Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe(born Norma Jeane Mortensen, June 1, 1926 – August 5, 1962) is arguably the twentieth-century's most famous movie star, sex symbol and pop icon. Born Norma Jeane Baker, Monroe's rise to stardom began when she was recruited to do magazine modeling while her first husband was in the Merchant Marines. She did most of her films for 20th Century Fox, where she adopted the name with which she gained superstardom. After acting in bit roles for several years, she gradually became known for her comedic skills and remarkable screen presence. She worked toward serious roles later in her career and, up to an extent, managed to realize these goals. However, constant publicity and romantic disappointments led her to personal problems. The circumstances surrounding her death have been the subject of much speculation, but have not tarnished her reputation as one of the most legendary public figures of all-time.

Early life

Although she would eventually become one of the most celebrated actors in film history, Monroe's beginnings were humble. She was born in the charity ward of the Los Angeles County Hospital. Her registered name was Norma Jeane Mortenson, but her grandmother, Della Monroe Grainger, later had her baptized Norma Jeane Baker. Most biographers believe her biological father was Charles Stanley Gifford, a salesman for the studio where Monroe's mother, Gladys Pearl Monroe Baker Eley, worked as a film-cutter. However, her birth certificate lists Norwegian Martin Edward Mortenson as her father, and in later years some biographers have leaned towards believing that is the case.

Gladys was unable to persuade Della to look after Norma Jeane, so she was placed with foster parents Albert and Ida Bolender of Hawthorne, California, southwest of Los Angeles, where she lived until she was seven years old. In her autobiography My Story, Monroe states she thought Albert and Ida were her parents until one day, rather rudely, Ida corrected her.

Again according to My Story, Gladys visited Norma Jeane every Saturday, but never smiled, hugged or kissed her. At some point, Gladys announced that she had bought a house for herself and her daughter, but a few months after they moved in, she suffered a mental breakdown. Monroe recalled Gladys "screaming and laughing" as she was forcibly removed to the State Mental Hospital in Norwalk, California, the same hospital where Gladys' mother Della had died in August 1927. Gladys' father, Otis, had also died in a mental hospital(near San Bernardino, California) as a result of syphilis.

However, it should be noted that My Story is not to be considered a trustworthy source, as it was ghost-written by the journalist Ben Hecht and designed to colour Monroe's image as a long-suffering orphan. Its factual claims have been considered suspicious.

Norma Jeane was declared a ward of state and Gladys' best friend, Grace McKee(later Goddard) became her guardian. After McKee married in 1935, Norma Jeane was sent to the Los Angeles orphanage and then to a long succession of foster homes where it is alleged she was subjected to abuse and neglect. There is little evidence, however, that she lived in as many foster homes as claimed. Moreover, Monroe herself is known to have given exaggerated information about her childhood during interviews.

In September 1941, Norma Jeane was reunited with her mother. The Goddard family, however, were moving to the East Coast and felt it would be best if 15-year old Norma Jeane were to marry, as otherwise she would have had to return to the orphanage. She had been introduced to a neighbor's son, James Dougherty, who would become her first husband.

Career

Early years

While her husband was away fighting in World War II, the young Mrs. Norma Jeane Dougherty began work in a factory spraying airplane parts with fire retardant. A young army photographer, David Conover, scouted local factories taking photos for a YANK magazine article about women contributing to the war effort. He immediately saw her potential as a model and she was soon signed by The Blue Book modelling agency. She became one of their most successful models, appearing on hundreds of magazine covers. In 1946 she came to the attention of talent scout Ben Lyon. He arranged a screen test for her with 20th Century Fox. She passed and was offered a standard six-month contract with a starting salary of $75 per week, the high end of industry standard. She was given the name Marilyn after the actress Marilyn Miller and suggested her mother's maiden name Monroe as her surname. Thus the twenty-year old Norma Jeane Baker became "Marilyn Monroe".

During her first six months at 20th Century Fox, Monroe was given no acting work. Instead, she learned about hair, make-up, costumes, acting and lighting. After six months Fox decided to renew her contract and in the following six months she was given very minor roles in two movies, Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hay! and Dangerous Years, both released in 1947. Both films failed at the box office and Fox decided not to renew her contract again. Monroe returned to modelling and began to network and make contacts in Hollywood.

In 1948, a six-month stint at Columbia Pictures saw her star in one movie, Ladies of the Chorus, but the low-budget musical was not a success and Monroe was dropped. She then met one of Hollywood's top agents, Johnny Hyde, who had Fox re-sign her after MGM had turned her down. Fox Vice-President Darryl F. Zanuck was not convinced of Monroe's star potential. However, due to Hyde's persistence, she gained supporting parts in All About Eve and The Asphalt Jungle. Even though these two roles were minor, movie-goers took notice and Monroe began receiving more fan mail than some top-billed movie stars of the time.

