Humphrey Bogart

(1899 – 1957)

Biographical Sketch

Humphrey DeForest Bogart (New York, NY, USA, December 25, 1899 – Los Angeles, CA, USA, January 14, 1957) was an American screen actor whose performances in iconic 1940s films noir such as The Maltese Falcon, Casablanca, and The Big Sleep earned him status as a cultural icon.

Bogart began acting in 1921 after a hitch in the U.S. Navy in World War I and little success in various jobs in finance and the production side of the theater. Gradually he became a regular in Broadway shows in the 1920s and 1930s. When the stock market crash of 1929 reduced the demand for plays, Bogart turned to film. His first great success was as Duke Mantee in The Petrified Forest (1936), and this led to a period of typecasting as a gangster with films such as Angels with Dirty Faces (1938) and B-movies like The Return of Doctor X (1939).

Bogart’s breakthrough as a leading man came in 1941 with High Sierra and The Maltese Falcon. The next year, his performance in Casablanca (1943; Oscar nomination) raised him to the peak of his profession and, at the same time, cemented his trademark film persona, that of the hard-boiled cynic who ultimately shows his noble side. Other successes followed, including To Have and Have Not (1944), The Big Sleep (1946), Dark Passage (1947), and Key Largo (1948), all four with his wife Lauren Bacall; The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948); In a Lonely Place (1950); The African Queen (1951; Oscar winner); Sabrina (1954); and The Caine Mutiny (1954; Oscar nomination). His last film was The Harder They Fall (1956).

During a film career of almost 30 years, Bogart appeared in more than 75 feature films. In 1999, the American Film Institute ranked Bogart as the greatest male star of Classic American cinema. Over his career, he received three Academy Award nominations for Best Actor, winning one (for The African Queen).

Major Awards and Honors

Academy Awards (USA)

1951: Best Actor – “The African Queen”

American Film Institute (AFI)

1999: 100 Years, 100 Stars: Top 25 Legends (male) – No. 1
2003: 100 Years, 100 Heroes and Legends: Top 50 Heroes – No. 4 (Rick Blaine, “Casablanca”)
2003: 100 Years, 100 Heroes and Legends: Top 50 Heroes – No. 32 (Philip Marlowe, “The Big Sleep”)
2005: 100 Years, 100 Movie Quotes – 5th: “Here’s looking at you, kid.” (Rick Blaine, “Casablanca”)
2005: 100 Years, 100 Movie Quotes – 14th: “The stuff that dreams are made of.” (Sam Spade, “The Maltese Falcon”)
2005: 100 Years, 100 Movie Quotes – 20th: “Louie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.” (Rick Blaine, “Casablanca”)
2005: 100 Years, 100 Movie Quotes – 43rd: “We’ll always have Paris.” (Rick Blaine, “Casablanca”)
2005: 100 Years, 100 Movie Quotes – 67th: “Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.” (Rick Blaine, “Casablanca”)

Grauman’s Chinese Theater (Hollywood, CA, USA)

