MONTGOMERY CLIFT

'Edward Montgomery Clift' (October 17, 1920 - July 23, 1966) was an American Academy Award-nominated actor known by the stage name of 'Montgomery Clift'.
He was the great-grandson of Montgomery Blair, Postmaster General under President Abraham Lincoln, and the great-great grandson of Francis Preston Blair, a journalist and adviser to President Andrew Jackson, and Levi Woodbury, an Associate Justice of the Supreme Court.

Contents

Biography

Early life

Film career

Car accident

Sexuality

Post-accident career

Death

Academy Award nominations

Filmography

Stage appearances

External links

Biography

Early life

Clift was born in Omaha, Nebraska, the son of Ethel Anderson Fogg Blair and William Brooks Clift, a banker with roots in the South. Clift had a twin sister, Roberta, and an older brother, Brooks, ex-husband of Eleanor Clift, the columnist and political commentator, and father of their three children; Brooks also had a child by the late actress Kim Stanley. Later in life, he would describe his father as a drunken bigot with whom he was never on good terms.

Film career

Appearing on Broadway at the age of thirteen, Clift achieved success on the stage and starred there for 10 years before moving to Hollywood, debuting in 1948's ''Red River'' opposite John Wayne. In 1958 he turned down Dean Martin's role in ''Rio Bravo'', which would have reunited him with Wayne. Clift was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Actor that same year for ''The Search''. Clift was billed as a new kind of leading man: sensitive, intense and broodingly handsome, the kind of man women would want to take care of. He had a highly successful film career, performing in many Oscar-nominated roles and becoming a matinee idol because of his good looks and sex appeal. His love scenes with Elizabeth Taylor in ''A Place in the Sun'' (1951) set a new standard for romance in cinema. His roles in ''A Place in the Sun'', the 1953 classic ''From Here to Eternity'' and ''The Young Lions'' (1958) are considered signatures of his career.
Clift and his screen rival, Marlon Brando who was coincidentally born in the same city - Omaha, Nebraska, were popularly known in Hollywood as the "Golddust Twins" because of their rapid rise to stardom. Clift reportedly turned down the starring roles in ''Sunset Boulevard'' and ''East of Eden.

Car accident

On May 12, 1956, while filming ''Raintree County'', he smashed his car into a telephone pole after leaving a party at the home of his ''Raintree County'' co-star Elizabeth Taylor and her then-husband Michael Wilding. Alerted by friend Kevin McCarthy, who witnessed the accident, Taylor raced to Clift's side and kept him from choking to death by removing two of his teeth, which had become lodged in his throat. Clift needed extensive reconstructive surgery on his face (although his broken nose was never repaired) and he returned after several weeks to finish the film, his previously handsome appearance now permanently disfigured. Both faces of Clift, before and after, are apparent in the movie. By this time, Clift had become hooked on alcohol and pain pills, and his health deteriorated. Taylor and Clift remained close friends until his death. The punk rock band The Clash released a song about the car accident entitled "The Right Profile" on their 1979 album ''London Calling''. This is one of two songs about Clift released posthumously by rock acts, the other being R.E.M.'s 1992 song "Monty Got a Raw Deal."
(There is also mention of Mr Clift in the song "There must be some kind of Misunderstanding" by Andrew Thompson on the album The Best of Lewis Recordings. Further, Clift's good looks are referenced in the classic Eartha Kitt song "Monotonous (From "New Faces of 1952".)

Sexuality

Patricia Bosworth, who had total access to Clift's family and many persons who knew the actor and worked with him, writes in her book on ''Montgomery Clift'', "Before the accident Monty had drifted into countless affairs with men and women. It suited his personality to have sex with a variety of partners. After the accident and his drug addiction became more serious, Monty was often impotent, and sex became less important to him. His deepest commitments were emotional rather than sexual anyway, and reserved for old friends; he was unflinchingly loyal to men like Bill Le Massena and women like Elizabeth Taylor, Libby Holman and Ann Lincoln."