Monroe played her first role as a leading lady(excluding Ladies of the Chorus) in 1952's Don't Bother To Knock, portraying a deranged babysitter who, in a rage, attacks the little girl in her care. Although it received mixed reviews, Monroe later claimed it to be one of her favorite performances. Her turn in the film has later been acknowledged as one of the strongest of her career by many critics.

Stardom

Although American critics were, at first, unwilling to admit Monroe's abilities as a dramatic actress, they were left in no doubt about her sex appeal. Monroe was now carrying a big-budget thriller, Niagara, in 1953. Movie critics virtually forgot about the sinister plot and focused solely on Monroe and her connection with the camera. Niagara helped Monroe become an overnight sensation. Her turn as the unbalanced easy virtue, Rose Loomis, who is planning to murder her equally neurotic husband, led movie critics to claim Monroe would have been the perfect leading lady in an Alfred Hitchcock film.

It was around this time that nude photos of Monroe began to surface, taken by photographer Tom Kelley when she had been struggling for work. Prints were bought by Hugh Hefner and in December 1953 appeared in the first edition of his new magazine, Playboy. Even though Fox was worried that it might lead to a career-damaging controversy, Monroe decided to publicly admit it was indeed her posing in the pictures. To a journalist asking what she had on during the photoshoot, she replied: "The radio." When asked what she wore in bed, she said: "Chanel No. 5." Later on, both have become iconic one-liners.

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and How to Marry a Millionaire, both released in 1953, cemented Monroe's status as an A-list screen actress and she quickly became arguably the world's biggest movie star.

Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, was a camp musical exceptionally daring for its times, and today, it is regarded one of the best comedies of all-time by many critics. Monroe's self-ironic turn as the gold-digging showgirl Lorelei Lee is generally considered to be one of her most alluring on-screen efforts. Her rendition of "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" is among the best-known scenes in Monroe's career.

In How to Marry a Millionaire, Monroe was teamed up with two other major 20th Century Fox attractions, Lauren Bacall and Betty Grable. She played a short-sighted dumb blonde named Pola Debevoise and managed to shine even among her charismatic co-stars. Even though the role was in many ways a stereotype, Monroe garnered favorable reviews, and critics took note of her comedic timing. In the United States, she was considered a shallow sex symbol, whereas in Europe, she was already getting recognition for her acting skills, up to the extent that she was compared to Charles Chaplin.

Her next two films, the western River of No Return and the musical There's No Business Like Show Business, were not successful, partly due to the fact that Monroe wasn't given much to work with. Monroe, ambitious as ever and striving to face challenges, got tired of the roles that Zanuck assigned her. After completing work on The Seven Year Itch in early 1955, she broke her contract and fled Hollywood to study acting at The Actors Studio in New York. Fox would not accede on her new contract demands and insisted she return to start work on productions she considered inappropriate, such as Heller In Pink Tights(which was never filmed), The Girl in the Red Velvet Swing, and How To Be Very, Very Popular.

Monroe refused to appear in these films and stayed in New York. As The Seven Year Itch raced to the top of the box office in the summer of 1955, with other Fox starlets Jayne Mansfield and Sheree North failing to click with audience, Zanuck admitted defeat and Monroe triumphantly returned to Hollywood. A new contract was drawn up, giving Monroe complete directorial approval as well as the option to act in other studios' projects.

The first film to be made under the contract was Bus Stop, directed by Joshua Logan. Critics immediately took note of Monroe's profound approach on the character she played. Generally praised for her performance as Cherie, a saloon bar singer who falls in love with a cowboy, Monroe deliberately appeared badly made-up and non-glamorous. A lot of people believe she should have been nominated for an Academy Award. Generally, it is believed that Monroe wasn't nominated because of her controversial reputation. She did, however, get a Golden Globe nod.

Practically unheard of at the time, Monroe was the first woman to form her own production company with friend and photographer Milton H. Greene. Marilyn Monroe Productions released its first film The Prince and the Showgirl in 1957 to mixed reviews. Along with executive-producing the film, she starred opposite the acclaimed British actor Laurence Olivier, who directed it. Unfortunately, the chemistry between the two was lacking and Monroe's reputation in the film industry for being difficult only grew. Monroe's performance as songstress Elsie Marina, however, was hailed as a first-rate characterization by the critics of the time, especially in Europe, where she was handed the David di Donatello, the Italian equivalent of the Academy Award, as well as the French Crystal Star Award. Furthermore, Monroe got nominated for the much valued BAFTA award.

Later years

In 1959 she scored the biggest hit of her career starring alongside Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon in Billy Wilder's comedy Some Like It Hot. Her difficult behavior on the set is now legendary, as well as her numerous retakes. However, when the shooting was over with, Wilder stated that he would have been willing to go through the hard times with Monroe any time again, hailing her a first-rate comedienne. Some Like It Hot is now consistently rated as one of the best comedy films ever made. Monroe's performance as the promiscuous, constantly drinking but compassionate singer Sugar Kane was awarded with a Golden Globe for best actress in musical or comedy.

