Lauren Bacall in the script was originally much smaller, but during filming, her part was revised multiple times to extend it into the lead part that it became in the released film. Once released, "To Have and Have Not" catapulted Bacall into instant stardom, and her performance became the cornerstone of her star image, the impact of which extended into popular culture at large, even influencing fashion, as well as film-makers and other actors. Warner Bros. launched an extensive marketing campaign to promote the picture and to establish Bacall as a movie star. As part of the public relations push, Bacall made
Lauren Bacall film scholars consider "Written on the Wind", directed by Douglas Sirk in 1956, to be a landmark work in the melodrama genre. Appearing with Rock Hudson, Dorothy Malone and Robert Stack, Bacall played a career woman whose life is unexpectedly turned around by a family of oil magnates. Bacall wrote in her autobiography that she did not think much of the role, but reviews were favorable. Wrote "Variety", "Bacall registers strongly as a sensible girl swept into the madness of the oil family". While struggling at home with Bogart's battle with esophageal cancer, Bacall starred with Gregory Peck in "Designing