Lauren Bacall passed away this week, and fans and others are wondering about her children.
Bacall had three kids--Leslie Bogart, Stephen Bogart, and Sam Robards.
Leslie and Stephen are the children of Bacall and famed actor Humphrey Bogart. The couple were married on May 21, 1945. Stephen was born on January 6, 1946; Leslie was born on August 23, 1952.
Stephen is a producer and actor, and is known for Bogart: The Untold Story (1996), Humphrey Bogart: You Must Remember This… (1997) and This Last Lonely Place (2014), according to iMDb.
Stephen has been married twice himself, first to Dale Irene Gemelli from 1969 through 1984--they had one child together--and then to Barbara Bruchmann from 1985 through 2010. He and Barbara had two children together.
While largely staying away from the movie business, Stephen is an accomplished author, writing three books--“Bogart: In Search of My Father” by Stephen with Gary Provost.; “Play It Again”; and “The Remake: As Time Goes By.”
Actress Lauren Bacall holds the arm of her son, Stephen Bogart during a reception at the Palace Theater in New York City, Monday, Jan. 8, 1979. A reception by Knopf book company, marked the publication of Miss Bacall’s autobiography, which, among other items, gives details of Miss Bacall’s marriage to the late actor Humphrey Bogart, Stephen’s father. (AP Photo/Ron Frehm)
Stephen Bogart (R) and wife arrive at the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Inaugural Governors Awards held at the Grand Ballroom at Hollywood & Highland Center on November 14, 2009 in Los Angeles, California. (Photo by Kevork Djansezian/Getty Images)
In an interview last year with the Palm Beach Post, Stephen mused about why he didn’t take to acting like his parents. “I wanted to stay out of the limelight,” he said. “I had a kid when I was 21, but emotionally I was a lot younger than 21.”
Stephen said that he usually didn’t reveal his full name, because of the attention it would bring.
“Looking back, I ran away from who I was. I never gave anybody my last name unless I had to; I wanted people to like or dislike me for who I was,” he said.
“I never hung around with movie stars. All my friends are real people, not that movie people aren’t real, but you know what I mean. Did my mother like it? No.”
Stephen has also been involved in other ventures, such as hosting a show titled “Bogart at the Movies,” a movie review show, on WXEL-TV in Palm Beach.
Stephen also noted that Humphrey Bogart wasn’t the best father.
“My father was older, and he was set in his ways. He‘d go to work, and then he wanted to be with his fourth wife, have a drink and dinner. By then, it was time for me to go to bed. On the weekends, he’d go on his boat,” he said. “Babies were just not his thing. I believe we would have gotten closer as he grew older.”
Stephen’s sister Leslie was named after Leslie Howard, an actor and one-time close friend of her father Humphrey Bogart. Apparently Howard refused to appear in The Petrified Forest, a film made in 1936, unless Bogart was signed for a main role. Bogart expressed his gratitude by naming his daughter after him.
Leslie’s childhood friends included Lorna Luft, the daughter of Judy Garland.
In this July 29, 1968 file photo, French designer Yves Saint Laurent, center, is congratulated by American actress Lauren Bacall, left, and her daughter Leslie Bogart, after the presentation of Saint Laurent’s fashion collection. (AP Photo)
Actress Lauren Bacall (C) and her two children Stephen (R) and Leslie (L) by former husband Humphrey Bogart pose in front of a stamp commemorating his life 31 July during a stamp unveiling ceremony in Hollywood. The stamp portrait is from the movie poster for the 1946 film ‘The Big Sleep’. Bogart died 40 years ago and is celebrated in the Hollywood Legends stamp series. (Mike Nelson/AFP/Getty Images)
At 16, Leslie had aspirations to be a model, appearing in a four-page spread of Life magazine in 1968.
She married Erich Shiffmann in 1990 and they are still together.
Bogart was reported by multiple media outlets to be a nurse and yoga instructor beginning decades ago. It’s unclear if that’s still her profession; she appears to have been last quoted for an article in January 2011, called a teacher in the Viniyoga tradition.
“She has worked with people with physical and emotional ailments as a Registered Nurse since the 1970s. Leslie began practicing yoga in 1982, and received her first certification to teach yoga in 1985. In addition to working for a physical therapist, Leslie continued her studies with different yoga teachers, soon immersing herself in Yoga as therapy,” according to the Santa Monica Yoga website. “She focused on the teachings of Krishnamacarya and Desikachar, mostly as taught by Gary Kraftsow, and has completed his Yoga Therapists’ Training Course.”
Lauren Bacall’s third child was with another man.
Humphrey Bogart died in December 1957. Four years later, Bacall had married actor and Navy veteran Jason Robards Jr.
They had their only child together, Sam Robards, on December 16, 1961 in New York City. They later divorced in 1969; Robards Jr. had four wives altogether, of which Bacall was his third.
Sam Robards is an actor and producer, and is known for acting in American Beauty (1999) as Jim Berkley, A.I. Artificial Intelligence (2001) as Henry Swinton, and Awake (2007) as Clayton Beresford Jr.
Actor Sam Robards attends the Cinema Society with Alice+Olivia screening of ‘The Art of Getting By’ at Landmark Sunshine Cinema on June 13, 2011 in New York City. (Photo by Stephen Lovekin/Getty Images)
US actress Lauren Bacall (L) hugs her son Sam Robards after he presented her with the Julie Harris Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2001 Los Angeles Tony Awards Party in Santa Monica, California, 03 June 2001. (Lucy Nicholson/AFP/Getty Images)
He has also acted on a number of television shows and movies. He was Kyle Masterson in Twisted on ABC Family, Tim Feeny on Treme on, and Howie ‘The Captain’ Archibald on Gossip Girl on CW. He also appeared on eight episodes of The West Wing as Greg Brock, four episodes of Spin City as Arthur, and 23 episodes of Get a Life as Larry Potter.
He married Suzy Amis in 1986 but they got divorced in 1994, according to iMDb.
Robards later married Sidsel Jensen in 1997, and they have together ever since.
Correction: A previous version of this article misidentified Leslie Howard. Howard was a man. Epoch Times regrets the error.
