Morath: Photographic Learnings of THE MISFITS
© The Inge Morath Foundation/Magnum Photos
Rare photos of Marilyn Monroe, Clark Gable, Montgomery Clift, Arthur Miller, and others involved in the making of John Huston’s 1961 dramatic modern Western The Misfits are to be found in the exhibit “Inge Morath: road to reno,” on view at the Nevada Museum of Art until July 15.
The exhibit consists of about 70 photos, mostly in black in white. They record photographer Inge Morath’s 18-day road trip from New York City to Reno, where The Misfits was filmed throughout the summer and fall of 1960. Morath was one of nine photographers assigned the job by Magnum Photos, the company hired to document the shoot.
According to museum curator Ann Wolfe, Morath was “not interested in simply capturing the star power and the legend. She was looking for a greater truth behind the surface. It was a bittersweet melancholy encapsulated in some of her photos.”
Morath’s pictures of Marilyn Monroe “are particularly empathic and touching as she caught Marilyn’s anguish beneath her celebrity, the pain as well as her joy in life,” wrote Arthur Miller, the film’s screenwriter and Monroe’s husband at the time.
The Austrian-born Morath later married Miller, with whom she remained until her death at age 77 in 2002. Miller died in 2005 at age 89.
Also at the Nevada Museum of Art: On Friday, May 18, at noon, Neal Cobb, Reno historian and member of the Historical Resources Commission, “will share his encyclopedic memory of the events and people surrounding the making of the film and the impact it left in Reno.”
The making of The Misfits (above, Thelma Ritter with Gable and Monroe), a downbeat drama about a burgeoning affair between a divorcee (Monroe) and an aging cowboy (Gable), was marred by a series of on-set difficulties. In addition to Marilyn Monroe’s chronic tardiness and her marital woes with Arthur Miller, production was delayed by Montgomery Clift, still suffering from severe physical and emotional issues caused by his near-fatal car accident three years earlier. Compounding matters, many cast and crew members took part in late-night drinking and gambling. (Having arrived during the early weeks of filming, however, Morath didn’t get to capture the behind-the-scenes tensions and flare-ups.)
A box-office and critical disappointment, The Misfits turned out to be the last completed film for both Gable and Monroe. Gable, 59, died of a heart attack twelve days after filming was completed (some blame his death on the arduous shoot); Monroe’s 1962 death, at age 36, happened not long after she was fired from George Cukor’s Something’s Got to Give. Her death was ruled a suicide.
Montgomery Clift made three more film appearances before dying of a heart attack at age 45 in 1966.
One of the film’s second leads, however, Eli Wallach, 91, is still around and still making movies.
Ann Wolfe Quote: Associated Press.
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That’s a wonderful shot, with Marilyn at the window.