Montgomery Clift Biography

At the age of 13, Monty appeared on Broadway and chose to remain in the New York theatre for over a decade before being drawn into film. He gained excellent theatrical notices and soon attracted the interests of numerous lovelorn actresses.

While working in New York in the early 1940s, he met wealthy former Broadway star Libby Holman. She developed an obsession with the young actor, financing a play, Mexican Mural for him. His relationship with the bisexual middle-aged Holman was likely to be the last heterosexual relationship of his life and only cause him further anguish over his sexuality.

Montgomery Clift brought a new vitality and depth to American movies. He was a talented actor, and was devastatingly handsome.

He inspired both Marlon Brando and James Dean, who aped his naturalistic acting style. The characters Monty played on screen were lost, confused souls - a new, post-war image of the American male. Off-screen, he was a cypher - his addiction to pills and alcohol and his complicated sexual identity have been widely publicised. Previous books and documentaries have simplified Clift's psychological problems as stemming from his supposedly repressed homosexuality.

By the early 1950's he was exclusively homosexual, though he continued to maintain a number of close friendships with theatre women. His movie debut was Red River (1948) with John Wayne, which was quickly followed by his early personal success in The Search (1948).

He received four Academy Award Nominations for A Place in the Sun (1951), From Here to Eternity (1953) and Judgment at Nuremberg (1961), but never won.

A 1956 car accident, caused not by alcohol but by long hours on the film ‘Raintree County’, damaged his facial muscles. This both limited his range of expression and hurt his self-esteem. After this, Clift tended to take unglamorous roles which worsened his bad public image.

A lawsuit with Universal Pictures and his growing addictions, forced him into a four-year retirement in 1962. Although he was preparing for a comeback in the mid 1960s, he suffered a sudden and fatal heart attack in 1966.