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Biography
Born in Omaha, Nebraska, the son of Ethel (Fogg) and William Brooks Clift, a banker with roots in the south. He had a twin sister Roberta and an older brother Brooks, who was a husband of Eleanor Clift the columnist and political commentator and Brooks had a child by the actress Kim Stanley.
Film career
Appearing on Broadway at the age of thirteen, he achieved success on the stage and starred there for ten years before moving to Hollywood, debuting in 1948's Red River opposite John Wayne. Clift was nominated for the Academy Award for Best Actor that same year for The Search. Billed as the new kind of leading man, sensitive, intense and handsome, the kind of man women would want to take care of. He had a highly successful film career, performing in many Oscar-nominated roles and becoming a matinee idol for his good looks. His love scenes with Elizabeth Taylor in A Place in the Sun (1951) set the standard for romance in cinema. His roles in A Place in the Sun and in the 1953 classic From Here to Eternity are considered signatures of his career.
He turned down the starring roles in Sunset Boulevard and East of Eden.
He hid his alleged homosexuality and turned to alcoholism and drug use.
Car accident
In 1956, while filming Raintree County, he smashed his car into a tree after leaving a party. Elizabeth Taylor kept him from choking to death by removing two teeth lodged in his throat. She had been co-starring in the movie and happened to be at the party. He needed reconstructive surgery on his face and returned after several weeks to finish the film.
Post-accident career
Clift later appeared in Wild River, a 1960 film listed in the United States National Film Registry.
Clift was nominated for a best supporting actor Oscar for Judgment at Nurenberg in a role that only took up seven minutes of screen time.
Death
Montgomery Clift died in 1966 at the age of 45 of a heart attack brought on by his severe drug and alcohol addictions. He was interred in the Quaker Cemetery, Brooklyn, New York.
Trivia
Clift was also brother-in-law to Newsweek reporter Eleanor Clift.
Marilyn Monroe, who was also having emotional problems, playfully described Clift as: "The only person I know who is in worse shape than I am."
His post-accident career has been referred to as the "longest suicide in Hollywood" because of his continued substance abuse.
The songs "Monty got a Raw Deal" by R.E.M. and "The Right Profile" by The Clash are about him, and even The Clash's live album was named for one of his films (From Here to Eternity).
Clift's height was 5'10".
Academy Award Nominations
1962 - Best Actor in a Supporting Role - Judgment at Nurenberg
1954 - Best Actor in a Leading Role - From Here to Eternity
1952 - Best Actor in a Leading Role - A Place in the Sun
1949 - Best Actor in a Leading Role - The Search
Clift has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6104 Hollywood Blvd.
Filmography
The Search (1948)
Red River (1948)
The Heiress (1949)
The Big Lift (1950)
A Place in the Sun (1951)
I Confess (1953)
Terminal Station (aka Indiscretion of an American Wife) (1953)
From Here to Eternity (1953)
Operation Raintree (1957) (short subject)
Raintree County (1957)
Lonelyhearts (1958)
The Young Lions (1958)
Suddenly, Last Summer (1959)
Wild River (1960)
The Misfits (1961)
Freud (1962)
The Defector (1966)