After Some Like It Hot, Monroe did a musical named Let's Make Love directed by George Cukor and co-starring Yves Montand. Monroe, Montand and Cukor all considered the script subpar, yet Monroe was forced to make the film because of her obligations to Twentieth Century Fox. While the film was not a commercial or critical success, it included one of Monroe's legendary musical numbers, Cole Porter's "My Heart Belongs to Daddy".

By 1961, Monroe's third husband, the playwright Arthur Miller, had written and worked on what became her and her co-star Clark Gable's last completed film, The Misfits. It was a long and exhausting shoot in the middle of the hot Nevada desert. Monroe's tardiness became chronic and the shoot was troublesome all the way through. Despite all this, Monroe, Gable and Montgomery Clift were able to deliver performances that are now considered excellent, even iconic. Monroe became friends with Clift, whom she felt a deep connection with. Gable died of a heart attack soon after, and some blamed this on Monroe, claiming she had given him a hard time on the set. Gable had, however, insisted on doing his own stunts and was a heavy smoker and drinker, and the general consensus was that he simply got physically exhausted. Monroe did attend his funeral.

Monroe returned to Hollywood to resume filming on an already troubled picture, Something's Got to Give. In May 1962, Monroe made her last significant public appearance, singing Happy Birthday, Mr. President at a televised birthday party for President John F. Kennedy. After shooting what was claimed to have been the first ever nude scene by a major motion picture actress, Monroe's attendance became even more erratic due to illness.

Already in a financial strain due to production costs of Cleopatra, starring Elizabeth Taylor, Fox used Monroe's absences as an excuse to drop Monroe from the film, sue her, and then replace her with Lee Remick. However, a clause in co-star Dean Martin's contract gave him approval over the film's leading lady. As he was unwilling to work with anyone else, Monroe was rehired for double her original salary.

Monroe conducted a lengthy interview with Life Magazine, in which she expressed how bitter she was about Hollywood labeling her as a dumb blonde and how much she loved her audience. She also did a photo shoot for Vogue, and began discussing a future film project with Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra. She was also planning to star in a biopic as Jean Harlow. Other projects being considered for her were What a Way to Go! and The Stripper.

Before the shooting of Something's Got to Give resumed, however, Monroe was found dead in her Los Angeles home, on the morning of August 5, 1962. Her death, officially ruled to be a probable suicide by drug overdose, has since been found to contain instances of unprofessional handling of the investigation. It has become the subject of conspiracy theories, but these have done little to dent her iconic status as the archetypal sex symbol and movie star.

Marriages

James Dougherty

Age sixteen, Monroe married James Dougherty on June 19, 1942. In his books The Secret Happiness of Marilyn Monroe and To Norma Jeane With Love, Jimmie, Dougherty claimed they were in love and would have lived happily ever after had dreams of stardom not lured her away. Monroe, however, always maintained theirs was a marriage of convenience. Marilyn divorced Dougherty on September 13, 1946.

In the 2004 documentary Marilyn's Man, Dougherty made three significant claims: he invented the "Marilyn Monroe" persona; Fox forced her to divorce him; and she always yearned to return to him. There is no evidence to support these claims, nor that they remained in touch(she was an unknown in 1946, so his claim Fox "forced" a divorce is unlikely.) She was reportedly furious when he gave an interview to Photoplay in 1953, claiming that she threatened to jump off the Santa Monica Pier if he ever left her. He later appeared as a contestant on To Tell the Truth as "Marilyn Monroe's real first husband".

Dougherty's own actions did not support his claims of being Monroe's Svengali or her true love. He remarried only a few months after their divorce. When informed of her death, the New York Times reported he simply said "I'm sorry" and continued his LAPD patrol; he did not attend her funeral. In an interview for the A&E Network, he admitted that his mother had been approached by Grace Goddard and asked him if he'd be willing to marry Norma Jeane to prevent her from being sent to an orphanage.

Dougherty remained married to his third wife until her death in 2003. He lived in Maine until his death from complications due to leukemia on August 15, 2005.

Joe DiMaggio

In 1951 baseball star Joe DiMaggio saw a picture of Monroe with two Chicago White Sox players, but waited until his retirement before asking the man who arranged the picture to set up a date. Monroe did not want to meet him, fearing a stereotypical jock, but after a two-year courtship they eloped and married at San Francisco's City Hall on January 14, 1954. During the honeymoon, she was asked to visit Korea to entertain the troops. She performed ten shows over four days in freezing temperatures. Her audience consisted of more than 100,000 soldiers and marines. Reportedly, Joe was not pleased with his wife's decision during what he wanted to be an intimate honeymoon. Monroe biographer Fred Guiles speculated that Joe, knowing first-hand the power and hollowness of fame, wanted desperately to head off what he was convinced was Marilyn's "collison-course with disaster."

