We rehearsed Key Largo for three weeks. Karl Freund was the cameraman – one of the best. Lionel Barrymore played my father and was in a wheelchair at all times, which I had to manipulate. Lionel pretended to be a grouch who needed no one. He had been confined to a wheelchair for some years and his legs pained him almost unceasingly. More than once I frantically looked at John when I’d hear Lionel moaning, but Lionel never said anything – wasn’t even aware he was making a noise. Eddie Robinson was a marvelous actor and a lovely, funny man, Claire Trevor a wonderful actress and woman. I used to pour tea in my dressing room every afternoon and serve cookies. Lionel looked forward to it and worried if it was late – that there might not be any. We’d all gather round as he regaled us with theatrical stories. Eddie did ‘Molly Malone’ with a Yiddish accent which was wildly funny. I listened raptly to all. In the film, Lionel had a scene in which he was to draw himself out of his chair defending Franklin Roosevelt. As it happened, in real life he hated Roosevelt. John told us to watch how he gritted his teeth when he had to praise him – John loved stuff like that. Yet Lionel was marvelous in that scene – he was an actor first and foremost. Key Largo was one of my happiest movie experiences. I thought how marvelous a medium the movies were, to enable one to meet, befriend, and work with such people. What a good time of life that was – the best people at their best. With all those supposed actors’ egos, there was not a moment of discomfort or vying for position. That’s because they were all actors, not just ‘stars’.
Carolyn and Buddy Morris had their first child and we’d still had none. I went to see Red Krohn, Carolyn’s doctor, to make certain I had no problems. Even Bogie went to see him – I was determined he was to be a father. And once I made up my mind – !! Finally both Red and Bogie agreed I must take it easy – relax – it would happen. Meantime think of the fun we’d have. Bogie’s great observation was that making love is the most fun you can have without laughing. Although I calmed down, I went on watching the calendar for pregnancy signs. I finally caught on to saying nothing to Bogie, as he made it clear that sex was fun and at no time should anything clinical enter the picture.
We’d taken our usual trip to New York and celebrated our third anniversary. I remember saying we’d never had a honeymoon, to which Bogie rightly retorted, ‘You’ve been on a three-year honeymoon – ever since we’ve been married.’ Then I missed a period. I rushed to the calendar, marked it, and prayed. I counted every day until I missed the second. I’d had a false alarm once before.
I called Red Krohn and went in for my rabbit test. He called me: ‘Yes, ma’am, you are pregnant.’ I rushed to see him, he examined me and said absolutely – it would be around the end of December. The joy – the joy! I’d have to set the stage for Bogie’s homecoming that evening – he’d faint when he heard. He didn’t faint. I don’t know what happened, but after I told him, we had the biggest fight we’d ever had. I was in tears – this moment I’d been hoping for, waiting for, was a disaster. I should have learned right then never to act out a scene before it’s played. Bogie was full of sound and fury signifying that he hadn’t married me to lose me to a child – no child was going to come between us. The next morning he wrote me a long letter apologizing for his behavior, saying he didn’t know what had gotten into him except his fear of losing me – a child was an unknown quantity to him. He didn’t know what kind of a father he’d make. He was so afraid our closeness and incredible happiness together would be cut into by a child – but of course he wanted us to have a baby more than anything in the world, he just would have to get used to the idea. He’d spent forty-eight years childless, and had never really considered that being a father would ever become a reality at this point in his life.
Jack Warner had been trying to get me into a picture called Storm Warning. I didn’t feel it was right for me, but I wanted to work. I thought if I talked to him, perhaps some changes could be made that would enable me to be in it, so I didn’t intend to tell him about the coming baby.
Hedda Hopper had been told by one of her spies that I’d been to see Dr Krohn. She called to ask if I was going to have a baby. I denied it – it was none of her business, I thought. She said, ‘You’re not lying to me, are you, Betty?’ Those ladies were drunk with power during those years. I said, ‘No, I’m not,’ and hung up. I was always uneasy talking to those ladies – they had been allowed their power by the studios and they wielded it unmercifully. I told Bogie of the call and he said, ‘Forget it – the hell with her.’ The picture was never fixed – I was put on suspension – the story of the coming of the first Bogart heir was released, and I was denounced by Hedda in her column as caring more about money than I did about being a mother. We didn’t speak for a year after that – oh, she could be a bitch.
