The one actor Humphrey Bogart was always suspicious of: “We had long arguments”
Just hearing the name Humphrey Bogart calls to mind a specific image of Old Hollywood, all shadowy black-and-white, cigarette smoke dancing in the air, and a hat framing a concerned glance that bores into your soul.
The actor was one of cinema’s most iconic stars, racking up a filmography that most performers would be happy to have just a sliver of; whether he was appearing in a sumptuous crime noir like The Big Sleep or creating film history with one of the greatest and endlessly quotable romances ever put to screen, Casablanca, Bogart was every bit the Hollywood legend.
His career saw him work with the biggest stars that the industry had to offer, although there was one actor who admitted that Bogart seemed suspicious of her, resulting in the pair’s frequent bickering.
It was the indomitable Katharine Hepburn, who appeared alongside him in the classic Oscar-winning John Huston adventure flick The African Queen, which was made in rather challenging conditions, with most of the cast and crew getting sick from drinking contaminated water on location. Making the film wasn’t going to be easy, and paired with Hepburn’s tendency to be straightforward and vocal about her opinions, there were certainly moments of tension to abound.
“She could be quite bossy, but we all got used to it,” script supervisor Angela Allen told Vulture, attesting to Hepburn’s forthrightness, which might rendered her a little bossy, but really, she was just a woman refusing to submit to the men around her, unafraid to vocalise her opinions during a time when female actors were expected to just shut up and get on with it.
Hepburn was never going to cower to anyone’s demands, though. If she thought something needed changing, she’d say, but she admits that her insistence to suggest alterations to the film led Bogart to feel suspicious of her. This was hardly an unusual response from a male actor at the time.
Writing in The Making of the African Queen, she said, “He would argue, and Bogie would come by, suspicious of me, for the male star has a natural suspicion of a female star who is interested in script changes. But he discovered quickly that my interest was general, not personal… We had long and amiable arguments—nothing much was done, really, and I seemed to be happy.”
The actor knew that if she wanted to maintain her position in Hollywood, she had to stand up for her own ideas, even if people thought this shocking, about which she noted, “I found that I could be quite honest with John [Huston] about what I thought, and I also found that where I had good ideas, he would take them. Where I was just worrying and confusing the issue, he would say, ‘Let it alone’.”
Thus, a few arguments with Bogart emerged, but they were never serious, and the pair became good friends when the actor realised he didn’t need to be suspicious of his co-star at all. They remained close over the coming years, with Hepburn visiting him shortly before he died just six years later.
