12th February 2017
3

Marilyn’s Contemporaries: Debbie Reynolds

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Life and Career

 

Mary Frances Reynolds was born on the 1st of April, 1932, in El Paso, Texas to parents Maxene and Raymond Reynolds.  Growing up during the Depression, Debbie spent the first seven years of her life in a very small house with her parents, brother William, and their grandparents. She never had her own bed, and instead to share one with her relatives. During this time, her father, who worked on the railroad, was saving up every penny in hopes of building a house to provide better living conditions for his family. That hope came true in 1939, when he purchased a lot in Burbank, California.

 

Although continuing to live modestly on the west coast, the Reynolds family was happier in California, and Debbie was raised with a relatively average upbringing, and even became a proud member of the Girl Scouts.

 

At sixteen years old, Debbie was preparing to participate in the local Miss Burbank beauty contest, upon hearing that all contestants would receive a free blouse and scarf. Debbie was only interested in the free clothes, but her parents convinced her to stick to her commitment and work for the accessories by going through with the contest. She unexpectedly won, catching the eye of talent scout Solly Baiano from Warner Brothers, who happened to be in the audience that night.

 

Before she knew it, young Mary Frances Reynolds from Texas was signed to a major Hollywood studio, her name changing to Debbie at the suggestion of a Warner Brothers executive, and became one of the youngest contract players on the lot at the time. From there, Debbie continued attending private tutoring to finish school, while juggling small parts in films. She appeared in bit parts in June Bride and The Daughter of Rosie O’ Grady in the late 1940’s before Warner Brothers began to cut back on musicals. Solly Baiano drove Debbie to the MGM lot where she auditioned for the upcoming film Three Little Words. Her talent was instantly recognized after singing and performing the same song and dance as she had in the Miss Burbank contest, and was hired at $300 a week.

 

With Gene Kelly for Singin’ In The Rain

After working on Three Little Words, nineteen year old Debbie was whisked away to start production on a film that would become her first big break, earning her a spot in one of  the most legendary classics of all time: Singin’ In The Rain. However, the work behind the scenes was not as joyful as the final product. Debbie was new to dancing, and sweated through rehearsals for eight hours a day. Although they would become great friends and have a mutual respect for each other’s’  abilities, she was driven to tears by co-star Gene Kelly for working her too hard, until Fred Astaire came to her rescue and helped her with her routines, reassuring her that “If you’re not sweating, you’re not doing it right.” Debbie once said: “Making Singin’ In The Rain and childbirth were the two hardest things I’ve ever done.”

 

In 1954, while making Athena, Debbie met and fell in love with singer Eddie Fisher. A year later, the young couple married and Debbie learned she was expecting her first child. Carrie Frances Fisher was born on October 21, 1956, and in 1958, Debbie gave birth to her second child, son Todd Emmanuel Fisher, on February 24. Todd was named after producer Mike Todd, Eddie’s best friend and mentor. The Fishers spent a lot of time with Mike and his new wife, actress Elizabeth Taylor, whom he had married in 1957.

 

Tragically, however, Mike was killed in a plane crash the following March, leaving Elizabeth, Debbie, and Eddie devastated. Not thinking much of it and wanting to help Elizabeth during this difficult time, Debbie allowed Eddie to go and stay with her and comfort her when she needed company. What resulted was one of the biggest scandals in Hollywood history. Debbie stated in one of her memoirs:

 

“[Elizabeth] was so devastated by Mike Todd’s death that she looked for comfort in a convenient person who also was Mike’s best friend. That connection made her grab on to Eddie in an attempt to get over the loss of her true love.”

 

Debbie with her children

Although Eddie had initially not been around much as a father due to his work, Debbie still wished he would come home to her and the kids. But unfortunately, Eddie chose Elizabeth, and the two were married in 1959, after his divorce from Debbie. Despite the dramas of their past, Elizabeth and Debbie reconciled, and ended up developing a close bond that would last for the rest of their lives.

 

Debbie would endure two more failed marriages after Eddie. The second to Harry Karl, a successful businessman. Their marriage lasted thirteen years, ending in 1973 because of Harry’s relentless gambling and cheating. The third would be to real estate developer Richard Hamlett. Debbie and Richard would be married for twelve years, and they even worked to open a hotel in Las Vegas in 1993 called the Debbie Reynolds Hotel, a place where Debbie could perform shows and finally start to realize her dream of building a museum to show off the precious movie memorabilia from her MGM days that she had begun collecting since the 1970’s.

