Humphrey DeForest Bogart, colloquially nicknamed Bogie, was an American actor. His performances in classic Hollywood cinema films made him an American cultural icon. In 1999, the American Film Institute selected Bogart as the greatest male star of classic American cinema.
Bogart began acting in Broadway shows. Debuting in film in The Dancing Town, he appeared in supporting roles for more than a decade, regularly portraying gangsters. He was praised for his work as Duke Mantee in The Petrified Forest. Bogart also received positive reviews for his performance as gangster Hugh "Baby Face" Martin in Dead End, directed by William Wyler.
His breakthrough came in High Sierra, and he catapulted to stardom as the lead in John Huston's The Maltese Falcon, considered one of the first great noir films. Bogart's private detectives, Sam Spade and Philip Marlowe, became the models for detectives in other noir films. In 1947, he played a war hero in another "noir" film, Dead Reckoning, tangled in a dangerous web of brutality and violence as he investigates his friend's murder, co-starring Lizabeth Scott.