Humphrey Bogart of the play, "a peach ... a roaring Western melodrama ... Humphrey Bogart does the best work of his career as an actor." Bogart said that the play "marked my deliverance from the ranks of the sleek, sybaritic, stiff-shirted, swallow-tailed 'smoothies' to which I seemed condemned to life." This, however, did not yet mean felt secure. Warner Bros. bought the screen rights to "The Petrified Forest". The play seemed perfect for the studio, which was famous for its socially realistic, urban, low-budget action pictures, especially for a public entranced by real-life criminals like John Dillinger (whom Bogart resembled) and Dutch
Humphrey Bogart money were similar to those the studio waged with other high-spirited, less-than-obedient stars, such as Bette Davis, James Cagney, Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland. The leading men ahead of Bogart at Warner Bros. included not only such marquee names as James Cagney and Edward G. Robinson, but also journeymen leads, such as Victor McLaglen, George Raft and Paul Muni. Most of the studio's better movie scripts went to them, leaving Bogart with what was left. He made films like "Racket Busters", "San Quentin", and "You Can't Get Away with Murder". The only substantial leading role he got during this