Good Morning: Bogey wins his only Oscar

March 20, 1952: Humphrey Bogart wins Oscar

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57 years ago tonight, Humphrey Bogart receives his first and only Oscar, for Best Actor in The African Queen.

Born in 1899 in New York, Bogart planned to become a doctor like his surgeon father, but he was expelled from prep school for bad behavior, which ended his academic ambitions.

He joined the Navy during World War I and was injured in fight aboard his ship, USS Leviathan. His upper lip was scarred and partially paralyzed, giving him the tough-guy poker face and slight lisp that characterized his acting.

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USS Leviathan, in the bizarre "dazzle" camo used during WWI as she appeared when Bogey served aboard. The ship was a German liner siezed by the US government when the US declared war on Germany in 1917 and converted into a troop ship.

When he returned from the war, a family friend gave Bogart a job as an office boy at a theater. Eventually, Bogart became a tour manager and stage manager for the company and became interested in acting in the early 1920s. Sadly, the reviews of an early play in which he appeared, Swiftly, called his acting "what is usually and mercifully called inadequate."

Bogart kept at it. In 1935, he co-starred with Leslie Howard (who played "Ashley Wilkes" in GWTW) in a Broadway production called The Petrified Forest. When Warner Bros. bought the film rights, they wanted to keep Howard but recast Bogart's role, but Howard said the two were a package deal. The film, released in 1936, was a hit, and Bogart began landing movie roles.

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Bogey and Ingrid Bergmann in Casablanca

He played gangsters and other mediocre parts until 1941, when he played a gangster in High Sierra, written by John Huston. Huston, impressed with Bogart's abilities, cast the actor as detective Sam Spade in the noir classic The Maltese Falcon (1941), the first of many hard-boiled roles Bogart would play.

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The original movie boat from The African Queen is on permanent display in Key Largo, FL.

Bogart's most famous features followed: Casablanca in 1943, The Big Sleep in1946, and Key Largo in 1948. Bogart had been married three times when he starred in To Have and Have Not with 21-year-old actress Lauren Bacall. The two fell in love and married.

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Bogey (sneaking a peek at Marilyn's cavernous cleavage), Bacall (left) and Marilyn Monroe

In 1947, Bogey formed his own company, which produced hits like Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948), The African Queen(1951), and Sabrina (1954).

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Bogey and Hepburn dragging the African Queen through the reeds in the film

Bogart died of cancer in 1957, but college students in the 1960s rediscovered his films and launched the "Bogey" cult that still continues today.

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the movie version of the Maltese Falcon is kinda weak as far as real film noir. though, the Family Guy Stewie is a rip of Peter Lorre's character/speech pattern.

Treasure of the Sierra Madre is my fave Bogey flick.

Quote:

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Originally Posted by King Crimson

Treasure of the Sierra Madre is my fave Bogey flick.

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