 

Debbie called her third marriage being “married to the devil.” Not only was Richard wiping her out financially, but he was also backdating deeds to their shared estates and transferring them to his mistress. At one point, Debbie even feared for her life after Richard came home in the early morning hours from a rendezvous with his girlfriend, and Debbie confronted him. “I was sure he was going to toss me off the balcony. One shove and all his troubles would be over. I pictured myself plummeting twelve floors to the pavement.”

 

Debbie with daughter Carrie and granddaughter Billie.

Richard Hamlett would be her last attempt at marriage; they divorced in 1996. By then, her children were forty and thirty-eight years old. Todd had developed a successful career in the technical aspect of the entertainment industry, sound engineering, architectural design, and managing his mother’s hotel. Carrie had become an accomplished writer, an internationally famous actress with her timeless role of Princess Leia in the Star Wars franchise, and also an advocate for the awareness of bipolar disorder and prescription medication addiction.

 

On December 23, 2016, Carrie was rushed to UCLA Medical Center after suffering a major heart attack on a flight to Los Angeles from London. She was placed on a ventilator, but the damage had already been done. She passed away five days later on December 28, at just sixty years old.

 

Debbie’s biggest fear was her children pre-deceasing her. In her 2013 memoir, she poignantly and prophetically stated:

 

“It’s not natural to outlive your child. This has always been my greatest fear. Too many mothers have lost their children, for thousands of different reasons. I don’t know if I could survive that.”

 

Debbie was completely devastated and broken by the loss of her daughter. The morning after Carrie’s death, Debbie suffered a stroke, and passed away after being hospitalized at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles, California. Her son Todd released the statement, “She went to be with Carrie.”

 

Debbie was one of the few remaining Old Hollywood royalty we still had with us today. Her legacy has only just begun, and her memory and talent will continue to dazzle and warm the hearts of audiences around the world.

 

Marilyn Connections

 

In 2011, Debbie was forced to part with many items in her film memorabilia collection to pay off the seemingly endless debt leftover from her third marriage. She held the famous Debbie Reynolds Auction through Profiles in History. One of the hundreds of items on the auction block was Marilyn’s white subway dress from The Seven Year Itch. The dress made headlines after selling for an unbelievable total of $5.6 million.

 

Debbie with Marilyn’s costume from Let’s Make Love

Both women were presenters at the 1951 Academy Awards.

 

Both women knew the pain of losing an unborn child. During the filming of My Six Loves (1963), Debbie became pregnant with her third child during her marriage to Harry Karl. She lost the baby during her pregnancy, and was forced to carry it to term for seven months, resulting as a stillborn. In the beginning of 1963, she became pregnant again, and again she learned that the baby had died during pregnancy, and this time labor was induced. “The pain was excruciating. The experience left me depleted and emotionally devastated.”

 

In 1964, Debbie filmed Goodbye Charlie with Tony Curtis, who had worked with Marilyn on Some Like It Hot (1959). Debbie’s role in Goodbye Charlie was originally offered to Marilyn in 1960.

In addition to causing problems with Marilyn in the press by making a heated comment that kissing Marilyn was “like kissing Hitler,” Tony Curtis also made ridiculous claims that she carried his baby at one point, only coming forward after both Marilyn and husband at the time Arthur Miller had passed away. Curtis also caused problems for Debbie on the set of Goodbye Charlie. This was just a few years after Debbie’s divorce from Eddie Fisher. Tony had been spreading Eddie’s lies about her. “I didn’t realize that Tony had been telling people around town that my marriage to Eddie Fisher broke up because I was a lesbian and a lousy lay. I’m not a lesbian. I may be a lousy lay, but Eddie was my first love.”

 

Both Marilyn and Debbie have faced many hardships in life, and both will always be remembered for how strong they truly were. Both were raised in the heart of Hollywood, in and out of a studio every day in their adult lives. Debbie has always had nothing but respectful things to say about Marilyn, and her relentless efforts for the preservation of Hollywood memorabilia will never be forgotten. Both trailblazing women have earned iconic status in their own right, and will continue to be cherished for their contributions to film and to the world for generations to come.
-Ky Monroe for Immortal Marilyn

30th January 2017
3

The Seven Year Mystery

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The white pleated halter dress that Marilyn Monroe wore in The Seven Year Itch is always described in superlatives: most iconic, most recognized, most recreated, most expensive. It can also be called the most mysterious: how many copies of the dress were there? Is there another one in existence, hidden away all these years? Did Marilyn herself own a copy of the dress, and if so, where did it end up? And perhaps most intriguing: was a copy of the dress really stolen back in 1993?

