Will the Real Movie Star Please Stand Up.

Photo by: bigdmia

Marilyn Monroe wanted nothing more than to be a serious actress.  And she struggled for her art.

When Monroe first went to Hollywood, she was bounced from studio to studio and cast in bit roles in forgettable movies.

In 1949 just twenty-three years old, she was broke and needed to pay her rent, so she posed nude, not something nice girls did, for fifty dollars.  The resulting image of her lying on her side on red velvet and looking over her shoulder with her mouth slightly open was pure eroticism.  The photographer sold it for nine hundred dollars, making a nice profit.

Two years later  Collier’s magazine featured her as “1951’s Model Blonde.” It was wonderful publicity for a young woman who hadn’t yet appeared in a starring role, but it exposed her as one of the models in a popular pin-up calendar that hung in garages and barber shops around the country.

Studio publicists told Marilyn to deny it was she, but she told the truth.  “Why deny it,” she told a reporter.  “Beside, I’m not ashamed of it.  I’ve done nothing wrong.”

When pressed for details as to what she had on during the photo shoot, Marilyn answered, “The radio.”   She knew how to handle the media, and everyone was crazy about her.

I’m looking forward to seeing Michelle Williams as Marilyn in My Week with Marilyn.  The movie is  based on the diary of a young assistant on the London set of The Prince and the Showgirl starring Marilyn and Sir Laurence Olivier.

Scarlett Johansson had once been considered for the part.   She might have the looks, but she doesn’t have the attitude.

When leaked cell phone photos of the current A-list actress cropped up all over the Internet, she called her lawyer.  “The highly personal and private photos at issue capture our client self-posing in her own home in a state of undress and/or topless,” he wrote in a cease and desist letter to infringing websites, “If you fail to comply, you will be acting at your own peril.”

Wow.

Now hacking is a serious issue, and the FBI is on the case.  But wouldn’t it be better to lighten up?  If you can’t stand the heat, stay out of the kitchen and take one layer off at a time.

Smile and say “cheesecake”.

© 2011 Susan Marg – All Rights Reserved