Post-accident career

His post-accident career has been referred to as the "longest suicide in Hollywood" because of his alleged substance abuse. In his first movie following the accident, Clift starred with Lee Remick in Elia Kazan's ''Wild River'' in 1960, a film listed in the United States National Film Registry. He then costarred in John Huston's ''The Misfits'' (1961), which turned out to be the last film for both Marilyn Monroe and Clark Gable. Monroe, who was also having emotional problems at the time, famously described Clift as: "The only person I know who is in worse shape than I am." By the time Clift was making John Huston's ''Freud the Secret Passion'' (1962) his destructive lifestyle was affecting his health. Universal sued him for his frequent absences which caused the film to go over budget. The case was later settled out-of-court; the film's success at the box office brought numerous awards for screenwriting, and directing, but none for Clift himself.
Clift's last Oscar nomination was for best supporting actor for his riveting role in ''Judgment at Nuremberg'' (1961), a seven-minute part. The film also starred Spencer Tracy, Marlene Dietrich, Maximilian Schell, Burt Lancaster, and Judy Garland. The film's Director, Stanley Kramer, later wrote in his memoirs about how Clift - by this stage a wreck of a man - struggled to remember his lines even for this one scene: "Finally I said to him, 'Just forget the damn lines Monty. Let's say you're on the witness stand. The prosecutor says something to you, then the defense attorney bitterly attacks you, and you have to reach for a word in the script. That's all right. Go ahead and reach for it. Whatever the word may be, it doesn't really matter. Just turn to [Spencer] Tracy on the bench whenever you feel the need, and ad lib something. It will be all right because it will convey the confusion in your character's mind.' He seemed to calm down after this. He wasn't always close to the script, but whatever he said fitted in perfectly, and he came through with as good a performance as I had hoped."

Death

Montgomery Clift died in 1966 at the age of 45 of a heart attack brought on by complications of his severe drug and alcohol addictions. He is interred in the Quaker Cemetery, Prospect Park, Brooklyn, New York.

Academy Award nominations

★ 1962 - Best Actor in a Supporting Role - ''Judgment at Nuremberg''

★ 1953 - Best Actor in a Leading Role - ''From Here to Eternity''

★ 1951 - Best Actor in a Leading Role - ''A Place in the Sun''

★ 1949 - Best Actor in a Leading Role - ''The Search''
Clift has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6104 Hollywood Blvd.

Filmography

★ ''The Search'' (1948)

★ ''Red River'' (1948)

★ ''The Heiress'' (1949)

★ ''The Big Lift'' (1950)

★ ''A Place in the Sun'' (1951)

★ ''I Confess'' (1953)

★ ''Terminal Station'' (aka ''Indiscretion of an American Wife'') (1953)

★ ''From Here to Eternity'' (1953)

★ ''Operation Raintree'' (1957) (short subject)

★ ''Raintree County'' (1957)

★ ''Lonelyhearts'' (1958)

★ ''The Young Lions'' (1958)

★ ''Suddenly, Last Summer'' (1959)

★ ''Wild River'' (1960)

★ ''The Misfits'' (1961)

★ ''Freud'' (1962)

★ ''Judgment at Nuremberg (1962)

★ ''The Defector'' (1966)

Stage appearances

★ ''Fly Away Home'' (1935)

★ ''Jubilee'' (1935)

★ ''Yr. Obedient Husband'' (1938)

★ ''Eye On the Sparrow'' (1938)

★ ''Dame Nature'' (1938)

★ ''The Mother'' (1939)

★ ''There Shall Be No Night'' (1940)

★ ''The Skin of Our Teeth'' (1942)

★ ''The Searching Wind'' (1944)

★ ''Foxhole in the Parlor'' (1945)

★ ''You Touched Me'' (1945)

★ ''The Seagull'' (1954)

External links

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★ Montgomery Clift at Findagrave.com

★ Montyclift.com - Fan Site Link Page