On location in New York

In 2011, The Seven Year Itch dress was sold to great fanfare for an astounding $5.6 million. It had been part of the Debbie Reynolds collection, obtained by her during studio sell offs of costumes in previous decades. Astute Marilyn fans noticed that there were some discrepancies between the dress being auctioned and the one Marilyn appeared to be wearing. For cost saving measures, studios would reuse costumes, making alterations as needed, and this was no exception: the dress was altered and worn by Roxanne Arlen in the film Bachelor Flat in 1962, and this was the dress in Reynold’s collection. Scott Fortner investigated extensively and was able to prove beyond doubt that the dress auctioned was in fact one that was worn by Marilyn and was also confirmed by the designer, William Travilla, himself.So it would appear that   the dress auctioned is authentic, alterations and all. You can read Scott’s detailed research here.

However, Scott’s research raised some more questions, especially after it was revealed in Travilla’s notes that he had actually made four copies of the famous dress. It would make sense that one was used on location in New York, and another for the reshoots  of the scene in Los Angeles. So where are the other dresses, if they exist?

Filming on an LA soundstage.

When Marilyn Monroe died, her Last Will and Testament stated “I give and bequeath all of my personal effects and clothing to LEE STRASBERG, or if he should predecease me, then to my Executor hereinafter named, it being my desire that he distribute these, in his sole discretion, among my friends, colleagues and those to whom I am devoted.” Rather than distributing these items to her friends, Lee had everything from her Los Angeles home and her New York apartment placed in storage. Two years after the death of his wife Paula in 1966, Lee married Anna Mizrahi, a woman 38 years his junior. They met when Anna, an aspiring actress, auditioned for a place at The Actor’s Studio. When Lee died in 1982 his entire estate, which included Marilyn’s belongings, was inherited by Anna. Anna Strasberg has been a controversial figure, as she held sole rights to Marilyn’s belongings, name, image, and licensing and ruled them with a litigious iron fist although she had never even met her. Lawsuits were filed against anyone who attempted to use Marilyn for commercial gain, including a drawn out battle with Marilyn’s photographers over who retained the rights to their photos: the photographers who took them or Anna, as they contained Marilyn’s image. (the photographers won). In 1999, following Joe Dimaggio’s death, Anna cosigned the majority of Marilyn’s belongings that had been warehoused to Christie’s Auctions for the now legendary $13 million sale. However, a few years prior to that we gained some clues as to the whereabouts of a second Seven Year Itch dress.

Initial news report of the burglary.

On September 13, 1993 a stolen property report came in to the 10th Precinct of the New York Police Department. A storage unit had been burglarized, and some cartons had been stolen. A pretty nondescript crime, except  those cartons contained the personal property of Marilyn Monroe. The report was filed by none other than Anna Strasberg. She kept several boxes of Marilyn’s things in a seventh floor storage locker at Chelsea Mini-Storage on West 28th Street. An employee had gone to do an inventory report for an upcoming exhibit and discovered that there was a new lock on the door and cartons were missing. Evidently a burglar had cut the lock, stolen 3 or 4 (reports vary) boxes of priceless Marilyn memorabilia, and then took the time to put a new lock on the unit. The last time the items had been checked on was late July, so the crime could have occurred at any time in the previous six weeks.

Initial news reports on September 15 claimed that items listed as missing were letters between Marilyn and Lee Strasberg, the sequinned Jean Louis dress that she wore when she sang Happy Birthday to President Kennedy, and the dress and shoes from The Seven Year Itch. However, the following day Detective William Oldham of the Major Case Squad stated to the press that reports that the Happy Birthday dress was missing were false.

Thomas O’Malley, a detective with over 20 years on the police force, was assigned the case of the missing Monroe items. He spent six and a half months tracking down clues and investigating who had stolen the Marilyn items and where they were now, and the pressure was on for him to find the most valuable missing items: Marilyn’s white pleated dress and shoes from The Seven Year Itch. As he pursued leads, the local and national newspapers all reported on the theft of the most recognizable film costume of all time. O’Malley searched out witnesses, fingerprinted the scene, checked the storage facility’s customer list, and interrogated prisoners. Eventually he got a lead that seemed worthwhile: a prisoner told him that it had been a crime of opportunity, and the thief was someone named Jesus Davila. After discovering that Davila had a previous arrest for burglary of a storage unit and had a rented unit on the same floor of the storage facility as Anna, O’Malley felt he had his man.

On March 28, 1994, armed with a search warrant, O’Malley entered Davila’s storage unit and immediately spotted boxes with Anna’s name and address on them contained within. O’Malley called Anna in California with the good news and asked her to send a representative over to identify the stolen property. Eagerly awaiting a look inside the boxes, O’Malley wholeheartedly hoped that the Seven Year Itch dress had been recovered. “Not just for Anna’s sake, not just to do my job as a detective, but for Marilyn Monroe herself,” he said. “The dress is a piece of movie history, and a symbol of its sexiest star.”

