Ladies and Gentlemen ... I hereby present to you, one of my favourite actors ... Montgomery Clift. He presented an anti-hero image in the late 40s and 50s, when he became a major superstar. His intensive style of acting has been copied by fellow actors, Marlon Brando and James Dean (who used to call him on his phone to meet up with him because Monty was his idol) and actors like Al Pacino, Robert DeNiro and Jack Nicholsan. However, he always chose to do it his way and was the first actor of his time to be able to make changes to the screenplay as he saw fit. His best friend was Elizabeth Taylor (whom he calls Bessie Mae), who loved him because he taught her how to act. He has been nominated on 4 counts by the Academy but never did win once. He was only recently recognised for his work on contributing to the screenplay of his first movie to be screened (though it was his second movie for Hollywood) "The Search". He found the character that he played a tad shalloow and changed most of the lines, not only his but some of his co-stars as well. The end result was more of Monty's work than the original writers. Ironically, the writers won the Oscar for Best Screenplay that year. It is only recently that his name was rightfully added.

Throughout his short life (46 years), he struggled with his homosexuality, and his overpowering mother, and then drugs and alcohol. He was disfigured in a car accident in 1957 during the making of "The Raintree Country" and that sort of destroyed his Hollywood career as well but Elizabeth Taylor stood by him. He finally died in 1966 after making only 17 films.

The following are some pictures of him but I would like to introduce his turbulent life in more detail when I have more time to write something about him. In the meantime, just enjoy looking at the photos.
 
 
 

http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/9766/clift.html