Lauren Bacall quotes:

I think your whole life shows in your face and you should be proud of that.

I used to tremble from nerves so badly that the only way I could hold my head steady was to lower my chin practically to my chest and look up at Bogie. That was the beginning of The Look.

I put my career in second place throughout both my marriages and it suffered. I don't regret it. You make choices. If you want a good marriage, you must pay attention to that. If you want to be independent, go ahead. You can't have it all.

Stardom isn't a profession, it's an accident.

I loved reading Grimm's fairy tales and Hans Christian Andersen, and I loved to dream about other worlds and other lives. Maybe that has something to do with having an incomplete family, being an only child. All I know is I loved to pretend, and all that was in tandem with my wanting to be an actress.

You spend a good part of your adult life acquiring things: building a home, filling it with objects that please your eye and make you feel comfortable. Then you spend the last part of your life trying to figure out how to get rid of it all.

I love being Jewish; I have no problem with it at all. But it did become like a scar, with all these people saying you don't look it.

When everything happens to you when you're so young, you're very lucky, but by the same token, you're never going to have that same feeling again. The first time anything happens to you - your first love, your first success - the second one is never the same.

You learn to rise above a lot of bad things that happen in your life. And you have to keep going.

A famous love story is hard to maintain when you both live in the spotlight.

I don't look in the mirror; don't like what I see; never have. I am not my idea of a beauty. Never was. This is not false modesty. I've just never been enamoured of my face, which of course is magnified umpteen times on screen.

The biggest misconception people have about me is that I'm in control of every situation. I'm rarely in control of any situation.

Looking at yourself in a mirror isn't exactly a study of life.

You realize yourself when you start reflecting - because I don't live in the past, although your past is so much a part of what you are - that you can't ignore it. But I don't look at scrapbooks.

What is the point of working all your life and then stopping?

Find me a man who's interesting enough to have dinner with and I'll be happy.

You can't always be a leading lady.

I like to work with really good professional people - anyone with real talent.

A man's illness is his private territory and, no matter how much he loves you and how close you are, you stay an outsider. You are healthy.

When a woman reaches twenty-six in America, she's on the slide. It's downhill all the way from then on. It doesn't give you a tremendous feeling of confidence and well-being.

Men need to feel important. They feel better when they're with younger girls or unknown girls.

Life is amazing, life is odd. Life is not what you expected it to be. Things happen... Growing up takes longer than you think.

I'm not a sedentary person. I've always been active.

I happen to watch public television more than anything else. I'm also a news junkie, so I watch a lot of CNN.

That was my original dream, anyway, to be on stage. I think the stage is an actor's place because actors, it belongs to you.

Movies are great fun and wonderful when they're good. But you never get to see them till six months after they're finished. So you never get a sense of whether they're really well liked or how good they are. And you don't really know what the finished product is going to be like, because it's a director's medium.

I was this kid, and I was scared to death of all these pros around me... My head would shake, and my hands would shake, and I discovered if I kept my head down and looked up, my head would not shake, so I started to do that when I could, when it was appropriate in a scene.

My definition of a star is someone who really lasts for a very long time.

I've always felt that work - learning from people who know more than I know - is what keeps you going.

I never believed marriage was a lasting institution. I thought that to be married for five years was to be married forever.

My mother was the greatest example to me of anyone I've ever known. She didn't have an easy life. I adored her. She worked hard all her life, and she was the one who set my values. She was quite an amazing woman, although she wasn't tough at all.

In Hollywood, an equitable divorce settlement means each party getting fifty percent of publicity.

I find that through the sad times, work is what made my continuing, not breaking down, possible. In work, I was always someone else and I subconsciously reveled in that.

No, I don't like legend. I mean, I don't like the category. And to begin with, to me, a legend is something that is not on the Earth, that is dead

I always thought I had crooked eyebrows and crooked teeth. That's why I never understood why people called me a beauty.

When you talk about a great actor, you're not talking about Tom Cruise.

I hope I'm thought of as not just a showbiz personality, but as someone who has lived a life and who has hopefully made a contribution to something along the way - someone who is a human being as well as an actress.

[Katharine Hepburn] was much stronger, much more opinionated than I am or ever was, and it was considered attractive on her. But not on me. I don't know. Maybe her Bryn Mawr accent was more appealing than mine.

I have made mistakes in the past and been in movies that really weren't good, and that I needed the money at the time, or something -- and the money wasn't even that great. But I needed it, and... they come back on television, those movies... to haunt you. And it's a nightmare!

