Photoplay (Jul-Dec 1953)

This in no way reflects the opinions of those who’ve worked with him. As Manny Klein, famous trumpeter who coached him on the bugle for “Eternity” says, “I’ve been playing a trumpet and bugling for thirty-five years — but the kid wore me out! Such diligence. I’ve never seen a guy work so hard.” At 6: 00 a.m. the lone figure marching around the Hollywood High School athletic field, near his hotel, was Montgomery Clift, learning to make like a “soljer.” So determined was he to master every military detail, Colonel Pendleton Hogan, who served as technical adviser on the picture, would have been delighted to recruit him permanently for Uncle Sam. Monty ran fight films, and reported three weeks early to work out with Mushy Callahan for the big slugging scene. “He wanted to look like Sugar Ray Robinson when he fights,” Callahan observed. Monty’s intense concentration results in such realism that Deborah Kerr says, “You have the strangest feeling he’s actually experiencing the scene. You could feel the knife in Monty’s side for days after his fight with Fatso in ‘Eternity.’ When he was shot, it wouldn’t have surprised me if they’d said, ‘He’s dead.’ ” This, Director Fred Zinnemann, from his six years of association with Monty, explains with, “He’s so good an actor he gives the feeling he isn’t even acting. That he’s just being himself. Monty is technically one of the greatest actors I know. He couldn’t play a part he doesn’t believe.” He didn’t work for two years after “A Place in the Sun,” turning down script after script because he didn’t believe any of the parts were right for him. “He needed the money, too,” a friend told me. Then came three believable parts in one year. The priest in “I Confess,” Prewitt , and that of a young American-Italian professor in the David O. Selznick— Vittorio De Sica production, “Terminal Station,” a love story told with all the De Sica realism, the passion and despair. Filmed against the dramatic background of Rome’s Terminal Station, it’s the last hour and a half of a love affair. “It’s a very good part,” Monty says, “and I’d always wanted to make a picture with Vittorio De Sica.” Monty has an insatiable curiosity that encourages exploration. “You see kids today who are cynics at eighteen,” he says. “They’ve had it. All of it. That’s sad . . .” It’s easy to see why his kid-like zest and eagerness to explore would draw children to him like a Pied Piper. “He loves them and they love him,” his friend Howie Horowitz says, speaking for his three small daughters. “They think Monty’s a kindred soul and so much fun. He kills them.” As for the Fred Zinnemann’s thirteen-year-old son, Timi, he thinks of him fondly as an older adopted brother. “He adores Monty,” his parents say. When it had developed Timi would be in New York for a few hours en route from a European summer, Monty made excited plans for Timi to see the Big Town via helicopter. Monty felt certain there would be some way of engineering it. No wonder their son adored him. This would really be a boy’s idea of sightseeing. “Why, no,” Mrs. Zinnemann laughs. “Actually it’s Monty’s idea. You see — Monty’s never been up in a helicopter.” And as for New York, the popular conception of Monty Clift as a moody recluse who fox-holes into a coldwater flat between ^pictures, is as mythical as the rest of it. “It’s a very nice apartment,” Monty protests laughingly. His place in the East Sixties in New York City is a walk-up with a spacious living room with a high-beamed ceiling and a fireplace, a bedroom, a small kitchen, and a view — on a clear sunny summer day Look for the heart . . . for the Lovable look The Lovable Brassiere Co., Dept. TS-12 ISO Madison Ave., New York 16, N.Y. , 89