How to Be a Movie Star (16 page)

For the first time Elizabeth saw an actor on fire with his own artistic convictions and not docilely dependent on screenwriters and directors. Shivering under blankets with him as the crew readied a scene, Elizabeth became entranced by the charismatic Clift. At twenty-eight (he'd turn twenty-nine during the making of the film), Monty wasn't fond of Hollywood and was openly disdainful of the culture of stardom—like the kind of buildup that Elizabeth was getting at the moment. "I'm not called an actor out there," he'd complain to his New York theater friends. "I'm called a hot property. And a property is only good if it makes money."

Clift was moody, dark, and sultry, with the kind of smoldering good looks that made studio executives nervous. Since becoming a star overnight in
The Search
(1948), in which he played a sensitive American GI helping a little boy find his mother in war-torn Czechoslovakia, Clift had been a challenge for Hollywood press agents, who were forced to dispel perceptions that he was too pretty or not quite masculine enough. Campaigns for
Red River
and
The Big Lift
aggressively sold Clift's macho credentials to the fan magazines, but not everyone was buying. In her column Hedda Hopper called Monty a "pantywaist" compared to the real air force flyers used as extras in
The Big Lift.

Hedda, of course, had the dirt. She knew that Clift was not only homosexual but relatively open and unapologetic about it. She got wind of an arrest in New Orleans on a possible morals charge even before Monty's agent learned of it. But it wasn't Clift's homosexuality per se that perturbed the columnist, but rather his insufferable New York superiority and his refusal to go along with the Hollywood game. She hated his blue jeans, his flip answers in interviews. Once she asked him what other profession he might enjoy. "Bartending," he said. This was unforgivable. Hedda, who never got irony, saw it simply as disrespect for the industry for which she lived and breathed.

But Elizabeth found Monty delightful. She loved his rebellion and hipness. Their chemistry built during the two weeks of filming at Tahoe. Hiding out in his dressing room, they snuck sips of brandy and made up silly names for everyone on the set. Sara would come by, knocking frantically on the door in search of her daughter. Hunkered down with Monty, Elizabeth just plugged her ears and pretended not to hear. She was suddenly eager to be all grown up, describing her mother as a "pain in the ass."

On October 17 they all packed up and returned to Hollywood, where, the next day, cast and crew were given an early-morning call to report to Paramount's Stage 9—all but Elizabeth, who was given a day off to regroup. But she found it difficult to get back into the swing. On the 20th, given a call for 9:00, she didn't appear until 2:30.

Perhaps she was getting ready for that evening's festivities, which may have seemed more exciting to her than that day's script. She was to be Monty's date to the premiere of his film
The Heiress
at the Carthay Circle Theater on San Vicente Boulevard. The decision to pair them off for the benefit of the newsreel cameras was made by agents and publicists, but given how fond they were of each other, Monty and Elizabeth were, no doubt, happy to oblige. Everyone knew that Clift hated these things, but paired with "Bessie Mae" (his term of endearment for his teenaged costar) he might be able to get through the experience. That fan magazines would depict them as a couple was a given.

Huddled in the backseat of a long black limousine, an anxious Monty nudged Elizabeth and suggested that they stop for a hamburger before the show. The girl let out a whoop and happily agreed. As they chowed down, careful not to drip too much grease on their formal attire, they were watched by Monty's stone-faced acting coach Mira Rostova and the press agent Harvey Zim, who could barely conceal his amusement. So buoyant and "foul-mouthed" was Elizabeth, Zim said, that she accomplished what he'd thought impossible: She got Clift to relax and enjoy himself.

A few blocks from the theater, Zim and Rostova were dropped off so that the two stars could arrive on their own for the photographers. Stepping out onto the red carpet, they set off an immediate explosion of flashcubes and cheers from the crowd. Inside, as Monty squirmed in his seat, critical of his performance, Elizabeth told him that he was nuts. She thought he was magnificent. When it was over, he grabbed her hand and they rushed out before the crowds could get to them. At a post-premiere party at the director William Wyler's home, the unlikely couple drew everyone's gaze like a pair of magnets. "The combination of their beauty was staggering," said the actress Diana Lynn. The next day the newspapers were filled with breathless reports of their love affair.