The representative arrived and the boxes were opened. The famous dress was not there.

The next day, March 29, O’Malley arrived at St. Luke’s -Roosevelt hospital, where Jesus Davila worked, to make the arrest. Davila quickly confessed to committing the crime and said that he had given some of Marilyn’s things to his coworkers and a neighbor in his building. They were told they had until 8 o’clock that evening to return everything or face charges of receiving stolen goods themselves.

Back at the precinct, Davila offered more details of the crime. He had clipped the lock on Anna’s storage unit and removed the boxes, but claimed he had no idea what was in them until the press reported that the theft was of Marilyn Monroe’s property. He then moved some of the items to his home, and gave some away as gifts. Davila consented to having the officers escort him to his apartment to do a search and recover the stolen goods, and that search was conducted at 4:40 pm on March 29. Nothing was found in Davila’s apartment, but the neighbor Davila had given items to brought down a black plastic bag and handed it over to the detectives. It contained a few hats, a fur piece, and some plates but no white pleated dress and Davila was not forthcoming about it’s whereabouts.

The press reported on the items recovered but noted that the Seven Year Itch dress was still missing. O’Malley was taken aback when his superiors told him to stop working to recover  the dress. They were claiming the the new ”official” story was that the dress and shoes had been located in Anna’s storage unit after all. The detective was initially startled by this pronouncement, but after all his years as a detective thought he had figured out what had happened.

In an interview in 2000 about the case of the missing dress, O’Malley used the following analogy:

“If a stamp collection with one world famous stamp were stolen and most of it recovered except the premier stamp, the owner would of course do anything to get it back; and if the perp had a half decent lawyer, he would know that stamp was his bargaining chip. The lawyer could offer to return the stamp provided his client didn’t get any jail time. Probation, maybe, but no jail time.
{As far as the dress} Here’s a guy who got himself a get-out-of-jail-free card.
Lawyers make deals with the district attorney’s office, they don’t make deals with the police department. The DA has the last lick. So if a cop is looking for a world famous stamp and the DA tells him to stop poking around, what’s he to do but stop looking?
But how do you explain the stamp all of a sudden showing up? Of course, the media is going to ask the police if they recovered the stamp. The detective would respond “I never recovered the stamp”. So the media would say “Wait a minute, what’s going on here? If the police didn’t recover it, how was it found?’ To save face, the DA might say “The stamp was reported stolen in error. It was in the back of the safe, and we didn’t see it. But it was always there.The owner’s got his stamp back, the perp does soft time, the district attorney is happy because the case is closed with probation, and the police department is happy because the case is closed.”

Detective O’Malley was interviewed for this article. He speaks in the no nonsense way that one would expect from a New Yorker with years on the police force, but his story remains absolutely consistent with both the published reports at the time and later interviews he gave about the missing dress. “We checked the guy’s apartment, there wasn’t much there. He didn’t keep the stuff. He put it in an upstairs apartment, we went there and found everything.  The DA  and I sat down and she  said ‘Tommy, you got him good.” He couldn’t say he didn’t do it, everything led to him. We found it in the storage bin in his name and got a confession from him. I had it locked down,a  done deal. The perp was charged with  grand larceny and burglary also.”

He goes on to reiterate how he was told lay off anything to do with the famous white dress, which was not recovered at Davila’s apartment building. “I get a call from DA,  she says the dress will be recovered. It was the only thing that was still missing but I was told to stop working the case. I asked “How are you going to put that into play?” She says to  go see Anna Strasberg and talk to her. So I go see her at her apartment. She tells me it was never missing, I always had it. I didn’t believe her, but she insisted, so that’s how it’s going to be. If it’s not missing, and she has it, that’s it, case closed. All she really  wanted was the dress, that’s why  it was big time publicized and in all the papers at the time. I could have made a big stink, but it was considered closed and I had other cases to get to.”

He repeats his earlier theory that the dress was used as a bargaining chip to get a plea deal: “I think the guy’s lawyer convinced him to return the dress to her, she says it’s  her mistake, it was  never actually stolen. The DA  went along with it, the  whole case is dismissed. They worked out a deal, I see it all the time. I don’t think he even did any time for it. That’s how you get out of doing time for stealing a million dollar dress.”

