Humphrey Bogart in "Watch on the Rhine". The film vaulted Bogart from fourth place to first in the studio's roster, finally overtaking James Cagney. By 1946 he'd more than doubled his annual salary to over $460,000, making him the highest-paid actor in the world. Between 1943 and 1944, Bogart went on the United Service Organizations and War Bond tours accompanied by Methot, enduring arduous travels to Italy and North Africa, including Casablanca. Bogart met Lauren Bacall while filming "To Have and Have Not" (1944), a loose adaptation of the Ernest Hemingway novel. The movie has many similarities with "Casablanca"—the same enemies, the
Humphrey Bogart were not yet air-conditioned), and his regimented, tightly scheduled job at Warners was anything but the indolent and "peachy" actor's life he hoped for. However, he was always professional and generally respected by other actors. He used these "B movie" years to start developing his enduring film persona—the wounded, stoical, cynical, charming, vulnerable, self-mocking loner with a code of honor. In spite of his success, Warner Bros. had no interest in making Bogart a top star. Shooting on a new film might begin days or only hours after the previous one wrapped. The studio system, then at the most entrenched,