DiMaggio biographer Maury Allen quoted New York Mets PR man Arthur Richman that DiMaggio told him everything went wrong from the trip to Japan on. Although Marilyn said she wanted to settle down, she was intent on continuing her career. Friends claimed that DiMaggio became possessive and controlling as Monroe grew increasingly defiant of his wishes. After filming the notorious skirt-blowing scene in The Seven Year Itch, Billy Wilder recalled the "look of death" on DiMaggio's face as he watched with fans and extras. Co-star Tom Ewell told the Louisville Courier-Journal decades later that Wilder set the whole scenario up, and had a fan placed under the subway grate that would blow her dress over her head. DiMaggio biographer Richard Ben Cramer claims that Joe was so "disgusted" by Marilyn's "sloppiness" he began to abuse her. Her makeup man, Allan "Whitey" Snyder, recalled that Marilyn later appeared on set with bruises on her upper arms. On October 27, 274 days after the wedding, she filed for divorce on grounds of mental cruelty.

Soon after her divorce from Arthur Miller, Monroe returned to her self-destructive ways, falling in with people DiMaggio felt detrimental to her(including Frank Sinatra and his "Rat Pack"). The state of her physical and mental health became widely speculated upon by gossip columnists. Monroe's psychiatrist arranged for her to be admitted to the Payne Whitney Psychiatric Clinic. Unable to voluntarily check herself out, she called DiMaggio. On February 10, 1961, he secured her release(she was reportedly placed in the ward for the most seriously disturbed). She later joined him in Florida. Their "just good friends" claims did not stop rumors of remarriage. At the 1960 Academy Awards telecast, Bob Hope jokingly dedicated Best Song nominee The Second Time Around to them. According to Maury Allen, on August 1, 1962 DiMaggio quit his job with a military post exchange(PX) to return to California and ask her to remarry him.

For twenty years, DiMaggio had a dozen red roses delivered to Monroe's crypt three times a week. Unlike her other two husbands, or the men who claimed to have known her intimately, he never talked about her publicly or "cashed in" on the relationship. He never remarried. He died on March 8, 1999, of lung cancer.

On January 23, 2006 it was announced that DiMaggio's granddaughters will have his personal items auctioned in May, among them, a photo Marilyn inscribed to him: "I love you Joe."

Arthur Miller

On June 29, 1956, Monroe married playwright Arthur Miller, whom she had first met in 1951, in a civil ceremony. A Jewish ceremony followed two days later(she had converted to Judaism.) After she finished shooting The Prince and the Showgirl, the couple returned to the States from England and discovered she was pregnant. However, she suffered from endometriosis and the pregnancy was found to be ectopic; it was aborted to save her life. A subsequent pregnancy ended in miscarriage.

By 1958, she was the couple's main breadwinner. Not only did she pay alimony to Miller's first wife but he reportedly charged her production company for buying and shipping a Jaguar to the United States. His The Misfits was meant to be a Valentine gift, but by the time filming started in 1960 their marriage was broken beyond repair. A Mexican divorce was granted on January 24, 1961. On February 17, 1962, Miller married Austrian-born Inge Morath, one of the Magnum photographers recording the making of The Misfits.

In January 1964, Miller's After the Fall opened, featuring a beautiful, child-like, yet devouring shrew named Maggie. The similarities between Maggie and Monroe did not go unnoticed by audiences and critics, many of whom sympathized that she could not defend herself to such a portrayal. His last Broadway-bound work, Finishing the Picture, was based on the making of The Misfits and again painted a similar portrait. In interviews, he described her as "highly self-destructive." He told Vanity Fair (magazine) what "killed" her was not some conspiracy, but that she was Marilyn Monroe. In his 1987 autobiography, Miller elaborated on her and their marriage while defending his actions. He died on February 10, 2005, at the age of 89.

Death and aftermath

Monroe was found dead in the bedroom of her Brentwood, California home by her live-in housekeeper Mrs. Eunice Murray. She was thirty-six. Her death was apparently caused by an overdose of barbiturates, although as with the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, several theories have sprung up around the circumstances.

Most try to make a case for murder due to her connection with the Kennedy family and the sometimes strange and unprofessional relationships between Monroe and her psychiatrist Dr. Ralph Greenson; the housekeeper he hired for Monroe, Mrs. Murray; and her personal publicist Pat Newcomb, who was hired by the Kennedys immediately following Monroe's death. Suspicion also arises due to the fact that up to four hours passed between the discovery of her body, and the phone call to the Los Angeles Police Department. Jack Clemmons, the first officer on the scene claimed that when he entered the home, Mrs. Murray was doing laundry, Monroe's room was very tidy as though it had been cleaned prior to his arrival, and her body looked posed, "she was face down, her arms at her side, like a soldier at attention, a phone under her torso." Clemmons noted that Dr. Greenson kept pointing to rows of pill bottles lined up neatly on her nightstand and saying as if rehearsed, "She must have taken all of these." Simmons noticed that no typical signs of drug overdose were present, namely foaming of the mouth and twisting of the body due to convulsions. The police report mentioned a broken bedroom window and glass on the floor, to which Murray claimed that was the only access to the locked room. Also suspicious, lividity (settling of blood)in various parts of the body suggested that the body had been moved as well. Those who spoke with her in the days prior to her death would describe an upbeat, optimistic Marilyn.

