Marilyn Monroe: Enduring Screen Icon
Sexy, glamorous and risqué – these are just three of the mouthful of qualities that are regularly attributed to the most iconic blonde bombshell in American popular culture – Marilyn Monroe. But one can argue that she wasn’t the only pin-up girl or bombshell of her time. There was Bettie Page, Betty Grable, and Jayne Mansfield, to name a few. Why can’t Marilyn Monroe be ‘just’ Marilyn Monroe?
So many things about the enigmatic Monroe tickled the popular imagination, to the extent that even if she was only around in Hollywood for only a few years, her films accrued $200 million in profits, and her legendary blonde locks could be recognized globally, from North America to the Middle East.
A most universal Marilyn
Born Norma Jeane Mortenson, Marilyn was like good literature, because she easily transcended cultural differences and became a remarkably marketable actress and model everywhere she went. At a time when sexual attitudes in the United States was only beginning to evolve from being closed and conservative to becoming more open and accepting, Marilyn’s risqué figure spoke to people at a level that conservative discourses weren’t able to touch.
Vogue’s 25 most iconic photos of Marilyn Monroe continue to exude a powerful, feminine allure that not every actress of the 1950s could claim for herself. Marilyn’s blonde locks, slim figure, hourglass shape, and of course, her face – all came together in such a stunning way that she could easily turn the heads of millions of viewers with a simple appearance. The fact that she was celebrated as an icon even before her untimely death spoke volumes about how people felt about her: that Marilyn, without really trying, had transcended the everyday, and traded it for the eternally universal.
Marilyn became an expression of longing for something new and grand, as much as she was a beacon of light for radical changes in American culture and beliefs. Her ‘sameness’ with the American viewers of her time that paradoxically elided the common as it blossomed onscreen, combined with her emblematic stage presence and unforgettable roles, made sure that fifty years on, she would still be the same powerful icon she was until the day she departed.
More than a sex symbol, Marilyn Monroe bore the luminance of someone ‘out of time,’ and this created the impression that her creativity and public projection was something close to the Platonic ideal, borrowing from the Athenians. Critics continue to call it the “Monroe Magic.”
Hollywood Studio’s own William Travilla, who was responsible for dressing and creating costumes for Marilyn, said that the female icon had one of the most perfect figures in Hollywood during her time.
Sure, there was a flurry of imitators who were either inspired or tried to directly compete in Marilyn’s niche, but it remains that her uniqueness and the proportions that defined her physicality, were nothing short of glorious. She was a misfit because of her risqué attitude to how she projected herself, but she was one legendary misfit that we think paved the way for modern risqué actresses and performers decades later. It’s hard to imagine not having a Marilyn Monroe, plain and simple.
Marilyn in Hollywood
Hollywood in the 1950s could be described as a period of ferment, as old traditional values have been shaken to the ground because of war and evolving American politics. Marilyn Monroe was smack in the middle of this ferment, and like seeing a bright beam of light in an increasingly darkening place, even her small roles in dramas like Home Town Story (Pierson 1951) burned an indelible mark in people’s imagination. She dropped breathtaking lines like “I always treat men with respect, and they treat me with respect, Mr. Haskins,” while staring down traditionally well-respected figures like the male newspaper reporter, Slim Haskins.
Her other roles, like the enthralling vocalist Sugar Kane in Some Like It Hot (Wilder 1959) crystallized her burning personality as a sex symbol. With her natural husky, sweet voice, she titillated viewers endlessly with dialogue that only a Marilyn Monroe could pull off without a hitch: “You’re not giving yourself a chance, don’t fight it. Relax.” Her image as a hurt soul who didn’t want anything to do with male saxophone players anymore added to the sensory overload that perhaps she didn’t fully intend, but was always a result of her performances.
Marilyn’s screen presence is obviously magical – she is larger than life, and it seems that no matter how big or small her role is, she always manages to pop out of the screen effortlessly, by simply being in the moment. Models of today would always speak of “channeling their inner Marilyn Monroe” when they want to look ‘fierce’ in photo shoots.
But if you look at Marilyn’s own iconic photos, it appeared that she didn’t pay close attention to how she looked while she was being photographed – because she actually exerted a lot of control and preparation to make sure that she would be perfectly seen as she wanted to be seen even before the public could take photos of her. The fact that Marilyn barely had any photos from her private life is a testament to this.
And there was a reason for her dedication to privacy: her personal life tended to be in shambles. Marilyn Monroe was actually divorced three times in her lifetime, and her early childhood was nothing short of miserable, having to live in an orphanage. She was fiercely intelligent and was a voracious reader, but other film outfits rejected her because of her inability to work well with other people on the set.
While it’s true that her luminosity, unfortunately, did not fully cover the rest of her life, her legacy in the movies she was able to complete will continue to inspire legions of cineastes across the decades because she will remain this eternally enigmatic figure, like a good mystery that needs to be solved. What the actual mysteries are, is up to the filmgoers to decide. Even today the Monroe magic endures.
The RetroFilm Vault has movie trailers of all of Marilyn Monroe’s films as well as a number of newsreels from the period. reporting about her public life.
