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Marilyn
Monroe
Profiles
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Her
premature death was classified as a probable suicide.
Conspiracy theorists speculate that she was murdered.
She is #9 on the Forbes top earning dead celebrities
list.
Early
years
While
her husband was in the Merchant Marine during
World War II, Norma Jeane Dougherty moved in with
her mother-in-law where she started working in
the Radioplane Company factory owned by Hollywood
actor Reginald Denny. Her job required spraying
airplane parts with fire retardant and inspecting
parachutes. Army photographer David Conover was
scouting local factories, taking photos for a
YANK magazine article about women contributing
to the war effort. He saw her potential as a model,
and she was soon signed by The Blue Book modeling
agency. Shortly after signing with the agency,
Monroe had her hair cut, straightened, and lightened
to golden blonde. She soon began researching actresses,
enrolling in drama classes, and singing classes.
She
became one of Blue Book's most successful models,
appearing on dozens 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 was offered a standard six-month
contract with a starting salary of $125 per week.
Lyon
suggested she adopt Marilyn (after the famous
actress Marilyn Miller) as her stage name, since
Norma Jeane was not considered commercial enough.
For her last name, she took her mother's maiden
name. Thus, the 20-year-old Norma Jeane Baker
became Marilyn Monroe. During her first six months
at Fox, Monroe was given no work, but Fox renewed
her contract and she was given minor appearances
in Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hay! and Dangerous Years,
both released in 1947. [20]In Scudda Hoo!, her
part was edited out of the film except for a quick
glimpse of her face when she speaks two words.
Fox decided not to renew her contract again. Monroe
returned to modelling and began to network and
make contacts in Hollywood. During this time is
when she posed for nude photographs which would
later be featured in the first issue of Playboy.
In
1948, during a six-month stint at Columbia Pictures,
she starred in Ladies of the Chorus. However the
low-budget musical was not a success and Monroe
was dropped yet again. She then met one of Hollywood's
top agents, Johnny Hyde, who had Fox re-sign her
after MGM turned her down. Darryl F. Zanuck, the
vice-president of Fox, was not convinced of Monroe's
potential, but because of Hyde's persistence,
she gained supporting parts in the Marx Brothers
film Love Happy (1949), and in Fox's All About
Eve and MGM's The Asphalt Jungle (both 1950).
Even though the roles were small, moviegoers as
well as critics took notice. Hyde also arranged
for her to have minor plastic surgery on her nose
and chin, adding that to earlier dental surgery.
The
next two years were filled with inconsequential
roles in standard fare such as We're Not Married!
and Love Nest. However, RKO executives used her
to boost box office potential of the Fritz Lang
production Clash by Night. After the film performed
well, Fox employed a similar tactic, and she was
cast as the ditzy receptionist with Cary Grant
and Ginger Rogers in Howard Hawks's slapstick
comedy Monkey Business. Critics no longer ignored
her, and both films' success at the box office
was partly attributed to Monroe's growing popularity.
Fox
finally gave her a starring role in 1952 with
Don't Bother to Knock, in which she portrayed
a deranged babysitter who attacks the little girl
in her care. It was a cheaply made B-movie, and
although the reviews were mixed, they claimed
that it demonstrated Monroe's ability and confirmed
that she was ready for more leading roles. Her
performance in the film has since been noted as
one of the finest of her career.
Stardom
Monroe
proved she could carry a big-budget film when
she starred in Niagara in 1953. Movie critics
focused on Monroe's connection with the camera
as much as on the sinister plot. She played an
unbalanced woman planning to murder her husband.
Around
this time, the nude photos of Monroe began to
surface, taken by photographer Tom Kelley during
her unemployment. Prints were bought by Hugh Hefner
and, in December 1953, appeared in the first edition
of Playboy. To the dismay of Fox, Monroe decided
to publicly admit it was indeed her in the pictures.
When a journalist asked her what she wore in bed
she replied, "Chanel no.5".[29] When
asked what she had on during the photo shoot,
she replied, "The radio".
Over
the following months, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes
and How to Marry a Millionaire cemented Monroe's
status as an A-list actress, and she became one
of the world's biggest movie stars. The lavish
Technicolor comedy films established Monroe's
"dumb blonde" on-screen persona.
In
Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, Monroe's turn as gold-digging
showgirl Lorelei Lee won her rave reviews,[31]
and the scene where she sang "Diamonds Are
a Girl's Best Friend" has inspired the likes
of Madonna,[32] Kylie Minogue[33] and Geri Halliwell.
In the Los Angeles premiere of the film, Monroe
and co-star Jane Russell pressed their foot- and
handprints in the cement in the forecourt of Grauman's
Chinese Theatre.
In
How to Marry a Millionaire, Monroe was teamed
up with Lauren Bacall and Betty Grable. She played
a short-sighted dumb blonde, and even though the
role was stereotypical, critics took note of her
comedic timing.
