She was the kind of person you’d only want to serve your good wine to, because anything less than the best would’ve been an insult.

Although she is no longer with us, yesterday would have been Lauren Bacall’s 100th birthday. She is TCM’s Star of the Month, and they’ve been showcasing some of her best and most iconic performances on Monday nights in September.

Yesterday, they showed the four films she starred in with her first leading man and later husband, Humphrey Bogart: To Have and Have Not (1944) (which was also her film debut), The Big Sleep (1946), Dark Passage (1947), and Key Largo (1948).

I’ve seen Dark Passage twice and Key Largo years ago, but until last night I’d never managed to catch To Have and Have Not and The Big Sleep when they were on. The funny thing about that is I own them both on DVD, but it’s a lot more fun to watch them when they air on TCM (especially if there’s an intro and outro from one of the hosts, who I consider my own personal friends even though I’ve never spoken to any of them).

The thing I love most about Lauren Bacall, aside from her effortless acting ability, is how elegant she was. She classed up a room just by walking into it. She was the kind of person you’d only want to serve your good wine to, because anything less than the best would’ve been an insult.

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