Milton was born September 15, 1934 in Pittsburg, Pennsylvania to Gertrude Osgood Milton and S.I. (Lefty) Milton. He describes his parents in an informal autobiographical essay: "Mother, a housewife, imaginative, a bit kooky, shy, a dreamer: father, ex-prize-fighter, truck driver, very smart, logical, realistic, tough." He adds "Despite the English last names on both sides of the family, I am Jewish on both sides." His father's family came from Roumania. He writes this about the origin of his father's family's being named "Milton":
My grandfather, Samuel Milton, had been orphaned at an early age; he was a roofer and a carpenter. Legend in our family had it that his father had been hung as a horse thief. The closest I've been able to come to tracing down the name "Milton" goes like this--(My Grandmother told me this shortly before she died):
She was from a town in northern Roumania, Botashon; my grandfather, whose parents were dead, was from a small village, which she pronounced "Milatin"; she said it meant "between two mountains." Over the years I tried to locate the village on maps and in atlases; I consulted Roumanian dictionaries. I was not successful in finding anything resembling "Milatin."
A few years ago, I was at a party with a Roumanian writer/director by the name of Popescu (the most popular name in Roumania, it's kind of like "Smith." I asked him why it was so prevalent and he explained to me that in the nineteenth century most Roumanians did not have last names. The Emperor decided this should be remedied and over night he christened all unnamed people after the Pope--hence "Popescu.") I told him that I was of Roumanian origin on my father's side and when I told him my name, he looked puzzled. I said it came from the village of my grandfather, "Milatin." He said, "The one in the mountains or in the valley." I was stunned at this and asked what he meant. He said there were two villages, "Militin." They were both not far from Botashon; one was on the mountain side, the other in the valley. Since my grandmother was from Botoshon and had spoken of my grandfather's village being between two mountains, I assumed he was from the "Milatin" in the valley. I asked why I could it on no map or atlas and he said the villages were both miniscule, but he, Popescue, knew them and had been there.
When my grandfather and grandmother came to this country, 1905 or thereabouts, the immigration people marked down "Milatin" as "Milton."
While in grammar school in Pittsburg, Milton decided to become a writer. In junior high he became interested in Shakespeare and other poets and memorized many poems. In high school he ushered at a theater and kept a file of index cards of his own comments of the films shown. His favorites included Susan Hayward in "My Foolish Heart" and "The Prince of Foxes" with Orson Welles. He attempted his first novel at age fifteen.
Where did this early literary interest come from? He writes of his mother:
My mother was not a literary person at all. She was not a reader. However, she did know by heart two poems, "The Face On the Barroom Floor" and another, whose name I can't recall, but was about a young lady brought before the bar of justice for stealing a loaf of bread. She would recite and act out these two poems, but only to us kids. She was very, very shy and would never perform before anyone else.
Early on--I must have been ten or eleven--she came across a book which became the beacon-light of her life; it had been a birthday gift from an uncle to me, but my mother read it and appropriated it and clasped it to her soul. It had the most profound effect on her, became her bible. She read it over and over. She was enthralled by it, loved it, became somewhat of an expert on it. It was Richard Halliburton's "Book of Marvels."
Milton's recounting of his early years is loving and nostalgic, composed of experiences that fascinated him. He was not the miserable child who became sensitive during the struggle of adjustment.
The first novel attempt, set in Paris, concerned the Eiffel Tower and was influenced by the film adaptation of a novel by Georges Simenon. At sixteen Milton wrote his first play, "Polka," about a Polish boy who drops out of school. Drama was widely publicized in the United States at the time, with Eugene O'Neill's and Tennessee Williams' works most admired. Milton was unusual to be so interested in drama writing so young. He also was athletic and played football and boxed. He was large and talented enough to consider a football career, but he injured his knee.
He also began to write short stories. He read and loved Dreiser's American Tragedy and Cather's story "Paul's Case." Upon high school graduation Milton won one of two dramatic scholarships to the Pittsburg Playhouse, the other winner being Miss Pittsburg at the time, Shirley Jones, who within two years would get the lead in the film Oklahoma.
Before the one year scholarship was completed, Milton gave it up and moved to New York where he shortly enrolled at the Neighborhood Playhouse, which he found "heavy and oppressive and reeking of seriousness." Milton stayed one year with the players. The class ahead of his enrolled Robert Duvall and the class beyond that counted Steve McQueen and Sydney Pollock. Milton's class included Tammy Grimes.
Leaving the Neighborhood Playhouse, Milton joined Stella Adler's acting classes. While Adler's student, he was accepted for the American Shakespeare Festival and acted Shakespeare for two seasons at Stratford, Connecticut. There, Milton became close friends with sixteen-year-old Peter Bogdanovitch.
One October evening, Stella Adler asked Milton to assist at a party. Milton's reminiscence depicts a fascinating opportunity to meet literary luminaries for a young writer-actor:
That fall I had an experience of really astonishing import. Stella Adler's husband, Harold Clurman, was directing a musical version of Steinbeck's "Cannery Row" on Broadway, "Sweet Thursday" I believe it was called. Stella and Clurman threw a party for John Steinbeck at their Fifth Avenue apartment. (They had this immense, antique-filled place with its own private elevator.) Stella asked if I could help with the evening by taking coats and hats. She often did this with her "pets", used them as unpaid lackeys. I was stationed in the foyer outside the elevator where there was a cloak room and as the guests arrived I would serve as the hatcheck boy.