Her
next two films, the western River of No Return
and the musical There's No Business Like Show
Business, were not successful. Monroe 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 with Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio
in New York. Fox would not accede to her contract
demands and insisted she return to work on productions
she considered inappropriate, such as The Girl
in Pink Tights (which was never filmed), The Girl
in the Red Velvet Swing, and How to Be Very, Very
Popular.
Once
in New York Monroe set up her own production company
Maryiln Monroe Productions with fashion photographer
Milton H. Greene. She told a press conference
she had set up the production company 'so I can
play the better kind of roles I want to play.
As
The Seven Year Itch raced to the top of the box
office in the summer of 1955, and with Fox starlets
Jayne Mansfield and Sheree North failing to click
with audiences, Zanuck admitted defeat and Monroe
returned to Hollywood. A new contract was drawn
up, giving Monroe approval of the director as
well as the option to act in other studios' projects.
The
first film to be made under the contract and production
company was Bus Stop, directed by Joshua Logan.
She played Chérie, a saloon bar singer
who falls in love with a cowboy. Monroe deliberately
appeared badly made-up and unglamorous. She was
nominated for a Golden Globe for the performance
and was praised by critics. Bosley Crowther of
The New York Times proclaimed: "Hold on to
your chairs, everybody, and get set for a rattling
surprise. Marilyn Monroe has finally proved herself
an actress." In his autobiography, Movie
Stars, Real People and Me, director Joshua Logan
wrote: "I found Marilyn to be one of the
great talents of all time... She struck me as
being a much brighter person than I had ever imagined,
and I think that was the first time I learned
that intelligence and, yes brilliance have nothing
to do with education."
The
second movie filmed under her production company
was The Prince and the Showgirl starring Laurence
Olivier. Olivier praised Monroe's performance
by saying she was, "a brilliant comedienne,
which to me means she is also an extremely skilled
actress" However Olivier became furious at
her habit of being late to the set, as well as
her dependency on her drama coach, Paula Strasberg.
Monroe's performance was hailed by critics, 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. She was
also nominated for the British BAFTA award.
Later years
In
1959, she scored the biggest hit of her career
starring alongside Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis
in Billy Wilder's Some Like It Hot. After shooting
finished, Wilder publicly blasted Monroe for her
difficult on-set behavior. Soon, however, Wilder's
attitude softened, and he hailed her as a great
comedienne. Some Like It Hot is consistently rated
as one of the best films ever made. Monroe's performance
earned her a Golden Globe for best actress in
musical or comedy.
After
Some Like It Hot, Monroe shot Let's Make Love
directed by George Cukor and co-starring Yves
Montand. Monroe was forced to shoot the picture
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".
Arthur
Miller wrote what became her and her co-star Clark
Gable's last completed film, The Misfits. The
exhausting shoot took place in the hot Nevada
desert. Monroe, Gable and Montgomery Clift delivered
performances that are considered excellent by
contemporary movie critics. Tabloid magazines
blamed Gable's death of a heart attack on Monroe,
claiming she had given him a hard time on the
set. Gable, however, insisted on doing his own
stunts and was a heavy smoker. After Gable's death,
Monroe attended the baptism of his son.
In
1961 some of the most famous photographs of Monroe
were taken by Douglas Kirkland as a feature for
the 25th anniversary issue of LOOK magazine.
Monroe
returned to Hollywood to resume filming on the
George Cukor comedy Something's Got to Give, a
never-finished film that has become legendary
for problems on the set and proved a costly debacle
for Fox. In May 1962, she 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 on the set became even more
erratic. On June 1, her thirty-sixth birthday,
she attended a charity event at Dodger Stadium.
Financially
strained by the production costs of Cleopatra,
starring Elizabeth Taylor, Fox dropped Monroe
from the film and replaced her with Lee Remick.
However, co-star Dean Martin, who had a clause
in his contract giving him an approval over his
co-star, was unwilling to work with anyone but
Monroe. She was rehired.
Monroe
conducted a lengthy interview with Life, 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, according to
the Donald Spoto biography.
She
was planning to star in a biopic of Jean Harlow
as well as starring alongside Jack Lemmon in Irma
La Douce, a Billy Wilder comedy that eventually
starred Shirley MacLaine. Other projects under
consideration were What a Way to Go! (in which
Shirley MacLaine replaced her), Kiss Me, Stupid,
a comedy starring Dean Martin and Kim Novak, and
a musical version of A Tree Grows In Brooklyn.
Before
the shooting of Something's Got to Give resumed,
Monroe was found dead in her Los Angeles home
on the morning of August 5, 1962. She remains
one of the 20th century's legendary public figures
and archetypal Hollywood movie stars. (Credit:
Wikipedia).
Marilyn Monroe official website
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