Imagination is the highest kite one can fly.

It's inappropriate and vulgar and absolutely unacceptable to use your private life to sell anything commercially.

When you talk about a great actor, you're not talking about Tom Cruise. His whole behavior is so shocking. It's inappropriate and vulgar and absolutely unacceptable to use your private life to sell anything commercially, but I think it's kind of a sickness.

Legends are all to do with the past and nothing to do with the present.

My life has had meaning, with the friendships full and valuable and essential to me. My children, Steve, Leslie, and Sam, are all different-all first-rate human beings with high standards-whom I completely and unequivocally adore-don't always agree with-but always admire and respect. They all have wit and a sense of humor and, thank God, I have hung on to mine.

I am essentially a loner.

The madmen seem to live on forever, don't they?

I'm crazy enough to believe in taking chances in every way, in making choices and gambling with your life. That's the kind of gambling I believe in.

Young people, even in Hollywood, ask me, 'Were you really married to Humphrey Bogart?' 'Well, yes, I think I was,' I reply.

I would hate now to be married. It does occur to me on occasion that, if I fall and hit my head, there will be no one to make the phone call. But who wants to think about that disaster, I'd prefer not to.

A woman isn't complete without a man. But where do you find a man - a real man - these days?

I spent my childhood in New York, riding on subways and buses. And you know what you learn if you're a New Yorker? The world doesn't owe you a damn thing.

All the Warner actors were real actors. They started in theater and led very straightforward lives - you never saw entourages around. The MGM girls were the glamour girls, and they always had the makeup and hair people with them and all that.

I'm not tough, and I never have been. I suppose over the years I've built up kind of a veneer to protect myself because I have functioned on my own for a long, long time, and I have never had a lot of flunkies preceding me to clear the way.

I was always a little unsteady in my self-belief. Then there was the Jewish thing. I love being Jewish, I have no problem with it at all. But it did become like a scar, with all these people saying you don't look it.

I don't think being the only child of a single parent helped. I was always a little unsteady in my self-belief. Then there was the Jewish thing. I love being Jewish, I have no problem with it at all. But it did become like a scar, with all these people saying you don't look it.

Being a liberal is the best thing on earth you can be. You are welcoming to everyone when you're a liberal. You do not have a small mind.

I figure if I have my health, can pay the rent and I have my friends, I call it 'content.'

Standing still is the fastest way of moving backwards in a rapidly changing world.

After the age of 30 in the movie profession, you're pretty well over as far as the casting people are concerned.

I remember my oldest son, Steve, saying to me once, 'I don't ever remember seeing you with an apron on.' And I thought, that's right, honey, you did not. That was his concept of what a mother should be.

I adored 'Breaking The Waves,' so when Lars von Trier wanted me in 'Dogville,' I was beside myself with joy. He works in a way that nobody I've ever worked with works.

I don't sit around thinking that I'd like to have another husband; only another man would make me think that way.

I studied dancing for 13 years. And loved to dance. Always wanted to dance with Fred Astaire.

When I was a kid, it was Bette Davis. She was my idol. I used to cut school and sit in the back of the theater; of course, I would have snuck in because I couldn't afford a ticket.

I always wanted to work with Spencer Tracy, which never happened, although I knew him well. And I never worked with Cary Grant.

The big rule is that you must never get mixed up with a married man - never even look sideways at another woman's fella. Boy, I really was terrific at obeying that rule, wasn't I?

God - if the press ever quoted anyone correctly, it would be brilliant.

I'm a big fan of Daniel Day-Lewis. He's a marvelous actor. He stands alone, I think.

I'm a total Democrat. I'm anti-Republican. And it's only fair that you know it... I'm liberal. The L word!

There were times, sure, I wanted my career to go better. But once it starts to go downhill, you can never get back, or only to some degree.

I don't have an entourage. In fact, I have no live-in help.

I wish Frank Sinatra would just shut up and sing.

I am not a has-been. I am a will be.

It was Howard Hawks who changed my life.

Film is not a woman's medium. If you weren't the hottest kid in town, men stayed away from you.

They're guys who want to screw around all the time, which interests me not at all. God knows we've done that, been there, and we don't want to do that any more.

My feeling about the movies is that most of them are terrible. If you don't have a decent script and a decent director, forget it.

You can't start worrying about what's going to happen. You get spastic enough worrying about what's happening now.

Patience was not my strong point.

"My obit is going to be full of Bogart, I'm sure," she says, adding, "I'll never know if that's true. If that's the way it is, that's the way it is."

