RIP Lauren BacallLauren Bacall, the film and stage actress and model who was known for her distinctive husky voice and sultry looks, died Tuesday at the age of 89.
The celebrity news website TMZ quoted family as saying that she died at her home of a massive stroke. A separate report from cable news outlet MSNBC always quoted a family source as confirming the death.
Bacall first emerged as a leading lady in the Humphrey Bogart film To Have and Have Not (1944) and continued on in the film noir genre, with appearances in Bogart movies The Big Sleep (1946), Dark Passage (1947), and Key Largo (1948), as well as comedic roles in How to Marry a Millionaire (1953) with Marilyn Monroe and Designing Woman (1957) with Gregory Peck.
Bacall also worked on Broadway in musicals, gaining Tony Awards for Applause in 1970 and Woman of the Year in 1981. Her performance in the movie The Mirror Has Two Faces (1996) earned her a Golden Globe Award and an Academy Award nomination.
In 1999, Bacall was ranked #20 of the 25 actresses on the 100 Stars list by the American Film Institute. In 2009, she was selected by the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to receive an Academy Honorary Award "in recognition of her central place in the Golden Age of motion pictures."
Bacall was born Betty Joan Perske in the Bronx, New York, the only child of Natalie Weinstein-Bacal, a secretary who later legally changed her surname to Bacall, and William Perske, who worked in sales; both of her parents were Jewish. Her mother emigrated from Romania through Ellis Island, and her father was born in New Jersey, to Polish parents.
BACALL, Lauren (Betty Joan Perske)
Born: 9/16/1924, New York City, New York, U.S.A.
Died: 8/12/2014, Manhattan, New York, U.S.A.
Lauren Bacall’s western – actress:
The Shootist – 1976 (Bond Rogers)