[78], Robbins is said to have conceived the basic plot of West Side Story after Clift shared the idea with him, according to actor Russ Tamblyn. Please fill in your e-mail so we can share with you our top stories! It hardly helped lend nuance to that reading that Clift was a well-known and long-time abuser of pain killers and alcohol, actions which likely sped his death from a heart attack at 45 in 1966. "Monty," as the performer was known to family and. But it was his next pairing with Elizabeth Taylor that proved to be his most dynamic on-screen. In a new documentary, myths and assumptions about the Oscar-nominated heartthrob who struggled with his sexuality are replaced with the little-known truth. [47] Director Stanley Kramer, later wrote in his memoirs that Clift "wasn't always close to the script, but whatever he said fitted in perfectly" and that he suggested Clift turn to Spencer Tracy to "ad lib something" when he struggled to remember his lines for his one scene. Happy Birthday, Montgomery Clift. Montgomery Clift and Elizabeth Taylor star in A Place in the Sun. Elizabeth Taylor put her salary on the line as insurance in order to have Clift cast as her co-star in Reflections in a Golden Eye, to be directed by John Huston. After leaving a party at Taylor's house high in the Hollywood Hills and drowsy from two "downers" he'd taken before he left to help him sleep when he got home, Clift crashed into a telephone. SAG Awards 2023: See the 34 Best-Dressed Stars. Marlena Brause Self Employed. [36], On the evening of May 12, 1956, while filming Raintree County, Clift was involved in a serious car crash after leaving a dinner party hosted by Elizabeth Taylor and her husband, Michael Wilding. A four-time Academy Award nominee, he was known for his portrayal of "moody, sensitive young men", according to The New York Times.[1][2]. I think he was 12 or 13., Its obviously a non-issue for her, co-director Demmon said. For somewhat mysterious reasons, Robert Clifts father Brooks taped endless conversations with his famous brother, as well as with their mother and other figures relevant to the story. Clift countersued with the assertion that he struggled to keep up with an overwhelming volume of last-minute script revisions and that an accidental blow to both eyes on set gave him cataracts. Clift's second film role, though it premiered first that same year, was The Search which earned him his first nomination for an Academy Award for Best Actor. Angela (Elizabeth Taylor) is the rich, indolent young woman who. In one tape made by his father in the 1960s, we hear the stars mother tell him, with untroubled candor, that Monty was a homosexual early. In addition to lingering effects of dysentery and chronic colitis, an underactive thyroid was later revealed during the autopsy. In one instant Montgomery Clift's life changed forever. The famed movie star and her leading man first starred together in the 1951 drama, A Place in the Sun, resulting in a life-changing connection that lasted until Clift's death in 1966 at age 45. Still, the last half of his 20-year career has been referred to as the "longest suicide in Hollywood history" by acting teacher Robert Lewis because of Clift's subsequent abuse of painkillers and alcohol. It is commonly believed that drug addiction was responsible for Clift's many health problems and his death. Jack Larson, famous for playing Jimmy Olsen in the hit 1950s TV series Adventures of Superman, recalled how Clift gave him a full mouth kiss the first time they casually met. Clift is said to have valued privacy and ambiguity in his personal life, though he was known to be friendly and affectionate, blurring the emotions of platonic love and sexual attraction, particularly with close friend Elizabeth Taylor, as soon as Paramount Pictures arranged her to attend the Los Angeles premiere of The Heiress as Clift's date to generate publicity.[58]. Along with Marlon Brando and James Dean, Clift was considered one of the original method actors in Hollywood (though Clift distanced himself from the term); he was one of the first actors to be invited to study in the Actors Studio with Lee Strasberg and Elia Kazan. "I love Marilyn Monroe," said designer Tommy Hilfiger, explaining why he splurged on the jeans she wore in 1954's River of No Return and the cowboy boots she donned in '61's The Misfits. Contemporaries like James Dean and Marlon Brando also did. The following summer in 1949, Clift shot The Big Lift in Berlin: intended to be more of a semi-documentary, pro-America wartime film and less of an acting vehicle,[35] but still a welcome opportunity to portray a U.S. soldier. Tellingly, theyre always pitched under working titles like Beautiful Loser and' Tragic Beauty. 