Known For
Acting
Born
Oct 17, 1920
Died
Jul 23, 1966
Place of Birth
Omaha, Nebraska, USA
Credits
44 titles
Montgomery Clift
Biography
Edward Montgomery “Monty” Clift (October 17, 1920 - July 23, 1966) was an American actor of the Golden Age, known for often playing sensitive or conflicted outcast characters with realistic emotional depth and anxieties. Clift, Marlon Brando and James Dean are the trio typically associated with the new wave of film acting, with Clift being the oldest and first to make his stage and screen debuts. Starting at age 14, he was a breakout talent on Broadway throughout 1935-1945. He finally accepted one of many Hollywood offers: starring in the Western “Red River” which was filmed in 1946 but delayed release for 2 years. Fred Zinnemann’s “The Search” preceded “Red River” as his first film in 1948 and first Academy Award nomination. Clift’s next major films were “The Heiress” (1949) and “A Place in the Sun” (1951), cementing his romantic lead status. At the time, audiences had rarely seen a type of masculinity softened with Clift’s vulnerability. Hollywood had also never seen a young actor control his career and instant stardom the way Clift did in the late 1940’s: notoriously selective, refusing the standard seven-year studio contracts and rewriting scripts to preserve his artistic freedom. In 1953, Zinnemann again directed Clift to an Academy Award nomination in war drama “From Here to Eternity.” After suffering a near-fatal car accident during “Raintree County” (1957) he starred in acclaimed 1960’s films "Wild River,” "The Misfits” and “Judgment at Nuremberg” for which he earned a fourth and final Academy Award nomination for his 12-minute scene. Despite a 4-year hiatus and mounting health problems, Clift was eager to make a comeback in "Reflections in a Golden Eye,” secured by the insurance and insistence of co-star Elizabeth Taylor, but he tragically died of a heart attack at the age of 45 just weeks before shooting began.
Known For
Filmography
Elizabeth Taylor: The Lost Tapes
Self (archive footage)
Rat Pack
Self (archive footage)
Making Montgomery Clift
Self (archive footage)
The Fabulous Allan Carr
Self (archive)
Listen to Me Marlon
Self (archive footage)
Marlon Brando: An Actor Named Desire
Self - Actor (archive footage)
Starring Sigmund Freud
(archive footage)
Marilyn at the Movies
Self (archive footage)
Hitchcock's Confession: A Look at I Confess
Self (archive footage)
Edith Head: The Paramount Years
(archive footage)
Making 'The Misfits'
Self (archive footage)
George Stevens and His Place In The Sun
Self (archive footage)
Sir John Mills' Moving Memories
Self (archive footage)
The Silver Screen: Color Me Lavender
Self (archive footage)
Tennessee Williams: Orpheus of the American Stage
Dr. Cukrowicz (archive footage)
Gay! Gay! Hollywood
Hollywood Heaven: Tragic Lives, Tragic Deaths
(archive footage)
Hollywood Scandals and Tragedies
(archive footage) (uncredited)
Montgomery Clift: The Hidden Star
Self (archive footage)
Montgomery Clift
Self (archive footage)
The Men Who Made the Movies: Howard Hawks
Self (archive footage)
The Defector
Professor James Bower
William Faulkner's Mississippi
Self - Narrator
Freud: The Secret Passion
Sigmund Freud
The Merv Griffin Show
Self
Judgment at Nuremberg
Rudolph Petersen
The Misfits
Perce Howland
Wild River
Chuck Glover
Suddenly, Last Summer
Dr. Cukrowicz
Lonelyhearts
Adam White
The David Susskind Show
Self
The Young Lions
Noah Ackerman
Raintree County
John Wickliff Shawnessy
Operation Raintree
Self
From Here to Eternity
Pvt. Robert E. Lee 'Prew' Prewitt
Indiscretion of an American Wife
Giovanni Doria
I Confess
Fr. Michael William Logan
A Place in the Sun
George Eastman
The Big Lift
Sgt. 1st Class Danny MacCullough
What's My Line?
Self - Mystery Guest
The Heiress
Morris Townsend
Red River
Matthew Garth
The Ed Sullivan Show
Self
The Search
Ralph Stevenson