Mother had been working in England for a year, but now she was back in California. She never discussed her private life with me, so I only knew she’d enjoyed England but was glad to be home. In the summer of 1948 she took a trip to New York and returned in August. For some reason she wanted me to find her a room in a small hotel nearby. I did and went to help her unpack. While she was unpacking, I noticed a small diamond ring on her finger. I said, ‘What’s that?’
She never stopped taking the clothes out of the suitcase while she said, ‘Oh, that’s an engagement ring.’
‘What?’ I screamed. ‘Who?’
She laughed that shy laugh of hers. ‘Lee.’
‘When did he come back into your life?’ I knew she’d been in love with him and that they’d split up. But now he was back and she’d loved him all those years and never said a word. What a woman. So Lee Goldberg, Marshall of the city of New York, attractive, good man whom I hadn’t seen in years, was going to be my stepfather. That’s why she wanted the room. Sneaky. He was coming out in September. Bogie and I decided to give them the wedding at our house.
There was so much going on in 1948. Bogie went on a boat race one weekend and I shall never forget how much I missed him. I was so much in love with that man that when he left I felt a pain in my heart. I actually did. He was so much my life that I literally couldn’t think of anything else – had to catch my breath when he went away. Whenever I hear the word happy now, I think of then. Then I lived the full meaning of the word every day. Since then it has been elusive.
Harry Kurnitz gave Bogie a baby shower. If you can imagine Mike Romanoff, Paul Douglas, Dick Brooks, Jean Negulesco, Collier Young, Nunnally Johnson, Irving Lazar choosing baby presents for Bogie. It was funny – Dusty Negulesco, Ida Lupino, and I got dressed in our husbands’ clothes and crashed the party late in the evening. It was a little drunk and very sentimental. My own baby shower was smaller, more sedate, more traditional.
On September 14, 1948, Judge Edward Brand stood in our living room, with Bogie best man, me, matron of honor, and married Mother to Lee. As I stood there with the unborn Bogart putting a foot out here, an arm there, I thought of all the years my mother had waited for her shining knight to appear, never once making me aware of her yearning, only making me feel that what happened to me was what mattered. Had she ever given up as Bogie had, or had she always hoped? Never mind – her dream had come true, and when the Judge said, ‘I now pronounce you man and wife,’ she put her hand to her chest and let her breath out with an exclaimed ‘Oh.’ I knew that she couldn’t believe it had happened at last – that the tension of no compromise was over, that she would have a man to focus her love on, the love she had so much of. We had champagne and caviar, drank many toasts, and sent the bride and groom on their way – a slow honeymoon by car back to New York. At last it seemed that everyone in this impossible world had what they wanted.
Bogie formed his independent company called Santana Productions and started his first film, Knock on Any Door, with Nick Ray directing. He’d been working hard and was enjoying being his own boss. And I was reveling in my pregnancy. When a child starts to move inside you, it is the most fantastic feeling. God, I felt smug. I gloried in it – in every stage of
it. And, of course, I was convinced that all these emotions and happenings were peculiar to me – had never been felt before. I was active all through the nine months – had almost no discomfort – loved watching my stomach move around. I couldn’t get over the miracle that one person can live inside another person. I still think it’s a miracle. Nothing original there.