5, 114, Montgomery Clift: A Biography, Patricia Bosworth, 2012, List of actors with Academy Award nominations, List of actors with two or more Academy Award nominations in acting categories, List of LGBT Academy Award winners and nominees, "Montgomery Clift Dead at 45; Nominated 3 Times for Oscar; Completed Last Movie, 'The Defector,' in June Actor Began Career at Age 13", "Scandals of Classic Hollywood: The Long Suicide of Montgomery Clift", "Making Montgomery Clift: truth behind gay self-loathing myth". As the faded rodeo rider Perce Howland in The Misfits, his first, introductory scene performed inside of a phone booth only took two hours of the scheduled two shooting days which impressed cast and crew. He said that he was with Monty at a party on Fire Island [and Clift said] 'I've got an idea for a musical. [72] Clift and Robbins camouflaged their relationship by dating women. According to some reports, she reportedly held Clift and removed two teeth that had fallen out in the crash from his throat, as they were causing him to choke. He also talked publicly for the first time about his 1956 car accident, the injuries he received, and its aftereffects on his appearance. Clifts undated images depict a more mature Loy, with whom he starred in the 1958 film Lonelyhearts. That year, Clift voted for Brando in A Streetcar Named Desire. While the press assumed that Balaban and Clift were an item, Clift secretly dated British actor Roddy McDowall. He was only 45. Clift was nominated for. He struggled to make through some of the longer scenes. At 6:30a.m., James woke up and went to wake Clift, but found the bedroom door closed and locked. When they left, they got into their . The re-opening of the German market since WW2 put potential profits ahead of everything else and the picture suffered for it. A bout five years ago, filmmaking duo Robert Clift and Hillary Demmon Clift decided to make a documentary about Robert's long-dead uncle. Overall he ended up unhappy with his performance and left early during the film's premiere. (The director himself never met his famous uncle, having been born eight years after his death). George (Montgomery Clift) is an upwardly scrambling young man, embarrassed by his origins, dipping a toe in wealth's pool. [20] Clift proved to be a successful young stage actor working with, among others, Dame May Whitty, Alla Nazimova, Mary Boland, Cornelia Otis Skinner, Fredric March, Tallulah Bankhead, Alfred Lunt, and Lynn Fontanne. By Zoe Papadakis | Tuesday, 25 August 2020 11:49 AM EDT. Onscreen and off, he was what the kids these days Clift was only 45 years old when he died. National Board of Review of Motion Pictures, Inc. "Elizabeth Taylor at the 11th Annual GLAAD Media Awards", "TCM Fest: West Side Story's Queer Origins and Other LGBTQ+ Highlights", "Montgomery Clift's Pedigreed Upper East Side Townhouse Could Be Yours", "A Star Is Born Is the Ultimate Hollywood Horror Story, and Lady Gaga Might Be Perfect Casting", "Clift Takes Role in Columbia Film: Will Portray Paul Morel in Adaptation of Lawrence's Novel, 'Sons and Lovers', "The 21st Academy Awards (1949) Nominees and Winners", Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, "The 24th Academy Awards (1952) Nominees and Winners", "The 26th Academy Awards (1954) Nominees and Winners", "The 34th Academy Awards (1962) Nominees and Winners", New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, Montgomery Clift papers, Additions, 19291969, Montgomery Clift: better than Brando, more tragic than Dean, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Montgomery_Clift&oldid=1140258718, Short description is different from Wikidata, All Wikipedia articles written in American English, Articles with unsourced statements from January 2023, Articles with unsourced statements from February 2022, Internet Off-Broadway Database person ID same as Wikidata, TCMDb name template using non-numeric ID from Wikidata, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0. He represented the new wave of post-World War II actors who were handsome, intelligent, soft-spoken, introspective, and acted with intensity. How? Born in 1920 in Omaha, Nebraska, Clift was raised like an aristocrat, with a private tutor and frequent trips to Europe. Clift first met Elizabeth Taylor in 1949, and she felt an immediate attraction to him, according to People magazine. They starred together as romantic leads in a total of three films throughout the 1950s: A Place in the Sun, where, in their romantic scenes, they received considerable acclaim for their naturalness and their appearance, Raintree County and Suddenly, Last Summer, and remained close until his death. The crew of Raintree Country even had code words about his state of intoxication. The two starred in the 1961 film The Misfits; it would be Monroes last picture before her 1962 death. He was born Edward Montgomery Clift on October 17, 1920. However, in 1962, Cliff had to sign up to play Sigmund Feud in Huston's biopic "Freud: The Secret Passion." Often, suicides are never fully understood. He shifted his moods erratically, from a brooding pose to a bursting smile. Were not trying to give a definitive version of who Monty was, added Clift. It took Clift months to recover from his injuries. The schedule for Reflections in a Golden Eye was then set for August 1966, but Clift died in July 1966. Continued pain from his injuries led him to rely on alcohol and pills for relief as he had done after an earlier bout with dysentery left him with chronic intestinal problems. A still of Montgomery Clift. Guided by the key biographies of Clift, they reliably parrot a narrative which paints the actor as a startlingly attractive and prodigiously gifted man who, according to one notably overheated tabloid TV show became a drug-addicted alcoholic living in a self-imposed hell because he had a secret he couldnt live with. Taylor also threatened to end any photographer's career who dared to take a picture of the seriously wounded Clift. On the morning of July 23, 1966, Montgomery Clift's housemate couldn't wake the actor. Despite the studio's concerns over profits, Clift correctly predicted the film would do well, if only because moviegoers would flock to see the difference in his facial appearance before and after the crash.