It is easy to forget that Marilyn Monroe was a human being before the combination of her “dumb blonde” movie persona, unapologetic curvaceous sex appeal, and tragic early death transformed her from actress/sex symbol into a clichéd cultural phenomenon, with the proliferation of her image on everything from bed linens to trash baskets. Just a partial listing of the authors and artists who have delivered posthumous homages to Monroe includes Andy Warhol, Norman Mailer, Joyce Carol Oates, Lindsay Lohan, Anna Nicole-Smith, and Elton John.
Perhaps part of our ongoing fascination with the legendary blonde bombshell has to do with the fact that while Monroe is largely known for playing blonde as stupid, in reality she was neither blonde nor stupid. Her persona, however, helped to establish both of these traits as ideals for women during her lifetime. The actress herself recognized the irony of the fact that she was often expected to be her persona: “I can be smart when it’s important, but most men don’t like it.” Thanks in part to the posthumous dissection of every aspect of Monroe’s life and career, we seem as a society to have figured out, in the decades since her death, that women (and men), even blondes, can be both smart and attractive, not to mention talented. Sadly, there seem to be fewer and fewer such types in contemporary Hollywood. This is why we’re remembering the fabulous, but all too short, career of Marilyn Monroe on Wednesdays during July and August with a series of her best dramatic and comedic work.
Despite Monroe’s loyalty to her husbands—namely Joe DiMaggio and Arthur Miller—she manages to evoke a convincing adulterer and aspiring husband murderer in Niagara—three guesses to how she plans to get rid of Joseph Cotten—(hint: it doesn’t involve a wooden barrel and/or suspenders). Also screening as part of our Monroe series is Fritz Lang’s Clash By Night, in which the actress stars as perhaps the sexiest cannery worker in the history of cinema—apologies to Laverne and Shirley. Monroe stars with Jane Russell in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, featuring the classic “Diamonds Are A Girl’s Best Friend”—for those who haven’t seen the film, picture Madonna’s “Material Girl” video. How to Marry A Millionaire’s stellar cast pairs Monroe with Lauren Bacall and Betty Grable. Also screening is Billy Wilder’s The Seven Year Itch, featuring the iconic image of Monroe’s dress blowing upward—the shooting of which reportedly fueled the dissolution of her marriage to DiMaggio. Of course, any retrospective of Monroe’s body of work must include her genius comic timing in Some Like it Hot. The series concludes with Monroe’s last completed film The Misfits. Based on a screenplay written by Arthur Miller while he procured a quickie divorce in Reno, Monroe plays a divorcee who becomes involved in a romantic quartet with a cast of characters named Gay, Perce, and Guido, played by Clark Gable, Montgomery Clift, and Eli Wallach. The film would be both Gable and Monroe’s last. –Dinah Holtzman, Assistant Film Programmer, Motion Picture Department
