by Jackie Ganiy
Only Liz Taylor stood between Clift and complete Hollywood oblivion in the later years. He had become virtually uninsurable, and thus, unhireable. It was at Taylor’s insistence that Clift was cast opposite her in the film adaptation of Tennessee Williams’ play about latent homosexuality and overbearing mothers, Suddenly Last Summer. Was Williams channeling Clift’s own childhood? The decision was a mistake. Unable to shoot long scenes in a single take, as a movie adapted from a play often requires, Monty’s scenes had to be broken up so he could rest between them. His frail health and chronic alcoholism caused endless delays and extreme frustration for Joseph Mankiewicz, the director, who wanted to fire him after the first month. This roused the mother hen protective instincts of both Taylor and Katharine Hepburn, who both voraciously defended Monty against any attempts at dismissal. Hepburn was said to have spit in Mankiewicz’s face over what was construed as his mistreatment of the actor. The film was a flop.
In 1961, Clift was cast opposite Marilyn Monroe and Clark Gable in what would be the final film for both legends, The Misfits. Playwright Arthur Miller, then husband to Monroe, had written the script to showcase the actress’s fragile, shattered personality, and to highlight her vulnerability—something audiences had sensed for years, but which had never been fully exploited.
Unfortunately, the entire production seemed doomed from the start. The shooting location was extremely difficult, set in the searing one hundred and ten degree heat of the Nevada desert. All relevant parties involved—director John Huston, Monroe, Gable, and Clift—were in their declining years, and barely able to function. Monroe quipped that Monty was the only person she ever met who was in worse shape than she was. Huston spent all his free time gambling and getting drunk, often showing up on the set after having been on an all night bender, then falling asleep in his director’s chair. He lost so much money at the craps table that the studio was forced to cover some of his losses. Gable was not a young man, and the endless hours spent in the heat, often waiting for Monroe to stumble through numerous takes, or possibly not showing up at all, began to take a toll on both his patience and health. He remarked that “That girl is going to be the death of me!” and indeed he would die, just two weeks after filming wrapped. Monroe was so far gone by this time that she was barely functional. She would often keep the entire crew waiting for hours before she stumbled onto the set, ill-prepared and looking like hell. Sometimes she wouldn’t show up at all. Huston sent her to a hospital for two weeks just to dry out enough to be able to get through the picture. At one point, in an apparent dry run for the real thing, she overdosed on barbiturates, nearly killing herself. Her marriage to Miller disintegrated in a very public way, and Miller turned to drinking. It was as if there was a contest between these dysfunctional (real) misfits as to who would self-destruct first.
Amazingly, Monty proved to be the least troublesome member of the entire three-ring circus. He was professional, punctual and polite throughout the filming. There is a poignant scene where his character, Perce, places a call to his mother in a dusty, desert phone booth, almost begging for her approval. It is profound, moving, and uncomfortably similar to Clift’s relationship with his own mother. Monty nailed it in one take.
The movie was a box office bomb, partly due to being a little ahead of its time. The metaphorical nature of the plot, juxtaposed against the stark realism of the scenes, confused the average moviegoer. In hindsight, it has since only grown in stature, and today, it is viewed as a testament to Huston’s genius—a man who was apparently a better director when he was hungover then most others were when stone-cold sober. It showcases some of the finest performances of the stars’ careers, and reveals, in all their delicate vulnerability, the flickering final moments of two of Hollywood’s greatest icons. It is achingly beautiful in its purity, and has withstood the test of time.
Monty’s downward spiral continued, despite his standout performance in The Misfits. Unable to remember his lines, or get to the set on a regular basis, Universal sued him for breach of contract over the film Freud: The Secret Passion. His twelve-minute performance, as a mentally challenged man who had been tortured by the Nazis in Judgment at Nuremberg, had to be ad-libbed because he could not remember his lines. Still, he was nominated for an Academy Award for Best Supporting Actor. After Nuremberg, Hollywood had had enough of Montgomery Clift. He spent the next three years begging for an acting job, any acting job, to no avail. In 1967, he reemerged in a nondescript film titled The Defector, which was his final appearance onscreen. Taylor had badgered the producers of her film, Reflections in a Golden Eye, to give Monty a chance, and while they reluctantly agreed, it was not to be.