In his New York office, Russell Holman, Paramount's East Coast production manager, wired an emphatic memo to the studio's front office. Surrounded by tabloid photos of Monty and Elizabeth, Holman urged the higher-ups to drop the title
A Place in the Sun
and replace it with
The Lovers,
since the pair was "already being linked together press-wise." And not just in the tabloids either. Holman pointed to the current issue of
Time,
which also featured them as Hollywood's newest couple. "Confident George will make fine picture," Holman continued, "but there still will be problem of getting it reception commensurate with its merits from exhibitors and public unless we give it attractive title ... I plead on behalf of every executive here that we at once set title
The Lovers.
It would be a terrible showmanship shame not to use it." So terrible, Holman said, that it could mean the difference of $750,000 or more to the gross.

But back in Hollywood, Stevens folded his big arms across his barrel chest. He wasn't interested in showmanship. The title, thankfully, would not be changed.

The Lovers
might have been an apt title for the Monty and Liz show that was raging in the press, however. Fan-magazine readers were giddy at the thought of such a beautiful star couple. After what columnist Ruth Waterbury called all "those boy boys," finally La Liz was pairing off with a consort worthy of her. Paramount was thrilled at the publicity, hoping to ride it through to the film's release, and no doubt Metro was pleased as well, for the stories bolstered its own efforts to turn Elizabeth into a full-fledged adult star. Stories of Monty and Liz sneaking out for hamburgers were cranked out on purple mimeograph machines. Carefully posed photographs of the couple were distributed widely. It wasn't long before Hedda got into the act, striding onto the set wearing a tall pink hat and peering from behind the camera as Stevens shot Clift and Taylor in a romantic clinch. "Liz did the old Garbo trick," she told her readers. "She took him. Not a carpenter, electrician, prop man or laborer left the set. Some even sat on ladders to get a better look. That Liz gets them all—from 15 to 50. What a dish!"

Except that Elizabeth didn't get Monty—no matter how much has seeped into Hollywood legend. So good was the publicity in 1949-50 that, even now, Elizabeth Taylor's love for Montgomery Clift is a "fact" that everyone knows. Romantics still push the story that Monty was her one great love and that despite his sexual orientation, he was unable to resist her charms. This belief persisted even after Elizabeth repeatedly told the truth. "He was my best friend," she said, describing "a loving and lasting friendship." Jack Larson, who was Monty's lover for many years and a witness to his friendship with Elizabeth, said the pair shared a tremendously affectionate yet always platonic friendship. Clift's close friend Kevin McCarthy agreed: "The romance was publicity, what people wanted to believe."

As young and inexperienced as she was, Elizabeth had no problem accepting the truth about Clift. Right from the start she had sensed something different about him. "I was a virgin ... not a world expert on sexuality," she said. "But I loved Monty with all my heart and ... knew that he was meant to be with a man and not a woman, and I discussed it with him." While she may have lacked a concrete understanding of sexuality, Elizabeth had always been an instinctive creature—and she had known plenty of homosexuals from her youngest days on. At the moment Roddy McDowall, her pal and costar from
Lassie Come Home
and
The White Cliffs of Dover,
was also coming to terms with his gay identity—a process that he shared with Elizabeth, who supported him unconditionally.

Of course, Elizabeth might have had some hope that Monty might "change" for her. George Stevens, who discounted any romance, nonetheless thought that Clift "might have suggested fancies" in the sensitive teenager's mind. The romantic dream of wedding bells with Bill Pawley, as unlikely as it may have been, was still fresh in her mind. Being held in Monty's arms every day on the set, being kissed by him, being fired up by his ambition and talent, Elizabeth easily could have become smitten. But she was never the type to bang her head against closed doors.

And as much as he adored her, Clift was very conscious of the fact that Elizabeth was just seventeen years old; it would be a while, said Jack Larson, before their friendship deepened emotionally, at least from Monty's perspective. For now, it remained a happy, sometimes childlike association, with giggling fits and dripping hamburgers. Monty's gayness fostered a deeper and safer intimacy than she would ever have with most men. When Elizabeth spent a weekend with Monty and Roddy McDowall at the Park Plaza in New York, there was no hanky-panky or sexual tension, just good-natured (if somewhat out-of-control) fun. They drank lots of martinis, pelted each other with chrysanthemums, turned the paintings on the walls upside-down, and stole bathroom fixtures. And no one seemed to worry too much about a teenaged girl developing such a fond taste for vodka.

