The scenes which Montgomery Clift shot for this movie just before his accident represent the only color footage available of him before he was disfigured. All of his previous movies had been shot in black-and-white.
On the evening of May 12, 1956, during the shooting of this movie, Montgomery Clift was involved in a serious car accident on his way back home from a party at the house of Dame Elizabeth Taylor. He apparently fell asleep at the wheel of his car while driving and smashed his car into a telephone pole. His friend Kevin McCarthy witnessed the accident from his car, drove back and informed Taylor and her then husband Michael Wilding, who immediately drove to the accident location together with Rock Hudson. Taylor entered the car through the back door, crawled to the front seat and removed the two front teeth from Clift's throat that threatened to choke him. Hudson finally managed to pull Clift out of the wreck and together with Wilding and McCarthy they protected him from being photographed by reporters until the ambulance arrived. This was necessary because soon after the emergency call had come in to the local police station, reporters were already on their way and arrived at the scene when Clift was still in the car. The accident was well publicized. After nine weeks of recovery and with plastic surgery, Clift returned to the movie set and finished this movie, but with considerable difficulties. His dashing and looks, though, were gone forever. In some scenes throughout the movie, despite the cinematographer's skill, Clift's nose and chin look different, and the entire left side of his face is nearly immobile.
Dame Elizabeth Taylor had her own problems on the set, finding the costumes so constricting that one day she fainted due to hyperventilation. She also suffered from tachycardia.
After his car accident during shooting, there was some consideration given to recasting Montgomery Clift's role. Production insurance would have covered the costs of reshooting, but Dame Elizabeth Taylor and Rock Hudson insisted that Clift be allowed to continue once he recovered from his injuries.
Hopped up on painkillers and other drugs, Montgomery Clift's post-accident behavior became increasingly erratic. Director Edward Dmytryk noted in his autobiography that one day he went looking for his non-appearing star in his trailer, only to find one hundred containers of virtually every prescription drug, and a case full of needles and syringes. Clift would disappear for long periods of time and was even caught running naked through the town in which they were filming (Danville, Kentucky). The situation got so bad that a Policeman was stationed outside of his hotel room every night to make sure he stayed put.
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