Bacall Receives Lifetime Achievement Award

Nov. 21, 2000 -- “I do have to pinch myself to make sure I'm not dead,” joked 76-year-old screen legend Lauren Bacall, as she accepted a lifetime achievement award in Stockholm, Sweden

“An achievement award means it’s over, but I can assure you it’s not over,” said the star of such classic films as To Have and Have Not and How to Marry a Millionaire.

Bacall was honored Sunday at Stockholm’s 11th annual film festival. The actress, who was born Betty Jane Perske, was honored for her “straightforwardness, intelligence, and an ironic look that have … given her portrayals their unique strength and weight.” Early in her career, she formed one of cinema’s coolest on-screen couples with husband-to-be Humphrey Bogart in Key Largo and The Big Sleep. Most recently, she and Tony winner Rosemary Harris appeared in the Broadway play Waiting in the Wings as former actresses in a retirement home.