as you keep your feet on the ground, smile, gracious ‘Thank you’ with no trace of vanity, conceit or swell-headedness, you can travel the whole distance of life under your own steam.

  I bought the News – your first newspaper review – after dinner. A good one. I was so pleased and proud. You are my daughter. You are so unspoiled, so beautiful. Don’t ever spoil.

  Remember Granny and make your Mommy proud and happy and make her an integral part of your success.

  So he knew something. Mother must have written that she was worried about me and that unknown-but-had-to-be-no-good-for-me quantity called Bogart.

  I see now in my middle age how aware they were from the heights of their middle age of the dangers of being twenty – of decisionmaking in innocence and inexperience. That they who knew nothing really of the movie business should know what the pitfalls might be does them credit. But that both Charlie and Bill mentioned Mother astounds me. Did they really think I didn’t know how much I owed her – that I wouldn’t want her to share in my success? I had always been headstrong, selfish, but at my worst I never turned away from my mother – and I never stopped needing her.

  I’m fascinated and still unenlightened when I think of certain of my family now – Charlie especially. I see that he was a father figure – I see his worry, his love for me, his wit and his own need for approval, his need for his own mother. He always seemed the most vulnerable one to me, I guess that’s one reason I loved him the most. But I see too how solid they all were – what a firm base I had to grow from. They adored my fame and all that went with it, but their basic life values didn’t change. If they bragged, if they displayed my photograph in an office or at home, it stemmed from personal joy and pride in me. Not one of them ever used me for anything at any time. Even now as I live through my life for a second time, I am warmed and strengthened by reflecting on them. In moments of doubt (which are many) and insecurity about one’s future (which is more present than not), if I think about Charlie and my mother and my Uncle Bill, the lows and highs of their lives and how they dealt with them, it helps me to ride over the rough spot in the road. I was profoundly lucky to have such a family to draw upon.

  So To Have and Have Not transformed me from a nothing to a combination of Garbo, Dietrich, Mae West, Katharine Hepburn. I was the greatest discovery since … I made Bogart sit up and take notice … I was a new face to deal with on the screen … I was the answer … Hooray! So proclaimed the press. I was everything Howard Hawks had always wanted. My name would be on everyone’s lips all over the country, my words would be immortal – my God, what was I going to do about the me that was buried beneath all that, the me that I was stuck with, that was real? How could I live up to all that – how could anyone? Fortunately, I was unaware of the huge impact. As long as I stayed in my little apartment on Reeves Drive with Mother and Droopy – as long as I worked and didn’t go out too much – I would remain so.

  We started shooting The Big Sleep on Tuesday, October 10, 1944. My first scene was my first scene in the picture – the first day of shooting – with my hair up. I played it very cool on the outside, which was hard, since anyone could see my hand shaking every time I lit a cigarette or held a glass. I had to pour a drink in the first shot – my typical luck. As the bottle hit the moving glass, I wished I were dead. Bogie saw it immediately and joked with me a bit. We had the same camera crew, luckily, and I stayed very close to Howard th
at first week – that seemed to be the only way I could deal with it.

  Bogie asked me to stop on our street on the way home so he could talk to me. God give me strength!

  I played the yet-to-happen scene as I was driving toward Selma Avenue. I handled myself beautifully – it’s always easier when you’re playing both parts. The blue Cadillac was waiting. I stopped just behind it. He got into my car. I huddled against my door on the driver’s side – mustn’t get too close. He told me that the last few weeks had been the most difficult of his life. How many times he had wanted to call me, how much he had thought of me, how much he did love me. I must try to understand. Mayo said she’d stop drinking, she’d try. She’d failed before, but he had to give her a chance.

  I said I’d have to respect his decision, but I didn’t have to like it. And we needed so much to be together. He was unhappy, I was – even Mayo was, I guess. But I wanted what I wanted and when I wanted it. Patience is not one of my shining qualities, it never was. All I could do was the best I could do. There was no way Bogie and I could be in the same room without reaching for one another, and it wasn’t just physical. Physical was very strong, but it was everything – heads, hearts, bodies, everything going at the same time. After our talk it became easier to work, no time at all before we were back at our old joking, ribbing Slim-and-Steve status. I was more guarded than he was, but only at the beginning. After about two weeks of shooting, the phone rang late one night. Who else? I met him. We went back to my apartment. He couldn’t bear being away from me any longer. He’d had a fight with Mayo, of course. She’d been drinking when he got back from the studio and things went from bad to worse. He had to get out of the house.