I’m posing the question in the title “How did a Duggar pregnancy score a People Magazine cover over Lauren Bacall passing?,” which someone brought up in the comments yesterday, but I know the answer already. Look at Bedhead’s post for screen legend Lauren Bacall’s passing last week. It received a respectable 89 comments, but it didn’t blow up like the two Duggar threads did yesterday. Bacall was a class act her entire life. She had a successful career and a quiet retirement. She passed away at 89, an age many people would be happy to live to. Hollywood was able to give her accolades while she was living. Plus People just ran an in memorial cover, for Robin Williams, last week. They probably didn’t want to have two in a row.
The Duggars are controversial and they have a current reality show. While they might not have as many fans as Bacall, they get more attention. That’s just the way it is, but it can be infuriating if you think about it too hard. So let’s give some more attention to Bacall while we can.
I had the chance to read People’s story on Bacall, and it’s a nice tribute to an early screen star who lived out her years quietly in New York, not shying from the spotlight but not seeking it out either. The one detail I got from this story was that Bacall lived in the same apartment in NY, in the historic Dakota building, for 50 years. She also was active in the Democratic party, and often attended fundraisers. Bacall was one of a kind, and she will be missed.
During her six decades in the spotlight, the bold beauty seamlessly transitioned from model to movie star to a real-life love story so spellbinding that even today, “Bogie and Bacall” remains shorthand for grand romance. At 89, the screen legend known as “Betty” to friends and family apparently suffered a fatal stroke on August 12 in the New York City apartment she had called home for more than 50 years…
Though she would eventually amass an impressive collection of accolades, Bacall was the first to admit,”I put my career in second place throughout both my marriages.” The How to Marry a Millionaire actress web Bogart in 1945 but raised their son Stephen, 65, and daughter Leslie, 62, on her own after Bogart died of esophageal cancer in 1957. She was briefly engaged to Frank Sinatra (“He behaved like a complete s*,” she later said) before marrying actor Jason Robards. They had a son, Sam, 52, but the tempestuous marriage ended in 1969 amid Robard’s alcoholism and infidelity. “They are all off-center people – trouble and troubled,” Bacall said of the men in her life. “I suppose I must like all of that. No one simple ever thought I was great.”
Bacall spent her final years with her papillon Sophie (“my partner”), attending parties and Democratic fund-raisers held in the historic Dakota, a building with as storied a past as the actress her lived there. “This bygone place has the same view it did [in the 1900s],” says Bacall’s longtime neighbor Jane Rosenthall. “It’s a very special place. And now a gaslight has burned out.”
[From People Magazine, print edition]
See that was nice, People Magazine kept the tribute simple and fitting. Bacall was an incredible presence on screen, did her thing in her last decades and she remained elegant and non-controversial. She wasn’t worth gossiping about, because there was nothing negative to say. When she passed, all people could say about her was what they’d been saying her whole life: she was a pro on so many levels.
Photo credit: WENN.com
Source Cele Bitchy
