Humphrey Bogart

Humphrey Bogart married actress Helen Menken on May 20, 1926 after four years of courtship. However, the marriage did not last long and they divorced on November 18, 1927.

Next on April 3, 1928, Bogart married actress Mary Philips. Subsequently, Bogart moved to Hollywood; but Philips, who had an established career at New York, refused to accompany him. Finally they divorced in 1938, but remained on good terms.

Bogart next married actress Mayo Methot on August 21, 1938. She suspected Bogart of infidelity and the two fought to such an extent that friends called them ‘The Battling Bogarts’. Ultimately, they divorced in 1945.

Humphrey DeForest Bogart was born on December 25, 1899 in New York. His father, Dr. Belmont DeForest Bogart, was a well-known heart surgeon while his mother, Maud Humphrey, was a famous painter. Young Humphrey acted as his mother’s model a number of times

Humphrey was the eldest of his parent’s three children. He had two sisters; Frances and Catherine Elizabeth. His parents were rather formal and showed very little emotion to them.

Humphrey began his education at Delancey School and studied there until fifth grade. After that he was shifted first to prestigious Trinity School and then in 1917 to equally elite Phillips Academy. His parents expected him to join University of Yale after school.

Unfortunately, in 1918, he was expelled from the school purportedly for throwing a groundskeeper into Rabbit Pond in the campus. With no other option left he joined United States Navy. His time in the US Navy helped him to develop a separate set of values independent of family influence.

In 1919, once the World War I ended, Humphrey Bogart was honorably discharged from the Navy. He came home to find his father sick and family fortune diminished due to bad investment. Therefore, he began to look for work.

He got an office job at World Film Corporation, a company owned by theatre actor and producer William Aloysius Brad Sr. There he had to do all types of job and even tried his hand in script writing and directing, but failed.

In the end, it was William’s daughter Alice, who introduced Bogart to acting. He initially acted as her stage manager. Then in 1921, he made his stage debut in her production, ‘Drifting’, playing a Japanese butler and uttering nervously his one-line dialogue, "Drinks for my lady and for her most honored guests."

More roles followed and Bogart persistently worked at his chosen field. From 1922, he began appearing in number of Broadway productions with drawing room or country house settings. Initially he got small roles or second leads in comedies such as ‘Meet the Wife’ (1923) where he played the part of reporter Gregory Brown.

In 1925, he got his first leading role in a comedy called ‘Cradle Snatcher’. His success at the Broadway was soon noticed by film directors. In 1928, he made his film debut with a short film called ‘The Dancing Town’; but concentrated mainly on stage.

Then the stock market crashed in 1929; it had a huge negative impact on stage production and there was hardly any work. Therefore, like many other stage artists, Bogart set out for Hollywood and along with Spencer Tracy co-starred in ‘Up the River’, a 1930 feature film directed by John Ford.

Over a span of three decades Humphrey Bogart had appeared in around seventy-five movies. Among them, ‘Casablanca’ (1942), ‘To Have and Have Not’ (1944), ‘The Big Sleep’ (1946) ’The Treasure of the Sierra Madre’ (1948), ‘In a Lonely Place’ (1950), ‘The African Queen’ (1951), ‘Sabrina’ (1954), and ‘The Caine Mutiny’ (1954) are now regarded as screen classics.