Film icon Lauren Bacall dies

HOLLYWOODLEGENDLaurenBacall, considered one of the last remaining icons of cinema’s golden age, died at home in New York on Tuesday at the age of 89.

Born Betty Jean Perske in New York in 1924, the Jewish actress was the only child of a Romanian mother and Polish father. She changed her name to a modified version of her mother’s maiden name when she began her acting career.

She starred in classics such as The Big Sleep and To Have and Have Not, and married Humphrey Bogart in 1945. In 2009, she was given an honorary Oscar in recognition of “her central place in the golden age of motion pictures”.

Ms Bacall was a cousin of former Israeli president Shimon Peres.