1946: Hand- and Footprints in cement

Hollywood Walk of Fame

1960: Star plaque

Filmography

The Dancing Town (1928)
– Role: Man in Doorway at Dance
Broadway’s Like That (1930)
– Role: Ruth’s Fiancé
Up the River (1930)
– Role: Steve Jordan
A Devil With Women (1930)
– Role: Tom Standish
Body and Soul (1931)
– Role: Jim Watson
Bad Sister (1931)
– Role: Valentine Corliss
A Holy Terror (1931)
– Role: Steve Nash
Women of All Nations (1931)
– Role: Stone (scenes deleted)
Love Affair (1932)
– Role: Jim Leonard
Big City Blues (1932)
– Role: Shep Adkins
Three on a Match (1932)
– Role: Harve
Midnight (1934)
– Role: Garboni
The Petrified Forest (1936)
– Role: Duke Mantee
Bullets or Ballots (1936)
– Role: Nick “Bugs” Fenner
Two Against the World (1936)
– Role: Sherry Scott
China Clipper (1936)
– Role: Hap Stuart
Isle of Fury (1936)
– Role: Valentine “Val” Stevens
Black Legion (1937)
– Role: Frank Taylor
The Great O’Malley (1937)
– Role: John Phillips
Marked Woman (1937)
– Role: David Graham
Kid Galahad (1937)
– Role: Turkey Morgan
San Quentin (1937)
– Role: Joe “Red” Kennedy
Dead End (1937)
– Role: Hugh “Baby Face” Martin
Stand-In (1937)
– Role: Doug Quintain
Swing Your Lady (1938)
– Role: Ed Hatch
Crime School (1938)
– Role: Deputy Commissioner Mark Braden
Men Are Such Fools (1938)
– Role: Harry Galleon
Racket Busters (1938)
– Role: Pete “Czar” Martin
The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse (1938)
– Role: “Rocks” Valentine
Angels with Dirty Faces (1938)
– Role: James Frazier
Swingtime in the Movies (1938)
– Role: Himself
King of the Underworld (1939)
– Role: Joe Gurney
The Oklahoma Kid (1939)
– Role: Whip McCord
You Can’t Get Away with Murder (1939)
– Role: Frank Wilson
Dark Victory (1939)
– Role: Michael O’Leary
The Roaring Twenties (1939)
– Role: George Hally
The Return of Doctor X (1939)
– Role: Dr. Maurice Xavier, aka Marshall Quesne
Invisible Stripes (1939)
– Role: Chuck Martin
Virginia City (1940)
– Role: John Murrell
It All Came True (1940)
– Role: Grasselli aka Chips Maguire
Brother Orchid (1940)
– Role: Jack Buck
They Drive by Night (1940)
– Role: Paul Fabrini
High Sierra (1941)
– Role: Roy Earle
The Wagons Roll at Night (1941)
– Role: Nick Coster
The Maltese Falcon (1941)
– Role: Sam Spade
All Through the Night (1942)
– Role: Gloves Donahue
The Big Shot (1942)
– Role: Joseph “Duke” Berne
Across the Pacific (1942)
– Role: Rick Leland
Casablanca (1942)
– Role: Rick Blaine
Action in the North Atlantic (1943)
– Role: Lt. Joe Rossi
Sahara (1943)
– Role: Sgt. Joe Gunn
Thank Your Lucky Stars (1943)
– Role: Himself
Passage to Marseille (1944)
– Role: Jean Matrac
To Have and Have Not (1944)
– Role: Harry “Steve” Morgan
– With Lauren Bacall.
I Am an American (1944)
– Role: Himself
Conflict (1945)
– Role: Richard Mason
The Big Sleep (1946)
– Role: Philip Marlowe
–With Lauren Bacall.
Two Guys From Milwaukee (1946)
– Role: Himself
Dead Reckoning (1947)
– Role: Capt. “Rip” Murdock
The Two Mrs. Carrolls (1947)
– Role: Geoffrey Carroll
Dark Passage (1947)
– Role: Vincent Parry
–With Lauren Bacall.
The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948)
– Role: Fred C. Dobbs
Key Largo (1948)
– Role: Frank McCloud
–With Lauren Bacall.
Always Together (1948)
– Role: Himself
Knock on Any Door (1949)
– Role: Andrew Morton
Tokyo Joe (1949)
– Role: Joseph “Joe” Barrett
Chain Lightning (1950)
– Role: Lt. Col. Matthew “Matt” Brennan
In a Lonely Place (1950)
– Role: Dixon Steele
The Enforcer (1951)
– Role: District Attorney Martin Ferguson
Sirocco (1951)
– Role: Harry Smith
The African Queen (1951)
– Role: Charlie Allnut
Deadline – U.S.A. (1952)
– Role: Ed Hutcheson
The Road to Bali (1953)
– Role: Himself
Battle Circus (1953)
– Role: Major Jed Webbe
Beat the Devil (1953)
– Role: Billy Dannreuther
The Caine Mutiny (1954)
– Role: Lt. Cmdr. Philip Francis Queeg
Sabrina (1954)
– Role: Linus Larrabee
The Barefoot Contessa (1954)
– Role: Harry Dawes
The Love Lottery (1954)
– Role: Cameo role at end as himself in British Ealing comedy
We’re No Angels (1955)
– Role: Joseph
The Left Hand of God (1955)
– Role: James “Jim” Carmody
The Desperate Hours (1955)
– Role: Glenn Griffin
The Harder They Fall (1956)
– Role: Eddie Willis
Dead Men Don’t Wear Plaid (1982)
– Role: Posthumously reprised role of Philip Marlowe via stock footage from The Big Sleep.
Tales From the Crypt (1995)
– Season 6, episode 15, “You Murderer”: Contains archive footage of Bogart; also starring John Lithgow, and directed by Robert Zemekis.

Broadway Appearances

Drifting (Playhouse Theatre, New York, 1922)
– Roles: Third Husband / Ernie Crockett
Swifty (Playhouse Theatre, New York, 1922)
– Role: Tom Proctor
Meet the Wife (Klaw Theatre [later CBS Radio Playhouse No. 2], New York, 1923-1924)
– Role: Gregory Brown
Nerves (Comedy Theatre [later Artef Theatre], New York, 1924)
– Role: Bob Thatch
Hell’s Bells (Wallack’s Theatre, [later Anco Cinema], New York, 1925)
– Role: Jimmy Todhunter
Cradle Snatchers (Music Box Theatre, New York, 1925-1926)
– Role: Jose Vallejo
Baby Mine (Chanin’s 46th Street Theatre [later Richard Rodgers Theatre], New York, 1927)
– Role: Alfred Hardy
Saturday’s Children (Booth Theatre & Forrest [later Eugene O’Neill] Theatre, New York, 1927-1928)
– Role: Rims O’Neil
Skyrocket (Lyceum Theatre, New York, 1929)
– Role: Vic. Ewing
It’s a Wise Child (Belasco Theatre, New York, 1929-1930)
– Role: Roger Baldwin
After All (Booth Theatre, New York, 1931)
– Role: Duff Wilson
I Loved You Wednesday (Sam H. Harris Theatre, New York, 1932)
– Role: Randall Williams
Chrysalis (Martin Beck Theatre [later Al Hirschfeld Theatre], New York, 1932)
– Role: Don Ellis
Our Wife (Booth Theatre, New York, 1933)
– Role: Jerry Marvin
The Mask and the Face (Guild Theatre [later August Wilson Theatre], New York, 1933)
– Role: Luciano Spina
Invitation to a Murder (Theatre Masque [later John Golden Theatre], New York, 1934)
– Role: Horatio Channing
The Petriefied Forest (Broadhurst Theatre, New York, 1935)
– Role: Duke Mantee

A Selection of Quotes

Casablanca

“Here’s looking at you, kid.”

“Louie, I think this is the beginning of a beautiful friendship.”

“We’ll always have Paris.”

“Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine.”

The Maltese Falcon

“The stuff that dreams are made of.”

Links

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