Montgomery Clift

Personal Info

Known For Actor

Gender Male

Birthday 1920-10-17

Deathday 1966-07-23 (45 years old)

Place of Birth Omaha, Nebraska, USA

Also Known As Edward Montgomery Clift, Monty Clift, Монтгомери Клифт

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

Actor

2022
Rat Pack

as Self (archive footage)

2018
Making Montgomery Clift

as Self (archive footage)

2015
Listen to Me Marlon

as Self (archive footage)

2014
Marlon Brando: An Actor Named Desire

as Self - Actor (archive footage)

2012
Starring Sigmund Freud

as (archive footage)

2004
2002
Edith Head: The Paramount Years

as (archive footage)

2002
Making 'The Misfits'

as Self (archive footage)

2001
George Stevens and His Place In The Sun

as Self (archive footage)

2000
Sir John Mills' Moving Memories

as Self (archive footage)

1997
The Silver Screen: Color Me Lavender

as Self (archive footage)

1994
Tennessee Williams: Orpheus of the American Stage

as Dr. Cukrowicz (archive footage)

1987
Montgomery Clift: The Hidden Star

as Self (archive footage)

1985
George Stevens: A Filmmaker's Journey

as Self (archive footage)

1983
Montgomery Clift

as Self (archive footage)

1973
1966
The Defector

as Professor James Bower

1965
The Love Goddesses

as (archive footage)

1962
Freud: The Secret Passion

as Sigmund Freud

1961
Judgment at Nuremberg

as Rudolph Petersen

1961
The Misfits

as Perce Howland

1960
Wild River

as Chuck Glover

1959
Suddenly, Last Summer

as Dr. Cukrowicz

1959
Lonelyhearts

as Adam White

1958
The Young Lions

as Noah Ackerman

1957
Raintree County

as John Wickliff Shawnessy

1957
1953
From Here to Eternity

as Pvt. Robert E. Lee 'Prew' Prewitt

1953
1953
I Confess

as Fr. Michael William Logan

1951
A Place in the Sun

as George Eastman

1950
The Big Lift

as Sgt. 1st Class Danny MacCullough

1950
What's My Line?

as Self - Mystery Guest

1949
The Heiress

as Morris Townsend

1948
Red River

as Matthew Garth

1948
The Search

as Ralph Stevenson

1948
The Ed Sullivan Show

as Self (archive footage)

Writer

1948
The Search

as Writer