Clift, Montgomery

Clift, (Edward) Montgomery

(1920–66) film actor; born in Omaha, Nebr. After ten years as a stage performer, he went to Hollywood for his role in The Search (1948). Four times nominated for an Academy Award, this brooding, intense actor usually played an outsider. Rumors of heavy drinking, drug use, and homosexuality surrounded him, and a car accident left him scarred, but the disfigurements seemed to give him added strength and pathos.

The Cambridge Dictionary of American Biography, by John S. Bowman. Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1995. Reproduced with permission.