The real woman...

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___These remembrances and other similar stories are the real Monroe, fragile, insecure, but witty, smart and shrewd, and talented. She was not ever crazy, not a bitch in the sense some other nameless actresses could be. The horrifying things they are trying to pass off as truth now are crystal clear lies that not only her fans know is garbage, but also the general public. There is an agenda going on, but it will fail, they won't be allowed to murder Marilyn twice.

Dear D---

Oh, I think she could be a bitch. I don't think it was her nature, but in the business she was in, she had be a "tough, tough tomato" at times.(As Sam Shaw colorfully observed.) She probably hurt people more out of her insecurity, and her need to strike first, rather than being struck. The self-absorption of a star is never a healthy thing, even for healthy personalities. If she'd been a real bitch, she'd have likely survived the summer of '62.

But half a century after her death, the best of her still rises to the top, those qualities still attract people more than the unsavory tales. No matter if those tales feed the flame, or if they initially attract younger fans who have no idea about the realities of her life and career.

Ava Gardner said it best, when faced with gossip, "Listen, honey, people are going to believe what they want to believe." From what I've observed since the day Marilyn died, is that people, in general, want to believe the best of her. They want to keep that good thought for Marilyn.

Denis,
__Agree, I wasn't going to name names, but had she been tougher like a Stanwyck or a Crawford, maybe even West, she might still be around. As others pointed out, she might be percieved as a 'B', but in her case "there was no meanness in her", so as you say it was more a reaction rather than calculating behavior. I believe Lauren Becall said as much, even George Cukor, who could an did say some pretty awful stuff to cover his own behind, the rat!

I wouldn't disagree on Crawford, if only for her lifelong hatred of Monroe--and her frequent public "suggestions" to other female stars. (Joan thought that rolling her R's would somehow make her a lady) But Stanwyck was almost universally adored by the industry--directors, producers and her fellow actors. She was tough, but fair (well, her adopted son might have disagreed) And she never dissed Monroe, despite even at that early point, in "Clash by Night," MM was exhibiting the insecurities that would disrupt productions and damage her so much in later years. (I very much feel MM became a scapegoat for everything that might go wrong on a shoot, but she was open to that because of her own behavior, habits that her well-paid coaches seemed to encourage, keeping their golden goose even more dependent.)

It's interesting that both Crawford and Stanwyck had childhoods as bad if not worse than Monroe, but they coped much differently. Monroe could not let go of hers--analysis made this lingering on her past even worse! She remained an open wound. The other ladies shut themselves off from their early chaos, affecting hard shells to shield themselves. But if MM had been tougher, would she have been Monroe?

Denis,
___Yes, in Stanwyck's case she could be Glenda the good 'B',and despite her touchness, was almost always likeable. Crawford, a polar opposite. And, yet they were great friends and quite possibly more. In some ways I think Stanwyck was far worse than Crawford in the mother department-if that's possible. I can never understand her raw cruility to her adopted son. Ugly!

Dear D--

Another real quote I like, from a 1952 newspaper interview:

"I'm trying to find myself now, to be a good actress and a good person. Sometimes I feel strong inside, but I have to reach down and pull it up. It isn't easy. Nothings easy, so long as you go on living."

Ten years later she told Redbook magazine: "I am trying to prove to myself that I am a person. Then maybe I'll convince myself I am an actress."

MM's attempts to better herself as a person and as and actress were so mocked in her lifetime--it must have been a bitter thing to face everyday.

Marilyn, described by Alice McIntyre in Esquire magazine, on the set of "The Misfits"--

"Marilyn Monroe is like nothing human you have ever seen or dreamed. She is astonishingly white, so radically pale that in her presence you can look at others as easily as you can explore the darkness around the moon. Indeed, there seems the awful possibility in the various phases of her person that MM is the manifestation of the White Goddess herself: disdaining all lingerie and dressed in tight white silk emblazoned with countless red cherries, she becomes at once a symbol of impartial and eternal availability...and whose smile, when she directs it clearly at you, is exquisitely, heartbreakingly sweet."