On the morning of January 6, 1949, I awakened early. I felt strange, but wasn’t sure if I should start timing the pains or not. They weren’t the kind of pains I expected. I casually looked at the clock and sensed a beginning regularity to them. I said nothing to Bogie, who kissed me and happily went off to work. As soon as he’d gone I sat up and started to watch the clock. When the pains seemed fairly regular I called Red Krohn, who said to wait awhile – ‘When they’re coming every five minutes call me. I’ll be here.’ He was the only man who mattered to me on that day. I moved to the living room with my Baby Ben clock and at last the pains started to come at five-minute intervals. The phone rang – May told me that Sheilah Graham wanted to speak to me. I said ‘Hello,’ and while my eyes never left that clock I heard her voice say, ‘Tell me, is it true Bogie had a child by another woman?’ ‘No,’ I answered and hung up. I called Red again, who told me to come to the office. I remember dressing and feeling very vague as I walked down the path, waving goodbye to May, saying I’d be back later. I drove to Red’s office, still vague, and on examining me, the pains now coming at three-minute intervals, he said, ‘We’d better call Bogie – you’re going into the hospital.’ I was still sitting on the examining table when the door opened suddenly and a panicked, green-tinged Bogart face appeared. I don’t know what he expected – to find me hanging upside down by my heels? This was new territory for him. Red gave Bogie instructions, about hospital signing in, entrances, etc., and said we should get right down there, he’d meet us. Poor Bogie. He was so worried, he was afraid to touch me for fear something would go wrong. I wasn’t a bit worried. As he drove me to the hospital, I told him about Sheilah Graham’s phone call. I thought he’d go mad – he called her every name in the book. ‘Wait till I get hold of her, I’ll fix that insensitive bitch.’ It obviously wasn’t true, but suppose it had been and she’d made that call? ‘Why the hell didn’t she call me?’ He was nervous enough driving – terrified something would happen in the car. He kept saying, ‘Are you all right, Baby? We’re almost there, Baby.’ His face was ashen. It was much easier to be me than him that day. I was signed in, and while I was being prepared, he paced. Red brought him to the labor room to sit with me. He wore a green gown to match his face. He took my hand in his, oh, so gently – he was so helpless, so sweet, so scared. As I took my hand away to hold on to the bars of the bed above my head as instructed, he turned even greener. He didn’t know what to do – after a few minutes he asked if I minded if he waited outside, he couldn’t bear to see anyone he loved in pain. Things happened very quickly after that – two hours later, at 11:22 p.m., Stephen (after Steve in To Have and Have Not) Humphrey Bogart was born. Red showed him to me in the delivery room. He was beautiful – all six pounds, six ounces, twenty inches of him. Bogie was waiting for me when I was wheeled from the recovery room to my own room. So relieved to see me smiling at him, talking to him. I was still gaga from the anesthesia, but I knew my man when he looked at me with tears in his eyes and said, ‘Hello, Baby.’ It was the fullest, most complete moment my life has known.
Bogie had a son – after forty-nine years of living, there was another Bogart on earth. And I was a mother. Every dream I had had for my life with Bogie had come true.
He went to Chasen’s to pass out cigars. No cliché was overlooked. Early the next morning he came to the hospital before work and we called Mother and Lee. I was ready to have another baby immediately, I felt so good. Dr Spivek, our pediatrician, was at the hospital at 7:00 a.m. and came in to see me with his report on the perfection of Steve. He told me what formula Steve was on – I’d be able to feed him myself. He warned me not to be afraid of handling the baby – he wouldn’t break. ‘Enjoy him.’
Telegrams, flowers, phone calls started pouring in. Mother was coming out immediately to see her daughter and her first grandchild. My girlfriends visited me afternoons, Bogie and others at night. Dick Brooks brought his camera to the hospital and photographed Bogie looking through the glass at this first child. It was a happening to all our friends as well as to us, no doubt about that. Steve’s arrival was well recorded.
And the exhilaration – I could have climbed Mount Everest. No postpartum depression for me! Never, never have I felt as I did then. The first time I held that baby was overwhelming. This entire complex being, twenty inches long – I examined every fingernail, tried to count his eyelashes – the smell of him – the feel. I was twenty-four and an only child, but I took to feeding and handling Steve as though I’d spent my life doing it. Whoever first said it was right – clichés are clichés because they are true. It was instinct. I was a natural-born mother (with my own child).
Two days before I was to bring my baby home, Los Angeles had its first snowfall in fifty years. I remember sitting in my hospital bed and looking out the window – I thought I was imagining things. What a great dividend – only right for the child of Eastern-born parents! I couldn’t wait to get home. I could have a baby every nine months if it was this easy! I hoped Bogie was as happy as I was. As for me, I knew that I had it all – and Bogie had given it to me.
