Clark Gable was a performer.
Clark Gable . The next year , he landed his first leading Hollywood role and over the next three decades he became a leading man in more than 60 motion pictures . Gable won an Academy Award for Best Actor for It Happened One Night ( 1934 ) , and was nominated for leading roles in Mutiny on the Bounty ( 1935 ) and for his arguably best-known role as Rhett Butler in the epic Civil War drama Gone with the Wind ( 1939 ) . Leading man or leading gentleman is an informal term for the actor who is the protagonist or plays a love interest to the leading actress in a film or play . The Misfits is a 1961 American drama film written by Arthur Miller , directed by John Huston , and starring Clark Gable , Marilyn Monroe and Montgomery Clift .