On the evening of July 22, 1966, Clift had spent the day lounging in the bedroom of his New York apartment. His live-in personal secretary, Lorenzo James, invited him early in the evening to watch The Misfits on television with him. “Absolutely not!” Monty replied. He was found dead early the next morning, face up in his bed, glasses on, and stiff with rigor mortis. He had suffered a massive coronary, brought on by decades of self-abuse, some time during the previous night. He was forty-five. In three years, he had rarely had work. Hemingway once said, “All things truly wicked start from innocence.” Montgomery Clift, beautiful golden boy with a fragile soul, would never overcome the wicked power of his own debilitating self-doubt.
Section IV
Live Fast Die Young
The public has always had a macabre fascination with those among us who seem overly blessed, yet remain pitifully unhappy and restless. After all, if someone who is stunningly beautiful and talented is still miserable, this makes the unhappiness of everyone else’s lives seem much more tolerable. There is a certain smug gratification when the rarified and glamorous crash and burn in full view of those who placed them on their pedestal in the first place.
James Dean
Dean’s last known photo
A man is slumped over a microphone, sitting at a table meant for twenty, in an empty hall that once held a huge crowd. The huge, oblong banquet table dwarfs his slight frame. Two observers silently stand in the doorway at the rear of the hall, listening to his incoherent slobberings. Suddenly, his words become crystal clear, and he shouts loudly, as if giving a rousing speech to an attentive crowd, “What has Texas given to me? Not a god damn thing!” The clarity reverts to mumbling, then to sobs as the man stammers, “Pretty Leslie. Pretty Leslie! Wonderful, beautiful girl bride! Rich...rich Mrs. Benedict. She’s beautiful, lovely... the woman a man wants! The woman a man’s gotta have too!” The two observers turn and leave. James Dean, as Jett Rink, had just given the performance of his career. He would not live to give another.
It has been almost six decades since Dean was killed in an accident on a lonely stretch of California highway, far from the glitz of Hollywood. His legend continues to overshadow his short legacy. What is it about this troubled young man that continues to fascinate subsequent generations, even those whose parents weren’t even born when his life screeched to its abrupt end in 1955? He only made three films, and yet he is more famous today than when those films were released. The myth of James Dean is far more powerful and enduring than the reality; more timelessly engaging than any of his roles. This myth has become a part of the fabric of our collective American identity, and this is why the memory of Dean is as fresh today as it was when he first walked in front of the camera, over half a century ago.
Born on February 8, 1931, in Marion, Indiana, James was extremely close to his mother, Mildred, who died when he was only nine years old. His father was unable, or unwilling, to care for him, so James was sent to live with his sister and her Quaker husband on a farm near Fairmont, Indiana. In his teens, something happened to James that profoundly affected his life. A Methodist preacher named James Deweerd (oh, the irony) befriended him, and the two became inseparable. Deweerd (having a hard time referencing this with a straight face) influenced the young and impressionable James in his future obsessions with race cars, the theater, a
nd apparently other things. Their “friendship” also became Dean’s first homosexual experience. This man was well into his thirties when he singled Dean out for “special” guidance. Today, we call it child molestation. Then, it was called “mentoring.” Dean confided to Elizabeth Taylor, during the making of Giant, that he had been “molested by a preacher in high school.” Years later, it would come out that Deweerd was known in Fairmont as the local pedophile. In the biography, James Dean: Little Boy Lost, by Joe Hyams, he confessed that they “enjoyed a sexual relationship, but only after Jimmy was eighteen.” Really?