Conspiracy theories aside, it must be noted that the other women whom Kennedy was allegedly involved with, including Angie Dickinson and Judith Campbell Exner, survived him. Through her relationship with Sam Giancana, Exner seriously compromised both Kennedy and the Presidency itself, yet she told People magazine that, the FBI quit its survilence on her - and left her alone - once it was apparent that their affair was over.

DiMaggio claimed Marilyn's body and planned her funeral. He excluded all he deemed morally responsible for her death. Whitey Snyder prepared her face for her last appearance, a promise he had made her if she were to go before him. She was put in her favorite green Emilio Pucci dress and held a small boquet of pink teacup roses. The service was held at the Westwood Memorial Park Chapel in Hollywood, and only 30 people were in attendance. Marilyn's acting coach, Lee Strasberg, delivered her eulogy, and Judy Garland's "Over the Rainbow" played.

Monroe was interred in a pink marble crypt at the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery, Los Angeles. This is the cemetery where her foster mother Grace Goddard's aunt was buried and where Monroe in turn had arranged for Goddard to be buried.

Marilyn's mother had been diagnosed as a schizophrenic and between periods in mental hospitals had married her last husband, John Stewart Eley. He died in 1952. In the early 1970s she walked out of a sanitorium and flew to Florida, where her daughter, Berniece, met her at the airport. She died on March 11, 1984 at a Florida nursing home, refusing to the end to discuss either Norma Jeane or Marilyn Monroe.

Currently,(as of 2006) Berniece and her daughter Mona Rae reside in Florida. In 1994, they published a book about her relationship with Monroe, titled My Sister Marilyn.

A formal reinvestigation in 1982 by the Los Angeles County District Attorney uncovered no evidence of foul play, but concluded that the original investigation into her death had not been conducted properly. The officers that arrived at her home had failed to secure the scene, people freely came and went, possibly contaminating or destroying evidence. The reinvestigation also revealed that all lab work, tissue samples, and test results from the autopsy disappeared from the County Cornoner's Office immediately after the official ruling had been made public. Coroner Dr. Thomas Noguchi, who conducted the autopsy, claims that misplacement of samples has never happened in another case before or since. The report also suggests that Monroe's body may have been moved after death as lividity had sat in different parts of her body at different times. In his memoir Coroner, he also states that it was "highly likely" that Monroe's death was suicide. He concedes, however, that no trace of the barbiturates Monroe purportedly took were found in her mouth, stomach or intestines. This has led some theorists to suggest that Monroe had been rendered unconscious(for instance via chloral hydrate) and the overdose administered by intravenous injection, or, more likely, by rectal suppository.

On August 5, 2005 the Los Angeles Times published an account of Monroe's death by former Los Angeles County prosecutor John W. Miner, who was present at the autopsy. Miner claims that she was not suicidal, and offered as proof his notes on tapes she supposedly recorded for Greenson and Greenson played for him. Greenson's widow told the Times that her husband never mentioned any such tapes, which, if they ever existed, have been lost or destroyed, so there is no way to verify Miner's story.