As October rushed to a close, George Stevens was increasingly under pressure. Elizabeth had called in sick on the twenty-fifth and twenty-sixth, and time was an issue. Her contract stipulated that she be finished with all her scenes by November 26 in order to be back at MGM to start work on
Father of the Bride
the first week of December. Stevens began to push hard. Monty pushed back, openly disagreeing with much of what the director was tell ing them. According to Mira Rostova, he privately coached Elizabeth himself, rehearsing her in several scenes and taking "copious notes" to review later. Elizabeth was learning how to
act
—not just put on a costume and perform for the cameras.

Rehearsing a scene, Stevens played Franz Waxman's prerecorded score as inspiration. It was a pivotal juncture in the picture, the moment where a guilt-ridden Monty shares his heartbreak and Elizabeth comforts him. Standing in front of his actors, practically acting out the scene himself, Stevens instructed them to go through the motions without any dialogue, to just
feel
their characters. For once, Clift found the idea worthwhile, but Elizabeth was flummoxed. She'd never known filmmaking to be like this. Halfway through the rehearsal, she froze. Jumping in and taking her by the hand, Stevens prodded her along, assuring her that they'd "work at it, talk about it, do it over, change it, adjust it," until they got it right. To his great satisfaction, Elizabeth was game.

"I don't presume to be a great actress," she told him at one point, exhausted. "I presume to be an effective actress." But Stevens thought she could do more. Despite her inexperience, Elizabeth's performance was pleasing him, and not just because of the way she looked. What truly thrilled him was the wise, almost "earth mother" quality in her performance. "She had been associating with older people a good many years and there was a great maturity about her," Stevens said. He believed that she "had all of the emotional capabilities, the intelligence ... Anything she wanted to do, she could do."

And finally, it seems, she started to believe it herself.

When the time came to actually shoot the scene, Stevens told Bill Mellor to pop a six-inch lens into his camera. It would all be done in one gigantic close-up. To Stevens's mind, there was no more important moment than this one. He'd been up till two
A.M.
that morning, still tinkering with the dialogue. His actors had only gotten the new script a short time before they were called to the set. Elizabeth took one glance at the page and reacted sharply.

"Forgive me," she said, "but what the hell is this?"

In the new script, Monty was to say, "If I only could tell you how much I love you ... if only I could tell you all." And Elizabeth was to respond, "Tell Mama all."

The words seemed absurd to the teenager. No longer the obedient rookie, Elizabeth had been emboldened to think for herself. But Stevens didn't bend to her "distemper." Not only did he insist that she say the words, he insisted that she
believe
them, that she take them into her head and her heart, and speak them as if she really
were
this woman, loving this man as powerfully as if she had borne him herself. Elizabeth hesitated, then said she would try. Stevens knew she could do it. And when he called "action" and Mellor turned on his camera, she proved him right.

"Brilliant!" the director shouted after calling "cut." Of course, whether anyone else would share his view remained to be seen. They went on shooting, way past their deadline. Metro finally insisted that Elizabeth come home to start
Father of the Bride
on December 8, though she was back at Paramount on the twenty-seventh and twenty-eighth for some last shots. Stevens finally finished principal photography on January 3, 1950, then retired to the cutting room with editor William Hornbeck and dozens of cans of celluloid. It would be more than a year before anyone other than the two of them saw the film.

On May 6, 1950, Dick Clayton arrived soon after dawn outside the Church of the Good Shepherd in Beverly Hills, around the corner from the posh boutiques on Rodeo Drive. The sunlight was filtering through the fronds of the palm trees as the first of the crowd began to gather. By noon, three thousand people would be jostling each other on the street outside the small white church with the tiled roof, standing on curbs, on walls, on cars, drinking coffee from paper cups, passing around boxes of doughnuts. Most had cameras dangling from their necks. Some carried portable telescopes and home-movie cameras. Not since the funeral of Rudolph Valentino twenty-four years earlier had this many people assembled around the church.