ORBITRA
Montgomery Clift

Acting

Montgomery Clift

Oct 17, 1920 – Jul 23, 196644 titles 40 movies · 4 TV
Explore orbit
IMDb Website

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.

Also known as

Edward Montgomery Clift · Monty Clift · Монтгомери Клифт

Born

Oct 17, 1920 – Jul 23, 1966

Omaha, Nebraska, USA

Open in OpenStreetMap

Photos

Profile images from TMDB · click to enlarge

10 images

Roles across career

Titles counted once; a person can act and direct on the same film (roles merged).

44

Acting credits

0

Directing

0

Writing

0

Other crew

Most critically rated

Highest TMDB score (min 100 votes)

Most commercially successful

Highest TMDB vote count (attention / reach proxy; not box office)

Career timeline

By release / first air year · movie & TV merged

Orbit ↑

1948 3 title(s)

1949 1 title(s)

1950 2 title(s)

1951 1 title(s)

1953 3 title(s)

1957 2 title(s)

1958 1 title(s)

1959 3 title(s)

1960 1 title(s)

1961 2 title(s)

1962 2 title(s)

1965 1 title(s)

1966 1 title(s)

1973 1 title(s)

1983 1 title(s)

1987 1 title(s)

1988 1 title(s)

1990 1 title(s)

1994 2 title(s)

1997 1 title(s)

2000 1 title(s)

2001 1 title(s)

2002 2 title(s)

2004 1 title(s)

2011 1 title(s)

2012 1 title(s)

2014 1 title(s)

2015 1 title(s)

2017 1 title(s)

2018 1 title(s)

2022 1 title(s)

2024 1 title(s)