Trivia

• Haugesund, Norway, birthplace of Martin Edward Mortenson, has a lifesize statue of Marilyn.
• Childhood pictures show that Marilyn was a blonde, but her hair turned "mousy" as she grew up. She dyed her hair several different shades of blonde as an adult.
• Monroe fans: Albert Einstein, Ayn Rand, Jean-Paul Sartre, Edith Sitwell and Vladimir Nabokov.
• Colin Farrell admitted that as a child he would put sweets under his pillow for Monroe in case she visited him from heaven.
• When Rainier III of Monaco was looking for a famous wife, Monroe was suggested. However, since she wasn't Catholic, she could not be considered.
• Marian McKnight won the 1957 Miss America crown with a Marilyn act
• The "subway grate" scene in The Seven Year Itch has been aped in countless shows, commercials, products, and ads, and by everyone from Anna Kournikova to Absolut vodka to Betty Boop and the Statue of Liberty.
• A computer-generated Monroe is featured in The Sims: Superstar
• Monroe's features are copyrighted to her estate and are not allowed to be reproduced exactly.
• Monroe had a mild stutter, which was most severe during her teens. She commented in an interview, "I stuttered... Later on, in my teens, when I was at Van Nuys High School, they elected me secretary of the English class and every time I had to read the minutes I'd say, 'Minutes of the last m-m-m-meeting.' It was terrible." [1]
• Her first screen test was shot by cinematographer Leon Shamroy.
• Hugh Hefner bought a crypt next to Monroe's for $85,000. The other crypt next to hers was sold for $125,000. There are no empty spots available near Monroe.
• The myth that Monroe was born with eleven toes resulted from photos in The Birth of Marilyn by Joseph Jasgur in March 1946. The story is dismissed as an urban legend. [2]
• Miss Artichoke of 1948.
• The "subway grate" scene in The Seven Year Itch was reshot at Fox, since the crowds proved too distracting.
• Billy Wilder said Monroe had breasts like granite and a brain like Swiss cheese. However, Wilder also said she was a genius.
• A roommate of Shelley Winters.
• Talked a club owner into booking Ella Fitzgerald: "I owe Marilyn Monroe a real debt. It was because of her that I played the Mocambo, a very popular night-club in the 50’s. She personally called the owner of the Mocambo, and told him she wanted me booked immediately, and if he would do it, she would take a front table every night. She told him – and it was true, due to Marilyn’s superstar status – that the press would go wild. The owner said yes, and Marilyn was there, front table, every night. The press went overboard… After that, I never had to play a small jazz club again." [3]
• Said to be quite intelligent, although it was hidden behind her image. She wrote poems, enjoyed literature and always regretted never continuing high school.
• George Barris claims he took the last pictures of Monroe. However, it was Allan Grant who took the last pictures of Monroe, during an interview for Life magazine on July 7, 1962.
• Among the men Monroe allegedly had affairs with were: President John F. Kennedy, Frank Sinatra, Marlon Brando, and Yves Montand. In 2005 it was claimed she had a one-night stand with Joan Crawford.
• Frank Sinatra gave her a Maltese puppy that she named "Maf Honey". "Maf" was supposedly short for "Mafia".
• The beauty mark above her lip was genuine. It was a very pale mole that she darkened with makeup. [4]
• Truman Capote wanted her to play Holly Golightly in the film adaptation of his Breakfast At Tiffany's.
• Voted "Sexiest Woman of the Century" by People magazine in 1999.
• Pirportedly shaved a quarter of an inch off many of her right high-heeled shoes to accentuate the wiggle in her walk.
• The diamonds she wore as she performed Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend were rhinestones.
• The gown Monroe wore to sing happy birthday to John F. Kennedy sold in 1999 for over $1,500,000.
• Marilyn is the first stamp of the USPS's "Legends of Hollywood" series

Film	Year	Salary
Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hay!	1948	$75/week
The Asphalt Jungle	1950	$1,050
All About Eve	1950	$500/week, with one-week guarantee
We're Not Married!	1952	$750/week
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes	1953	$1,250/week
The Seven Year Itch	1955	$1,500/week
Some Like It Hot	1959	$200,000 plus 10% gross over $4 million
The Misfits	1961	$250,000
Something's Got to Give	1962	$100,000

Filmography

• Dangerous Years(1947)
• Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hay!(1948)
• Ladies of the Chorus (1948)
• Love Happy(1949)
• A Ticket to Tomahawk (1950)
• The Asphalt Jungle (1950)
• The Fireball(1950)
• All About Eve (1950)
• Right Cross(1950)
• Home Town Story(1951)
• As Young as You Feel (1951)
• Love Nest(1951)
• Let's Make It Legal(1951)
• Clash by Night (1952)
• We're Not Married!(1952)
• Don't Bother to Knock (1952)
• Monkey Business (1952)
• O. Henry's Full House (1952)
• Niagara (1953)
• Gentlemen Prefer Blondes(1953)
• How to Marry a Millionaire(1953)
• River of No Return (1954)
• There's No Business Like Show Business(1954)
• The Seven Year Itch (1955)
• Bus Stop (1956)
• The Prince and the Showgirl(1957)
• Some Like It Hot (1959)
• Let's Make Love(1960)
• The Misfits (1961)
• Something's Got to Give(1962) (unfinished)

Awards and nominations

• 1952 Photoplay Award: Special Award
• 1953 Photoplay Award: Most Popular Female Star
• 1954 Golden Globe, World Film Favorite: Female
• 1956 BAFTA Film Award nomination: Best Foreign Actress(for The Seven Year Itch)
• 1956 Golden Globe nomination: Best Motion Picture Actress in Comedy or Musical(for Bus Stop)
• 1958 BAFTA Film Award nomination: Best Foreign Actress(for The Prince and the Showgirl)
• 1958 David di Donatello Award(Italian): Golden Plate(for The Prince and the Showgirl)
• 1959 Crystal Star Award(French): Best Foreign Actress(for The Prince and the Showgirl)
• 1960 Golden Globe, Best Motion Picture Actress in Comedy or Musical(for Some Like It Hot)
• 1962 Golden Globe, World Film Favorite: Female

Monroe has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame at 6104 Hollywood Blvd.