A planned life is a dead life.

Acting is a life of rejection.

Actors today go into TV, which I don't consider has a lot to do with acting.

Actors today go into TV, which I don't consider has a lot to do with acting. They only think of stardom. If you photograph well, that's enough. I have a terrible time distinguishing one from another. Girls wear their hair the same, and are much too anorexic-looking.

All actors are terrified - they just learn how to control it.

Always I'm feeling, 'You're never going to work again.' That's going to happen one day, but I hope I'm not alive.

As long as I can walk and talk, I'll try almost anything. I say "almost" because the high wire is definitely out.

Being a liberal is the best thing on earth you can be. You are welcoming to everyone when you're a liberal. You do not have a small mind... I'm total, total, total liberal and proud of it. And I think it's outrageous to say "The L word". I mean, excuse me. They should be damn lucky that they were liberals here. Liberals gave more to the population of the United States than any other group.

Each time a friend dies, the present becomes the past, in an instant.

Everything in this country [the US] has got to be good looks and unlined faces and thin bodies and people running around in skirts slit up to their ass. It has nothing to do with thinking or with being a human being. There is life in mature people; it's not all over at 24½.

Generally women are better than men -- they have more character. I prefer men for some things, obviously, but women have a greater sense of honor and are more willing to take a chance with their lives.

God if the press ever quoted anyone correctly it would be brilliant.

Growing up takes longer than you think.

He [Bogie] had tremendous character and a great sense of honor and would not tolerate lies, even if they asked him what he thought of a movie. We were once at a screening at somebody's house, I forget whose, and they ran a movie that he was in, that he never thought much of. Afterward, the producer asked what he thought of it, and Bogie said "I think it's a crock." And this producer was horrified! He was about to release the movie, and he said to Bogie "Why would you say that?!" Bogie shrugged and said "Then don't ask me." He never played the schmoozing game. He was not into that at all.

He named me. He liked the sound of it. And I said, well, all right. I felt a little odd about it. I don't understand all that name changing business anyway... No, he felt that Lauren Bacall was better sounding than Betty Bacall. He had a vision of his own. He was a svengali. He wanted to mold me. He wanted to control me. And he did until Mr. Bogart got involved.

His attention span was not long, shall we say?

Hollywood is the only place in the world where an amicable divorce means each one gets fifty percent of the publicity.

How in hell can you handle love without turning your life upside down? That's what love does, it changes everything.

How long an actress lives professionally depends on her stamina, the extent of her masochism, her imagination, and her yearning for recognition or approval.

How many women do we know who were continually kissed by Clark Gable, William Powell, Cary Grant, Spencer Tracy and Fredric March? Only one: Myrna Loy.

Howard Hawks said he'd like to put me in a film with Cary Grant or Humphrey Bogart. I thought, "Cary Grant-terrific! Humphrey Bogart-yucch."

I always brought up my children not to believe in Mothers Day gifts, and now I regret it.

I am not a wealthy woman. I wish to hell I was, but I never had a wealthy man.

I called my business manager in California and said, 'Sell all of my stock' - what little of it I had - and it's the only smart financial move I ever made.

I don't consider myself a great actress. I'm just trying to stay alive, actually. I think I'm good, and I've learned a lot, certainly, mostly in the theater. I've been sloughed off movies for years. But what can you do? That's life.

I fairly often have thought how lucky I was. I knew everybody because I was married to Bogie, and that 25-year difference was the most fantastic thing for me to have in my life.

I finally felt that I came into my own when I went on the stage.

I never believed marriage was a lasting institution . . . I thought that to be married for five years was to be married forever.

I think I'm damn lucky. I'm lucky that my kids are all straight, that they haven't ended up in jail, that they're all worthwhile human beings, thank God. Their lives are happy; they have happy partners, wives, husbands.

I was this flat-chested, big-footed, lanky thing.

If goodness is its own reward, shouldn't we get a little something for being naughty?

If there was one thing I had never been, it was mysterious, and if there was one thing I had never done, it was not talk.

If you want me just whistle. You know how to whistle don't you? Just put your lips together and blow.

I'll miss Hollywood. Of the twenty friends I thought I had, I'll miss the six I really had.

I'm total, total, total liberal and proud of it.

In the world of relationships, possibly the most complicated, uncommon, hard to find, hard to keep and most rewarding has got to be friendship.

Isn't hope an incredible, a wonderfully demented thing?

It's not an old movie if you haven't seen it.

Life is not what you expected it to be.