Lauren Bacall on filming her famous scene in To Have and Have Not (1944):


 My hand was shaking, my head was shaking, the cigarette was shaking—I was so embarrassed. The more I tried to stop, the more I shook. I figured out that the only way to keep my head still was to lower my chin, almost to my chest, and look up at Bogart. It worked, and that became the start of 'The Look.'"


When director Howard Hawks discovered Bacall, he gave her a choice between working with Cary Grant or Humphrey Bogart. She was tempted to work with Grant, but Hawks cast her with Bogart in To Have and Have Not, and that led to one of Hollywood's most famous love stories.


Bacall wrote in her autobiography that by the third week of filming, their friendly joking turned into something more. After shooting one day, she said, "...he leaned over, put his hand under my chin, and kissed me. It was a quick kiss—he was a little shy, not forceful. He took a matchbook out of his pocket and asked me to write my phone number on it. I did."


At the time, Bogart was 44 and unhappy in his third marriage. Their chemistry on screen was obvious, but Howard Hawks was upset. He warned Bacall that the relationship might hurt her career, even threatening she could end up at Monogram Pictures (some say he was jealous and interested in Bacall himself). Hawks also said that Bogart would drop her after the movie, but that was far from true. Bogart divorced and married Bacall in 1945.


The couple made three more films together and stayed married until Bogart passed away from cancer in January 1957. At his funeral, Bacall placed a whistle in his coffin, a reference to her famous line in the film: "You know how to whistle, don't you? You just put your lips together and blow."



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