After high school, Jimmy moved to California to live with his father and stepmother, where he enrolled in UCLA, majoring in drama. This angered his father, and the two became estranged. He soon left college to pursue acting full-time. These were lean times for James, who would often sleep in his car because he couldn’t afford rent, and go on gay dinner dates just to eat. He even worked as a parking attendant at CBS studios. After getting only bit parts in commercials, he decided he wanted to become a real actor. He moved to New York, enrolling in the famous mecca of method acting, The Actors Studio. James betrayed the innocent wonderment of a besotted boy on Christmas morning, in a letter he sent home about his admittance into the prestigious acting school. “It houses great people like Marlon Brando, Julie Harris, Arthur Kennedy. Very few get into it! I am one of the youngest to belong.”
While at the Studio, his career began to take off with such vehicles as The Kraft Television Theater, The General Electric Theater and Omnibus. But it was his work in the theatrical production of The Immoralist that got director Elia Kazan’s attention. Dean’s brooding persona and wild energy were perfect for the lead, Cal Trask, in his film adaptation of John Steinbeck’s novel, East of Eden. Kazan had originally pegged Marlon Brando for the role, but when he saw Dean’s performance, he knew he was looking at his Cal. Even Steinbeck agreed, though he disliked Dean personally.
Jimmy gave an astonishing, pure method performance; much of it adlibbed and offscript, something he would do again and again in later roles. In the scene where his father—played by veteran actor Raymond Massey—rejects Cal’s gift of $5,000, the script called for Dean to turn and run away. Instead, he cried out in anguish, grabbed Massy, and clung to him in a pathetic, desperate attempt to elicit love from the man. Massey’s face betrayed his genuine shock at Jimmy’s offscript behavior, and it’s priceless. The scene is gut-wrenching to watch, and put Dean in a category by himself. He received an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor for East of Eden. It was the first posthumous nomination in the Academy’s history. It was the only film he made that was released during his lifetime.
Dean got involved with beautiful—but troubled—Italian actress, Pier Angeli, whom he followed around like a lovesick puppy. Pier’s controlling mother did not approve of the relationship, as Jimmy was neither Italian, nor Catholic (and not entirely heterosexual?). In his autobiography, Kazan writes that he was often subjected to them loudly making love in Dean’s dressing room on the set. Pier decided to allow her mother to control her destiny, marrying the approved Italian Catholic crooner, Vic Damone. James was not happy. He reportedly parked his motorcycle directly across from the church, watching the ceremony from afar, a la The Graduate. Apparently it didn’t work out for Pier and Damone, or anyone else for that matter, and she committed suicide fifteen years later.
An unintentionally gayish press release linked Dean with two other stars, in all their hunky, pool-boy goodness: Rock Hudson and Tab Hunter. The release stated that each of these men were “eligible bachelors”, who had not found the time to commit to a single woman. Right. All three would later become the darlings of the underground gay cinema set. Of his own sexuality, Dean made only one public comment. “No, I am not homosexual, but I’m not going to go through life with one hand tied behind my back.” Nailed it!
James followed East of Eden with another Brando castoff, the role of Jim Stark in the aptly-titled, Rebel Without a Cause. Rebel later garnered a macabre reputation for being cursed, as all three principal stars—Natalie Wood, Sal Mineo and James Dean—died tragically before their time. This is the movie that sealed Dean’s image as a restless outsider just too cool for this world. The classic scene where he begs on his knees his unbelievably insensitive parents to stop bickering, is one of the most powerful of his career. “You’re tearing me apart!” he wails pathetically.
Natalie Wood came to worship Dean as if he was a god, and believed he had no peer among actors. “He was all she could talk about. Every night, for weeks, she went to see him in East of Eden at the Egyptian Theater. She must have seen it fifty times!” recalled Sal Mineo, years later. This was his most famous performance, and another released posthumously. Jimmy never lived to see his leap from ‘interesting newcomer’ to full-blown Hollywood star.
