Mira Rostova

Mira Rostova (; April 10, 1909 – January 28, 2009) was a Russian-American actress turned acting teacher, best known for her own variation of method acting that she used in coaching Montgomery Clift. Her other students included Armand Assante, Alec Baldwin, Peter Gallagher, Jessica Lange, Zohra Lampert, Jerry Orbach, A.J. Benza and Madonna (who attended approximately half a dozen class sessions, working on scenes from Tennessee Williams' Summer and Smoke and Isherwood's I Am a Camera).

Early life Mira Rosovskaya was born on April 10, 1909, in Saint Petersburg, Russia. She fled to Switzerland after the 1917 Russian Revolution and then Hamburg, Germany, where she began acting. She also acted in Vienna. She moved to France after the rise of the Nazi party and reached the United States by way of England. In the U.S., she abbreviated her surname to Rostova.

Career Rostova was accepted on a scholarship by Robert Lewis. She was cast as a fake witch doctor in Mexican Mural, an experimental play directed by Lewis, when she first met Clift who was also in the play. Gradually, Rostova played an increasing role in his acting career, discussing for hours the roles he should accept and the way he should act in them. Patricia Bosworth, Clift's biographer, described how Rostova had been hired on the payroll as Clift's coach while he was starring in films including A Place in the Sun and The Heiress.

Elia Kazan banished her from the set of the 1960 film Wild River after a single day of filming.

Death Rostova died at age 99 on January 28, 2009, in a Manhattan nursing home.