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IMDbPro

Montgomery Clift(1920-1966)

  • Actor
  • Writer
  • Soundtrack
IMDbProStarmeter
See rank
Montgomery Clift
An examination of Czech-Austrian psychologist Sigmund Freud's career when he began to treat patients diagnosed with hysteria, using the radical technique of hypnosis.
Play trailer2:22
Freud (1962)
14 Videos
99+ Photos
Edward Montgomery Clift (nicknamed 'Monty' his entire life) was born on October 17, 1920 in Omaha, Nebraska, just after his twin sister Roberta (1920-2014) and eighteen months after his brother Brooks Clift. He was the son of Ethel "Sunny" Anderson (Fogg; 1888-1988) and William Brooks Clift (1886-1964). His father made a lot of money in banking but was quite poor during the depression. His mother was born out of wedlock and spent much of her life and the family fortune finding her illustrious southern lineage and raising her children as aristocrats.

At age 13, Monty appeared on Broadway ("Fly Away Home"), and chose to remain in the New York theater for over ten years before finally succumbing to Hollywood. He gained excellent theatrical notices and soon piqued the interests of numerous lovelorn actresses; their advances met with awkward conflict. While working in New York in the early 1940s, he met wealthy former Broadway star Libby Holman. She developed an intense decade-plus obsession over the young actor, even financing an experimental play, "Mexican Mural" for him. It was ironic his relationship with the bisexual middle-aged Holman would be the principal (and likely the last) heterosexual relationship of his life and only cause him further anguish over his sexuality. She would wield considerable influence over the early part of his film career, advising him in decisions to decline lead roles in Sunset Blvd. (1950), (originally written specifically for him; the story perhaps hitting a little too close to home) and High Noon (1952).

His long apprenticeship on stage made him a thoroughly accomplished actor, notable for the intensity with which he researched and approached his roles. By the early 1950s he was exclusively homosexual, though he continued to hide his homosexuality and maintained a number of close friendships with theater women (heavily promoted by studio publicists).

His film debut was Red River (1948) with John Wayne quickly followed by his early personal success The Search (1948) (Oscar nominations for this, A Place in the Sun (1951), From Here to Eternity (1953) and Judgment at Nuremberg (1961)). By 1950, he was troubled with allergies and colitis (the U.S. Army had rejected him for military service in World War II for chronic diarrhea) and, along with pill problems, he was alcoholic. He spent a great deal of time and money on psychiatry.

In 1956, during filming of Raintree County (1957), he ran his Chevrolet into a tree after leaving a party at Elizabeth Taylor's; it was she who saved him from choking by pulling out two teeth lodged in his throat. His smashed face was rebuilt, he reconciled with his estranged father, but he continued bedeviled by dependency on drugs and his unrelenting guilt over his homosexuality.

With his Hollywood career in an irreversible slide despite giving an occasional riveting performance, such as in Stanley Kramer's Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), Monty returned to New York and tried to slowly develop a somewhat more sensible lifestyle in his brownstone row house on East 61st Street in Manhattan. He was set to play in Taylor's Reflections in a Golden Eye (1967), when he died in the early morning hours of July 23, 1966, at his home at age 45. His body was found by his live-in personal secretary/companion Lorenzo James, who found Clift lying nude on top of his bed, dead from what the autopsy called "occlusive coronary artery disease." Clift's last 10 years prior to his death from his 1956 car accident were called the "longest suicide in history" by famed acting teacher Robert Lewis.
BornOctober 17, 1920
DiedJuly 23, 1966(45)
BornOctober 17, 1920
DiedJuly 23, 1966(45)
IMDbProStarmeter
See rank
  • Nominated for 4 Oscars

Photos318

Katharine Hepburn and Montgomery Clift in Suddenly, Last Summer (1959)
Katharine Hepburn, Montgomery Clift, and Mercedes McCambridge in Suddenly, Last Summer (1959)
Montgomery Clift
Montgomery Clift
Elizabeth Taylor and Montgomery Clift in A Place in the Sun (1951)
Montgomery Clift in The Heiress (1949)
Olivia de Havilland and Montgomery Clift in The Heiress (1949)
Montgomery Clift in The Heiress (1949)
Olivia de Havilland and Montgomery Clift in The Heiress (1949)
Olivia de Havilland and Montgomery Clift in The Heiress (1949)
Olivia de Havilland and Montgomery Clift in The Heiress (1949)
Montgomery Clift and Vanessa Brown in The Heiress (1949)

