Bosworth’s unforgettable portrait of one of Hollywood’s most magnetic, timeless, and tragic stars—Montgomery Clift.
From the moment he leapt to stardom with the films Red River and A Place in the Sun, Montgomery Clift was acclaimed by critics and loved by fans. Elegant, moody, and strikingly handsome, he became one of the most definitive actors of the 1950s, the first of Hollywood’s “loner heroes,” a group that includes Marlon Brando and James Dean. In this affecting biography, Patricia Bosworth explores the complex inner life and desires of the renowned actor. She traces a poignant trajectory: Clift’s childhood was dominated by a controlling, class-obsessed mother who never left him alone. He developed passionate friendships with Marilyn Monroe and Elizabeth Taylor in spite of his closeted homosexuality. Then his face was destroyed after a traumatic car crash outside Taylor’s house. He continued to make films, but the loss of his beauty and subsequent addictions finally brought the curtain down on his career.
Stunning and heartrending, Montgomery Clift is a remarkable tribute to one of Hollywood’s most gifted—and tormented—actors.
Editorial Reviews
“…Because of Bosworth’s artistry, her ability to choose the right details, and her own immersion in the subject…[this book] is an amazing excursion into a life.” -New York Times Book Review “It stands as the definitive work on the gifted, haunted actor.” -Los Angeles Times “Here it is – the real thing – inside Montgomery Clift. I’ve known other actors as well, but none with such a harrowing tale. I kept wondering, could Patricia Bosworth have been there? Everywhere? The book is that vivid and intimate.” -Elia Kazan
About the author
Born as Patricia Crum in Oakland, California, she is the daughter of writer Anna Gertrude Bosworth and attorney Bartley Crum, one of the six lawyers who defended the Hollywood Ten during the Red Scare at the start of the Cold War in 1947. Her younger brother, Bartley Crum Jr., and her father both committed suicide. Bosworth wrote a memoir about her family ANYTHING YOUR LITTLE HEART DESIRES published by Simon&Schuster.
After receiving her B.A. from Sarah Lawrence College in 1955 she became a member of the Actors Studio, in Manhattan.For the next ten years she worked on Broadway (most notably in the hit comedy “Mary, Mary” by Jean Kerr) and in the film “The Nun’s Story” (she played Audrey Hepburn’s best friend) In 1964 she quit acting and went into journalism freelancing regularly for the New York Times where she wrote on the arts and culture. She also became an editor at McCalls magazine, then Holiday, and then worked as managing editor of Harpers Bazaar. She joined Vanity Fair as a contributing editor in 1988 and has been there ever since. She has contributed articles to The Nation and the New York Times book review as well as Esquire. In the 199os she began teaching non-fiction writing at Columbia and Barnard; she lectured at Yale and the New School and is currently co-chair of the Biography Seminar at NYU. By then she had published biographies of Montgomery Clift and the photographer Diane Arbus; she is also the author of a short biography of Marlon Brando. In 2oo9 she took over the Playwright/Directors Unit at the Actors Studio which she runs with Estelle Parsons. Bosworth is the winner of the Front Page award. She was also a senior fellow at the National Arts Journalism program at Columbia where she researched Jane Fonda’s impact onmedia and media’s impact on Fonda especially during the Vietnam war.
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