Marilyn in popular culture

• "Photograph" from Pyromania by Def Leppard is an homage to Marilyn; she is "featured" in its video 1983.
• Elton John's Candle in the Wind was about Marilyn; he revised the lyrics for the funeral of Diana, Princess of Wales.
• In Kool and the Gang's video "Fresh," Marilyn "plays" the Fairy Godmother.
• The video for Madonna's Material Girl is a copy of Monroe's Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend from Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Marilyn and Joe DiMaggio are referenced in her song "Vogue"
• Michael Monroe of the Finnish glam rock band Hanoi Rocks, based his stage name on Monroe. He also wanted to name his band's first album Some Like It Hot.
• The Misfits took their moniker from The Misfits.
• Glenn Danzig wrote and recorded Who Killed Marilyn? which was released on August 5, 1981. The Misfits also covered it.
• Marilyn and Joe DiMaggio are referenced in Tori Amos's "Father Lucifer"
• Mentioned in the Spice Girls's "Lady is a Vamp"(Norma Jeane had a Seven Year Itch)
• Sonic Youth's "Sugar Kane", named after her character in Some Like It Hot.
• Kerry Katona played Marilyn in the Stars In Their Eyes 2002 Celebrity Christmas Special
• Marilyn Manson took his first name as an homage to her.
• In the video Cool, Gwen Stefani is made-up as Monroe.
• The video for Nelly's Tilt Ya Head Back had Christina Aguilera dressed like Monroe in Some Like It Hot.
• The 1985 single Some Like It Hot by The Power Station took its title from Some Like It Hot.
• Mariah Carey bought Monroe's white baby grand piano - which had originally belonged to her mother at Christie's 1999 auction for $663,000. Carey also pays homage to Monroe in the videos of "I Still Believe" (1999) and "Don't Forget About Us" (2005).
• Her likeness appears on The Beatles LP Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band

Films

• Pulp Fiction (A Monroe look-a-like is a waitress in a 50's themed restaurant)
• Fade to Black (A disturbed young man with a Marilyn obsession stalks a girl who looks like her)
• Don't Tell Mom the Babysitter's Dead(1991) (A Monroe drag queen steals a car)
• Holy Matrimony (Patricia Arquette's character impersonates Monroe in her act)
• Cool World(Kim Basinger's character is partially based on Monroe)
• Wonder Boys(Richard Thomas's character is obsessed by Marilyn and DiMaggio's marriage)
• Bordello of Blood (Vampire seductress takes the form of Monroe)
• Finding Graceland(A Monroe impersonator meets a man who believes he is Elvis)
• Town and Country (Jenna Elfman dresses as Marilyn)
• White Palace(Susan Sarandon's character is a Marilyn fan)
• The Woman in Red (Kelly LeBrock's skirt is blowing, similarly to Marilyn's infamous scene from The Seven Year Itch)

Portrayed in:

• Death Becomes Her
• Goodbye, Norma Jean(1976)
• Goodnight, Sweet Marilyn(1989)
• Calendar Girl
• The Island 1998 (Sally Kirkland)
• Just a Dream(2002)
• L.A. Confidential
• Mister Lonely 2006 (Samantha Morton)
• With Honors

Based on her:

• Paddy Chayefsky's The Goddess(1958) played by Kim Stanley

Television

• I Love Lucy episode "Ricky's Movie Offer," Lucy glams up as Marilyn.
• The November 19, 1952 and January 12, 1954 The Name's the Same had a contestant whose real name was Marilyn Monroe. June 22, 1954 guest Van Johnson's "secret wish" was for her to sit on his lap; August 31, 1954 guest Charles Coburn's "secret wish" was to dance the rumba with her again as he did in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.
• Edie Adams impersonated Marilyn on The Ernie Kovacs Show
• Buddy Hackett signed in as Marilyn on the August 21, 1960 What's My Line?
• Lizzie McGuire and Miranda watch Some Like It Hot at their cinema club(season 2)
• Married... With Children episode "It's a Bundyful Life" Al asks his gaurdian angel (Sam Kinison) if Marilyn is laughing at him because he gave in to Peg's demand he toss out his Playboys: "She doesn't even know you exist!"
• In The Simpsons:
  • "Beyond Blunderdome" Mel Gibson coos "Happy Birthday, Mr. President" to a studio honcho;
  • "A Fish Called Selma" Homer imagines Selma as Marilyn;
  • "Homer's Phobia" John Waters has a poster of Marilyn from The Seven Year Itch;
  • "Home Away From Homer" Ned emulates the "subway grate" scene;
  • "The World's Greatest Jacket" in "The Homer They Fall" has Marilyn on it;
  • "Rosebud" Smithers dreams of Burns cooing "Happy Birthday, Mr. Smithers," and a photo slide of Burns shows him emulating the "subway grate" scene;
  • "Thirty Minutes Over Tokyo" Marilyn is a robot in Americatown;
  • The senior Professor Frink was a "he-man" who worked on the atom bomb by day, slept with Marilyn by night, and sold secrets to the Russians at lunch.
  • Marvin Monroe's "birth" name was Marilyn.