On January 11 the ambulance took Steve and me home. As we were carried to the front door, there on the lawn was an enormous snowman which Bogie had spent half the night building. It was odd to see snow covering camellia bushes. I was taken to our bedroom, Steve to his at the other end of the house. We had an intercom rigged so that I could hear every sound in the nursery – could talk to the nurse if I wished. It was kept on at all times. Harvey was crazy with joy at my homecoming. Dr Spivek said to let him in the bedroom when Steve was with me – not to shut him out, make him jealous. Even Dr Spivek treated Harvey as human.
I kept going in and out of the nursery every five minutes. Steve’s nurse was not crazy about that, but she had to learn right from the start that I intended to do most things for my baby – that I had no intention of turning him over to anyone.
My first morning home I was having breakfast in bed when Bogie went off to work. Before he left, he stopped in to see his son – I had the intercom on and suddenly heard in a soft, new voice, ‘Hello, son. You’re a little fella, aren’t you? I’m Father. Welcome home.’ It was so unexpected – so moving. He’d never been faced with a tiny creature of his own before. He wasn’t sure what to say to him or how to say it. He was just letting him know that he was there – that he’d do his best and was glad to have him. Lucky Steve. Lucky me.
Friends came to view the son and heir. Gifts arrived. Someone sent us a Maud Humphrey baby book, bound in pale pink silk, with lovely Maud Humphrey children on every other page. And Stephen was a replica of his father, the original Maud Humphrey Baby. We had asked Louis Bromfield and Ginny and Quent Reynolds to be Steve’s godparents. With Bogie being a non-practicing Episcopalian and me a non-practicing Jew, we had no plan to do anything about formalizing Steve’s religion at that point.
A week after Stephen’s birth Bogie sent a twenty-dollar check to President Truman, accompanied by a letter asking him to please endorse the check and return it as a keepsake for Steve. A couple of months later the check arrived with the following:
Dear Mr Bogart –
I am returning the check which you sent me endorsed to Mr Bogart, Jr.
I hope you will buy him a savings bond with it and put it in his educational fund with my compliments.
It is a rare instance when I find a man who remembers his commitments and meets them on the dot.
Harry S Truman
The beginning of the Truman story was the fall of ’48 when Truman, campaigning for the Presidency, came to California for a rally. At the dinner preceding it, where I sat next to him, he and
Bogie made a bet on the baby’s sex – Truman said a boy, Bogie said a girl. Bogie lost.
The receipt of the Truman letter caused much excitement. What a nice man he was! The letter and the check immediately went into a frame, where they rest to this day, property of their rightful owner, Steve.
I fear my life began to revolve around my son. I wanted to do everything for him. When the nurse took a day off after the first three weeks, I slept in the nursery (Bogie didn’t care much for that) and just kept looking at that beautiful child.
There was no question of my going to the boat in the winter, weather being what it was, but finally Bogie prevailed upon me to go for a weekend. I hated to leave Stephen – was afraid I’d miss a new sound or look, sitting, standing, something. But I went and enjoyed it – we were lucky with the weather and it was lovely to be with Bogie alone. I remember making a remark Bogie found unforgettable. As I looked around me at the beautiful sea, the white landing with its small beach, the clear water, the sunshine, I sighed contentedly: ‘Who needs money when you can live like this?’ Bogie howled.
He knew I hated to leave Steve, but I reassured him about our boat life – I’d happily go with him, but please not every weekend. The problem of owning a boat is that it’s there and so expensive to keep up, you have to use it. That left us no alternatives. I would have liked going to the desert occasionally, but you couldn’t leave that glorious, expensive craft sitting alone and unused! I always loved the ocean, but would have preferred a beach house to a boat. That idea was never entertained. The Santana was beautiful, the life healthy and good, but I was always torn. It seems from the beginning I was torn – I wanted a career and I wanted Bogie, then I wanted both and a child. When I worked, I wanted to be home and vice versa. The truth is that I wanted it all – all the time. And God knows I tried to have it. And God knows I almost did.
By Myself and Then Some Page 25