DAVE ROSS

Lauren Bacall’s trouble with men

Aug 13, 2014, 8:09 AM | Updated: 8:32 am

FILE - This March 7, 2010 file photo shows actress Lauren Bacall backstage during the 82nd Academy Awards in Los Angeles. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo/Vince Bucci, File) FILE - This Oct. 15, 2007 file photo shows actress Lauren Bacall arrives at Elle magazine's 14th Annual Women in Hollywood tribute in Los Angeles. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo/Kevork Djansezian, FIle) FILE - This March 16, 2002 file photo shows actress Lauren Bacall waving as she enters Marble Collegiate Church in New York for the wedding of Liza Minnelli and David Gest. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo/Ed Betz, File) FILE - This Jan. 23, 1993 file photo shows actress Lauren Bacall holding up her Cecil B. DeMille Award for Lifetime Achievement as she holds hands with actor Anthony Hopkins backstage at the 50th annual Golden Globe Awards in Beverly Hills, Calif. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo/Reed Saxon, File) FILE - This March 4, 1982 file photo shows a Lauren Bacall and Jason Robards, right, at a rally to save the Morosco and Helen Hayes Theatres in New York. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo/Marty Lederhandler, File) FILE - This Jan. 14, 1981 file photo shows actress Lauren Bacall rehearsing with Eivind Harum, for the musical "Woman of the Year," in New York. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo/Suzanne Vlamis, File) FILE - This June 8, 1979 file photo shows actress Lauren Bacall, center, with Henry Kissinger, left, and actor Henry Fonda at a party to launch her autobiography,"By Myself" at the Palace Theater in New York. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo/Ron Frehm, FIle) FILE - This 1965 file photo shows actress Lauren Bacall at her home in New York. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo, File) FILE - This Oct. 12, 1955 file photo shows actors Humphrey Bogart, left, and his wife, Lauren Bacall at the premiere of "The Desperate Hours," in Los Angeles. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo/Harold Filan, FIle) FILE - In this Feb. 1950 file photo actor Humphrey Bogart, left, and his wife, actress Lauren Bacall, appear at the Stork Club in New York. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo, File) FILE - In this Feb. 10, 1945 file photo, Vice President Harry S. Truman plays the piano as actress Lauren Bacall lies on top of it during her appearance at the National Press Club canteen in Washington. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo, File) FILE - This May 1945 file photo shows actor Humphrey Bogart, left, with his wife actress Lauren Bacall. Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo, File) FILE - This 1944 file photo originally released by Warner Bros. shows actor Humphrey Bogart, right, holding actress Lauren Bacall in a scene from, "To Have and Have Not." Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo, Warner Bros. Pictures, File)

This 1944 file photo originally released by Warner Bros. shows actor Humphrey Bogart, right, holding actress Lauren Bacall in a scene from, "To Have and Have Not." Bacall, the sultry-voiced actress and Humphrey Bogart's partner off and on the screen, died Tuesday, Aug. 12, 2014 in New York. She was 89. (AP Photo, Warner Bros. Pictures, File)

(AP Photo, Warner Bros. Pictures, File)

She was a Hollywood legend who kept company with Presidents and could freeze a man with that deep voice and that famous no-nonsense “Look.”

But she dismissed the legend stuff, and came across as one of the more grounded people you could ever meet.
In 1994 she told Charlie Rose it was frustrating that she seemed to intimidate men off-screen as well as on:

“I find so many men so immature, so preoccupied with their manliness that they can’t have a relationship. They need constant reassurance. They need younger women to tell them how wonderful they are.”

She was that younger woman when she married Humphrey Bogart. She was 20, Bogart who had been married three times before, was 45.

She said he worried about that, “because he felt I was too young and that he was too old and that I would run off with somebody else after five years. He told this Peter Lorre who was a good friend of his. And Peter Lorre said, ‘Five years is better than nothing.'”

They would stay together until he died of cancer eleven years later, and she would have other relationships – but none like Bogart.

And she refused to be arm candy. “He’s got to be interesting. And he’s got to have humor. And many men don’t have any humor.”

Well, one man did.

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Lauren Bacall’s trouble with men