Portrayed in:

• "This Year's Blonde" 1980 NBC miniseries Moviola (Constance Forslund)
• Marilyn: The Untold Story 1980 ABC (Catherine Hicks)
• Norma Jean & Marilyn 1996, HBO
• Curb Your Enthusiasm episode "The End"
• Dark Skies episode "The Warren Omission"
• Growing Pains episode "Happy Halloween: Part 2"
• Quantum Leap episode "Goodbye Norma Jean: April 4, 1960"
• Red Dwarf episodes "Better Than Life" and "Meltdown"
• The Rat Pack
• Jackie, Ethel, Joan: The Women of Camelot 2001 NBC miniseries
• A Woman Named Jackie 1991 NBC miniseries
• Hoover vs. the Kennedys: The Second Civil War 1987 (Heather Thomas)
• Introducing Dorothy Dandridge
• Marilyn and Me 1991 ABC a man claimed he secretly married Monroe in 1952
• Marilyn & Bobby: Her Final Affair 1993 USA imagines a tryst between Marilyn and Robert F. Kennedy(Melody Anderson)
• Richard Belzer: Another Lone Nut 1997
• Blonde 2001 CBS miniseries (Poppy Montgomery)
• James Dean 2001 Showtime

Based on her:

• The Sex Symbol 1974 ABC movie with Connie Stevens and Shelley Winters, based on The Symbol by Alvah Bessie
• Ghost Writer 1989 with Audrey Landers and Judy Landers

Art/Photography

• Willem de Kooning's Marilyn Monroe 1954
• Andy Warhol's Marilyn Diptych 1962; versions in pink, gold and blue released as Marilyn Monroe 1964
• Faith Ringgold's Marilyn Monroe 1997
• The book Marilyn in Art by Roger Taylor 2006 is a compliation of works in various mediums
• Eve Arnold, Jock Carroll, Andre de Dienes, Milton Greene, and Bert Stern published books of their photos. She sat for Richard Avedon, Cecil Beaton, Henri Cartier-Bresson, Alfred Eisenstaedt, Elliott Erwitt, Philippe Halsman, Harold Lloyd, and Gordon Parks, among others.
• Anna Nicole Smith rented the home Monroe died in, and has posed as her for various shoots, most notably for PETA.
• Marie Claire(September 2002) of Marilyn visiting the troops in Korea in a bomber jacket: she "made even military-issue jackets sexy."
• American Photo devoted its May/June 1996 issue to Marilyn

Stage

• The 1964 play After the Fall and the 2004 play Finishing the Picture by Arthur Miller.
• In The Who's Tommy, Marilyn is a saintly figure.
• The 1982 play Insignificance by Terry Johnson; filmed by Nicolas Roeg.
• The 1983 Broadway musical Marilyn!
• Operetta Marilyn by her friend, Norman Rosten.
• The 1986 Norman Mailer play "Strawhead" starred his daughter, Kate.
• The 1995 rock opera America The Beautiful by Rob Volpintesta.

Books

According to amazon.com, there are over 600 books on Marilyn; the folllowing are fictional takes:

• Blonde by Joyce Carol Oates.
• Candle in the Wind by George Bernau.
• Marilyn's Daughter by John Rechy.
• Of Women and Their Elegance by Norman Mailer.
• Queen of Desire by Sam Toperoff.
• The Symbol by Alvah Bessie. 

Further reading

• Victor, Adam(1999). The Complete Marilyn Monroe, Thames and Hudson Ltd. ISBN 0500019789. An exhaustive and thorough A–Z look at Monroe's life.
• Wolfe, Donald H.(1988). The Last Days of Marilyn Monroe, William Morrow & Company. ISBN 0688162886. Argues for Kennedy connection to Monroe's death.
• Smith, Matthew(2004). Marilyn's Last Words: Her Secret Tapes and Mysterious Death, Carroll & Graf Publishers. ISBN 0786713801. Contains alleged transcripts of Monroe's therapy sessions.
• Giancana, Sam, and Giancana, Chuck(1993). Double Cross: The Explosive Inside Story of the Mobster Who Controlled America, Warner Books. ISBN 0446364126. Mobster Sam Giancana's nephew and brother claim that Giancana had Monroe killed(pp.434–438).
• Mailer, Norman(1973). Marilyn, a Biography, Grosset & Dunlap. ISBN 0448010291. Norman Mailer's biography of Marilyn is illustrated with hundreds of photographs.