Dean decided to take the role of the complex Jett Rink in Giant to avoid being typecast forever as the rebellious, angst-ridden teenager. This was his first official adult role, and he tackled it with his typical intensity and extreme focus. Whereas he had only toyed with Natalie Wood, just because he could, he genuinely fell for Elizabeth Taylor. It seems anyone with a penis loved Ms. Taylor: gay, straight, young, old, rich, poor, dogperson, catperson, vampire, werewolf, vegetarian, carnivore—it didn’t matter. Dean and Taylor would disappear together for hours, showing up only when they had to for their scenes. Dean’s relationship with Hudson was another story. They shared a room briefly at the start of the shoot, and the story was that Hudson made an awkward pass at Jimmy, who preferred younger, edgier lovers. Spurned, Hudson felt an intense dislike of his young costar, complaining to director George Stevens, that he was being upstaged by the little asshole (which he was).
Had he known this would be his final performance, Dean could not have done more justice to the character. As Jett Rink, he is at once both hateful and pitiable, both an insecure child and a cunning tycoon. The subtleties of his performance are astonishing. In one of his most memorable scenes, he does not even speak, but is shown only in silhouette, pacing off the boundaries of his newly-inherited patch of scrub brush. Finally, at the end, he scales a windmill and plunks down, surveying his prize in complete contentment as the sun descends behind him. Without speaking a word, Dean perfectly conveyed Jett Rink’s joy at finally possessing something of his own. He was nominated posthumously for a Academy Award again, and that was the only time in history that had happened.
Dean developed a love for racing early on, purchasing a motorcycle and MG sports car as soon as his finances covered more than his basic needs. He had raced in several competitions, placing first and second in his class. In 1955, while still filming Giant, he purchased a Porsche 550 Spyder, which he had custom-painted with the number “130” and “Little Bastard”. The studio had barred him from all racing events for the duration of the film shoot, which made him restless, as racing was his way of releasing stress and relaxing between projects. As soon as the final scenes were in the can, and the ban lifted, he took off in his new sports car for a race in Salinas, California. Just before he left, he took the time to film what is now an eerie public service message about speeding, in which he looked straight into the camera and said, “Take it easy driving. The life you save might be mine.” Those were the last words he ever spoke on film.
Actor Alec Guinness recalled feeling a sudden unease when Dean proudly showed him the car a week before. He looked at Jimmy and said “If you get in that car, you will be found dead in it by this time next week.” Jimmy laughed. This was on September 23, a week before the fatal accident.
On the morning of September 30, 1955, Dean picked up the Porsche from his mechanic, Rolf Wütherich, who had been fine-tuning it for the race. Both men headed out to make the four-hour trip up the coast. At the notorious Grapevine, a steep mountain grade south of Bakersfield, Dean’s Porsche began to whiz down the highway a little too fast, prompting CHP officer Otie V. Hunter to pull him over and cite him for speeding.
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sp; Two hours later, as he neared the bump in the road known as Cholame, the sun was sinking below the horizon. He closed in on a Y-intersection where highways 466/41 and 46 meet, usually free of traffic. Donald Turnupseed (no, that is not a misprint), driving a 1950 Ford Coupe, was coming east from 466, and turned left onto 46. The sun was low, and Turnupseed later claimed that he never even saw the Spyder as he entered the intersection. Dean was going 63 mph, saw the Ford approaching without hesitation, and asked Wütherich, “That guy’s gotta see us, right?” He didn’t. The Ford pulled directly in front of the Porsche. Dean had very little time to react, so instead of slamming on his brakes, he sped up and swerved to try to avoid the other car. This was a classic racing move taught to drivers to avoid collisions on the track, but there was simply not enough time to pull it off. Dean’s left front bumper slammed into the left front bumper of Turnupseed’s car. The driver’s side of Dean’s Porsche Spyder bore the brunt of the impact, crushing him inside the mess of twisted metal. Neither Rolf nor Dean was wearing a seat belt, but luck saw the mechanic thrown clear of the accident when the car spun violently on impact. Dean had a broken neck, crushed pelvis, broken legs and severe internal injuries. Wütherich suffered a broken jaw, hip and legs. Amazingly, he survived, living to tell the world of his experiences for decades. Jimmy wasn’t so lucky. He was twenty-four years old when they pronounced him dead on arrival at Paso Robles War Memorial Hospital. He was twenty-four.