[42]. speaks out against the above mentioned and. A Place in the Sun was critically acclaimed; Charlie Chaplin called it "the greatest movie made about America". His parents were Quakers and met as students at Cornell University, marrying in 1914. Before undertaking any course of treatment please consult with your healthcare provider. He spent months in the hospital and had major plastic surgeries. Still makes me weak in the knees. However, this changed after Clift's car accident that left his face in a terrible condition. 11:50 AM. To help build their case, the film-makers had rare access to the actors archives, as well as to the familys story, courtesy of a special connection: the doc was co-directed by the stars nephew, Robert Clift, and his wife, Hillary Demmon. (1936), Clift with a sultry Marilyn Monroe in a souvenir photograph taken at San Franciscos Fairmont Hotel, which once boasted a variety of alluringly named nightspots, including the Venetian Room, the Squire Room, and the Tonga Room. It was taken in 1936. is for general information purposes only. He would continue to act, but by the 1960's his career wasn't going well and he died prematurely at 45 suffering a heart attack most likely brought on by years of drug and alcohol abuse. Early Years Hailed as one of Hollywood's first true Method actors,. Elizabeth Taylor tried to seduce fellow screen legend Montgomery Clift and stood by him after coming out to her: 'They were soulmates' By Christopher Rogers For Dailymail.Com. To revisit this article, visit My Profile, thenView saved stories. After a break, Clift committed himself to three more films, all of which premiered during 1953: I Confess to be directed by Alfred Hitchcock; Vittorio De Sica's Terminal Station; and Fred Zinnemann's From Here to Eternity which earned Clift his third Academy Award nomination (his second of two nominations for films directed by Zinnemann). [18][19] He instead continued to flourish onstage and appeared in works by Moss Hart and Cole Porter, Robert Sherwood, Lillian Hellman, Tennessee Williams, and Thornton Wilder, creating the part of Henry in the original production of The Skin of Our Teeth. In studying Clift's output, one can easily see a before-and-after version of the actor, with the line between the two marked by his near-fatal accident on a break from filming "Raintree County" in 1956. Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift in A Place in the Sun. After completing John Huston's Freud: The Secret Passion (1962), Universal Studios sued him for his frequent absences that caused the film to go over budget. Loy responded to him almost visibly, an observer reportedly once said. He was only 12 years old when he appeared in a production of "As Husbands Go" in Sarasota. Mini bio of the life of actor Montgomery Clift who is probably most famous for starring in "A place in the sun" and "From here to eternity".This video was ma. SAG Awards 2023: The Red Carpet Goes Pink. With a man of such conflicted legacy, one can at least fall back on the basics. I have visited him there. George Eastman (Montgomery Clift), the nephew of a wealthy industrialist, arrives in California in the hopes of making his way up in his uncle's company. (Photo by Silver Screen Collection/Getty Images) Happy birthday to Montgomery Clift, who would have turned 97 today. According to the actor's lawyer, Jack Clareman, Clift was found by his secretary Lorenzo James, who claimed the actor went to bed "in good spirits.". Over the next decade, the burgeoning actor dug his heels in and made a name for himself on the stage. [38] She pulled a hanging tooth that was cutting into his tongue, before accompanying him into the ambulance.[39]. Judy Balaban, his daughter, has stated that she had an immediate connection with Clift and the two were "joined at the hip," dating for many months following. July 1966 ; as the performer was known to family and the new wave of post-World II. Awards 2023: the Red Carpet Goes Pink Named Desire however, changed... Clift in a production of `` as Husbands Go '' in Sarasota re-opening of the seriously wounded Clift to almost! Parents were Quakers and met as students at Cornell University, marrying in 1914 clifts undated images depict more! In 1920 in Omaha, Nebraska, Clift voted for Brando in a production of `` as Husbands Go in! 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