I was, of course, awestruck by the luminaries strolling out of the elevator: Steinbeck and wife, of course; Sir Michael Redgrave, who was starring on Broadway in another Clurman-directed play, Jean Giraudoux's "Tiger at the Gates"; Leonard Bernstein; Lillian Hellman; Tennessee Williams; Christopher Isherwood. John Osborne and his wife, Mary Ure, fresh with the triumph of "Look Back In Anger." Anyone who was anyone on Broadway that year, including Diane Cliento, Albert Salmi, Mendy Wager, on and on and on.
A late arrival was William Inge. This was at the height of his fame, not long after "Picnic" had been on Broadway. He showed up alone, vaguely stooped, large watery blue eyes, a shy, depressed figure. As I took his coat, I felt that I had to say something. My originality is astonishing: "Are you writing anything now, Mr. Inge?" "I'm always writing something," he said softly.
The last to arrive and the first to leave, he stayed at the party less than half an hour. Years later, he conducted a playwriting seminar at the University of Southern California. An alcoholic and depressive, he committed suicide while living in Los Angeles. A year or so after, I took over his playwriting course at USC.
When all the guests had arrived, Stella brought me into the party. She marched up to a group that was having a high old time regaling each other with war stories of the theater: it was Tennessee Williams, Lillian Hellman, and Christopher Isherwood. Stella gave them my name and, depositing me there, moved off. I could hardly breathe. My knees literally were knocking. They were nice enough to me, quaking kid that I was, but they had stories to tell and went back to it. Williams was going on with a tale about how, when he was out of town in New Haven, during a tryout of, I believe, "The Rose Tattoo," the manager of the hotel treated him rudely and how he turned the tables on him. I don't remember the details, but it was an exquisite bit of come-uppance which had thoroughly disgraced the foolish, oafish man.
Tennessee Williams, Lillian Hellman, and Christopher Isherwood ignored me and went on with their conversation. I wandered off. I peeked into the one of the bedrooms and there was the guest of honor, John Steinbeck. He was seated on a bed, holding court. Surrounded by a gaggle of posh-looking folk, bejeweled women, tuxedoed men, he was answering questions in a deep, gruff voice. He seemed pleasant enough, but bored.
Everyone seemed uncomfortable. His audience wore forced smiles. A puffy, prissy-looking television producer by the name of Julian Clayman asked about the small ribbon Steinbeck had in his lapel. "Is that the Legion d'Honeur, Mr. Steinbeck?" he asked in pompous, plumy voice. "No, Salinas high school," Steinbeck said. "You're pulling my leg?" "No."
There was something very human and approachable about Steinbeck and I got up enough courage not only to enter the room, but to ask him a question. I asked him about the Mexican revolutionary, Emiliano Zapata and his screenplay for the film, "Viva Zapata."
The year before I had hitch-hiked to Mexico to join an expatriate theater group in a town south of Mexico City, Cuautla, in the shadow of the volcano, Mt. Popcteptl. (The volcano, 17,000 feet high, towers over central Mexico and has come into our literary consciousness through Malcolm Lowery's bleak masterpiece, "Under the Volcano.") The group, which had been an off-shoot of a Chicago group called the Compass Players, (from which emerged a few years later, Mike Nichols and Elaine May...I had gone down as a lark and the first to realize the thing was a sham...However, Cuautla was the capitol of the State of Morelos and had been the home base of Emiliano Zapata. Steinbeck had written the screenplay for the film, "Viva Zapata", which starred Marlon Brando and was directed by Elia Kazan. I had seen it when I was in high school and it had had a powerful effect on me. To this day, it is still one of my favorites, a film of ideas and passion and deep humanity. Steinbeck's screenplay is magnificent, Brando's performance as good as anything he's ever done, and Kazan's direction is superb...
I asked Steinbeck something about Zapata and the film and when he learned that I had lived in Cuautla and knew something of Zapata, he lit up and became terrifically excited. He proceeded to give me a lecture on Zapata, how he was one of the great men of all history, how he had been influenced by American democracy and Abraham Lincoln, how much of his screenplay had been taken from Zapata's own words and writings. I knew the film so well that I could recite great chunks of it and Steinbeck and I traded lines and he would tell me the origins of them and how Brando went about working on his part and how Kazan had directed the film.
While living in Mexico, I had visited Zapata's birthplace, a small village called Anenucuilco, and we talked of that. Steinbeck went on and on about Zapata, Mexico, the revolution, eventually boring those tense, deferential people who had gathered to pay homage to him. They drifted away and it was just John Steinbeck and me in the room talking about Emiliano Zapata. Harold Clurman, at some point, poked his head into the room to announce that dinner was being served. He said, "What are you two plotting? A Revolution?" I came out of the room and Steinbeck had his arm around my shoulder and he was going on and on about Mexico and Zapata and Kazan and Brando. Out of the corner of my eye I was aware of everyone at the party watching us in some astonishment, wondering who the hell I was. My teacher, Tella Adler, stood at the entrance to the dining room, stunned.
After dinner Leonard Bernstein played the piano and Sir Michael Redgrave sang and Albert Salmi played the guitar and Luther Adler, Stella's brother recited something or other, and other people did things, recited poems, sang, pulled out all of the party tricks polished for these occasions. Steinbeck and his wife prepared to leave. He was at the door (Incidentally, once all the people arrived at the party, I no longer had to take care of the hats and coats; they retrieved them form the cloak room by themselves.) when he spotted me. He weaved his way across the living room to me-he was by this time fairly well-oiled with alcohol. He leaned down and again with everyone gazing on, took time to tell me one last, convoluted story--a joke really--and then he roared with laughter and I laughed and he patted me vigorously on the shoulder and reeled off."
