Lauren Bacall RIP

[fountainhall]

I thought there might have already been something on the forum about the death of one of the 'greats' - Lauren Bacall. There are lots of movie clips on You Tube, but here is one of her serenading the conductor/composer Leonard Bernstein on his 70th birthday. The wonderfully clever lyrics were written by Stephen Sondheim, one of Bernstein's collaborators on West Side Story back in the 1950s. They centre on the fact that Bernstein was so multi-talented he could not "make up his mind" what he wanted to do for a career. As the gay community knows, it was initially thought Bernstein could not make up his mind about his sexuality either. In fact, he was always gay, as his wife's recently published letters make clear. In one, she writes, "you are a homosexual and you may never change". Bacall delivers it with her usual fabulous aplomb.

[youtube:26bwhtem]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zRB-HP9rPGQ[/youtube:26bwhtem]