A Guide to the Best of Southern California : ROMANCE : Caught in the Act

Gable and Harlow. Hepburn and Tracy. Taylor and Burton.

They had romance.

They had chemistry.

And on the big screen, they smooched a lot.

“Lovers,” (Turner Publishing Inc., $29.95) explores the magic shared between 16 of the greatest love teams in American movies. The book features more than 200 photographs of such on-screen lovebirds as Greta Garbo and John Gilbert, Myrna Loy and William Powell, and Errol Flynn and Olivia de Havilland--plus off-screen couples Vivien Leigh and Laurence Olivier, Paul Newman and Joanne Woodward, Woody Allen and Diane Keaton, and, later, Allen and Mia Farrow.

Author Linda Sunshine also includes several behind-the-scenes anecdotes and famous dialogue, such as this scene between Humphrey Bogart and Lauren Bacall in “To Have and Have Not”:

Bogart (after Bacall plants one on him): “Why’d you do that?”

Bacall: “Been wondering if I’d like it.”

Bogart: “What’s the decision?”

Bacall: “It’s even better when you help.” “Lovers” is available at Dutton’s Books, 11975 San Vicente Blvd., Brentwood, (310) 476-6263; Portrait of a Bookstore, 10061 Riverside Drive, Toluca Lake, (818) 769-3853; Book Soup, 8818 Sunset Blvd., West Hollywood, (213) 659-3110, and Vroman’s, 695 E. Colorado Blvd., Pasadena, (818) 449-5320.