Known for

Deborah Kerr, Burt Lancaster, Frank Sinatra, Ernest Borgnine, Montgomery Clift, and Donna Reed in From Here to Eternity (1953)
From Here to Eternity
7.6
  • Robert E. Lee Prewitt
  • 1953
John Wayne, Montgomery Clift, and Joanne Dru in Red River (1948)
Red River
7.8
  • Matt Garth
  • 1948
Elizabeth Taylor, Montgomery Clift, and Shelley Winters in A Place in the Sun (1951)
A Place in the Sun
7.7
  • George Eastman
  • 1951
The Search (1948)
The Search
7.8
  • Ralph Stevenson
  • 1948

Credits

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IMDbPro

Actor

  • Montgomery Clift, Christine Delaroche, Hardy Krüger, Karl Lieffen, Hannes Messemer, Macha Méril, and David Opatoshu in The Defector (1966)
    The Defector
  • Montgomery Clift, Susan Kohner, Larry Parks, and Susannah York in Freud (1962)
    Freud
  • Marlene Dietrich, Judy Garland, Burt Lancaster, Spencer Tracy, Montgomery Clift, Maximilian Schell, and Richard Widmark in Judgment at Nuremberg (1961)
    Judgment at Nuremberg
  • Clark Gable, Marilyn Monroe, and Montgomery Clift in The Misfits (1961)
    The Misfits
  • Wild River (1960)
    Wild River
  • Elizabeth Taylor in Suddenly, Last Summer (1959)
    Suddenly, Last Summer
  • Montgomery Clift, Myrna Loy, Dolores Hart, and Robert Ryan in Lonelyhearts (1958)
    Lonelyhearts
  • Marlon Brando, Montgomery Clift, and Dean Martin in The Young Lions (1958)
    The Young Lions
  • Elizabeth Taylor, Montgomery Clift, and Eva Marie Saint in Raintree County (1957)
    Raintree County
  • The Berlin Blaze
  • Deborah Kerr, Burt Lancaster, Frank Sinatra, Ernest Borgnine, Montgomery Clift, and Donna Reed in From Here to Eternity (1953)
    From Here to Eternity
  • Montgomery Clift and Jennifer Jones in Indiscretion of an American Wife (1953)
    Indiscretion of an American Wife
  • I Confess (1953)
    I Confess
  • Elizabeth Taylor, Montgomery Clift, and Shelley Winters in A Place in the Sun (1951)
    A Place in the Sun
  • The Big Lift (1950)
    The Big Lift

Writer

  • Montgomery Clift, Christine Delaroche, Hardy Krüger, Karl Lieffen, Hannes Messemer, Macha Méril, and David Opatoshu in The Defector (1966)
    The Defector
    • (uncredited)
  • Marlene Dietrich, Judy Garland, Burt Lancaster, Spencer Tracy, Montgomery Clift, Maximilian Schell, and Richard Widmark in Judgment at Nuremberg (1961)
    Judgment at Nuremberg
    • (uncredited)
  • The Search (1948)
    The Search
    • (uncredited)

Soundtrack

  • Montgomery Clift in Making Montgomery Clift (2018)
    Making Montgomery Clift
  • The Heiress (1949)
    The Heiress
    • (uncredited)

Videos14

Official Trailer
Trailer 1:49
Official Trailer
Trailer
Trailer 2:16
Trailer
Trailer
Trailer 2:22
Trailer
Trailer
Trailer 2:23
Trailer
Trailer
Trailer 2:42
Trailer
Trailer
Trailer 2:59
Trailer
Montgomery Clift Criterion Channel Teaser
Trailer 1:10
Montgomery Clift Criterion Channel Teaser
Official Trailer
Trailer 1:35
Official Trailer
Official Trailer
Trailer 2:51
Official Trailer
A Place in the Sun
Trailer 2:35
A Place in the Sun
Judgment At Nuremberg
Trailer 3:01
Judgment At Nuremberg
Suddenly Last Summer
Trailer 2:43
Suddenly Last Summer

Personal details

Edit
    • Official Site
    • October 17, 1920
    • Omaha, Nebraska, USA
    • July 23, 1966
    • New York City, New York, USA(coronary occlusion)
    • Brooks Clift(Sibling)
  • Other works
    Stage: Appeared in "Out of the Frying Pan" on Broadway, 1941.
  • Publicity listings
    • 2 Biographical Movies
    • 10 Print Biographies
    • 4 Portrayals
    • 7 Articles
    • 2 Pictorials
    • 36 Magazine Cover Photos

Did you know

Edit
  • Trivia
    At his near-fatal car accident in 1956, Rock Hudson, Michael Wilding and Kevin McCarthy formed a protective shield to prevent Clift's photo from being taken by photographers as he was carried from the wreck to the ambulance.
  • Quotes
    [his reported last words, upon being asked if he wanted to see one of his movies on television] Absolutely not!
    • Handsome appearance
    • Freud
      (1962)
      $130,000

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