O’Malley’s theory seems plausible,which would mean that the second Seven Year Itch dress is safely with Anna Strasberg and we may never know if it was actually stolen or not. However, there’s one more bit of intrigue to the Seven Year saga…..sources have said that Anna Strasberg not only says that she does not currently have a Seven Year Itch dress, she claims that she NEVER had a Seven Year Itch dress. I asked Detective O’Malley why he thought it would be claimed that she never owned the dress and while he was reluctant to speculate, he did state that maybe it had simply been sold privately some time ago and that both Anna and the new owner didn’t want that publicized.

Anna  cosigned what is believed to be the remainder of Marilyn’s personal items to Julien’s Auctions for a November 2016 sale and there is certainly no Seven Year Itch dress among the lots. Which begs the question….does Anna in fact have the dress and is withholding that information for reasons known only to her? Did she have it in 1994 but no longer has it today? Or, is she being truthful in stating that she has never had one….but then how does that explain the police report, filed by Anna Strasberg personally according to Detective O’Malley,  stating that it was missing? Stoically reluctant to answer questions pertaining to Marilyn on the record, we may never know from Anna herself. While it’s highly likely that there is more than one copy of the dress, until it surfaces and brings it’s story with it, all we can do is speculate on who has it and where it is now.

 

By Marijane Gray for Immortal Marilyn

30th January 2017
2

Marilyn’s Contemporaries: Lana Turner

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Life and Career

Lana was born Julia Jean Turner of Wallace, Idaho in 1921. Her father was murdered in 1930, and a year later, she moved to Los Angeles with her mother. Turner’s ‘discovery’ – while sipping a Coke at the soda fountain outside the Top Hat Café on Sunset Boulevard and after skipping a typing class – is the stuff of legend. She was just sixteen years old. Billy Wilkerson, publisher of the Hollywood Reporter, was struck by her youthful good looks, and in 1937 she was signed by MGM under a new name, ‘Lana’.

Lana in The Postman Always Rigs Twice

While initially more celebrated for her looks than her acting, Lana proved her critics wrong with a dramatic turn as an alcoholic starlet in Ziegfeld Girl (1941.) Perhaps her best-known performance is as the adulterous Cora Smith in the classic thriller, The Postman Always Rings Twice (1946.)

Turner married seven times, and once said of her many failed relationships, “I’m so gullible. I’m so damn gullible. And I am so sick of me being gullible.” In 1957, her teenage daughter was charged with stabbing Lana’s boyfriend, gangster Johnny Stompanato, to death after she found him beating her. It was later ruled as justifiable homicide.

She earned acclaim for her performances in The Bad and the Beautiful (1952), Peyton Place (1957), Imitation of Life (1959), and Madame X (1966.) Turner’s career continued until the early 1980s, when she acted in TV soap opera Falcon Crest. She died in 1994.

Marilyn Connections

“Sweater girl” Lana Turner

Sweater Girls: In her movie debut, They Won’t Forget (1937), Lana played a character loosely based on Mary Phagan, whose murder in 1913 led to the lynching of an innocent man. Lana’s first scene, in which she walked down a street wearing a form-fitting top, led to her being labelled ‘The Sweater Girl’, a name she detested. This trend was later adopted by Marilyn. She joked about it during a performance for US troops in 1952: “You fellows are always talking about sweater girls. I don’t know what the fuss is about. Take away their sweaters and what have they got?”

Mickey Rooney: Another of Lana’s early films was Love Finds Andy Hardy (1938), with Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney, America’s most popular young star at the time. In his 1991 autobiography, Life is Too Short, Rooney claimed that he and Lana had an affair and that she aborted his baby. “Mother was livid and adamantly denied it,” Cheryl Crane noted. “I know that it was very important to her to fight this accusation because she even phoned her attorney … If Rooney’s story had been true and she wanted to keep it a secret, it would have been more like her to act as though he didn’t exist.”

Rooney also claimed an affair with Marilyn, and even that he invented her name. In the latter case, it is well-known that her name was created in 1946 by Marilyn herself and the Fox talent chief, Ben Lyon. (‘Marilyn’ was inspired by a Broadway star of the 1920s, Marilyn Miller, while ‘Monroe’ was the maiden name of Marilyn’s own mother.

MGM: As her career rocketed during the early 1940s, Lana was managed by Johnny Hyde, “a dear friend for years” according to Cheryl Crane. In 1949, Hyde met Marilyn in Palm Springs, and was instantly smitten. “He said that he had discovered Lana Turner and other stars,” she recalled, “and that I had more than Lana and it was a cinch I would go far.”

Marilyn had sought an MGM contract as early as 1947, while under the management of Lucille Ryman Carroll, a talent scout for the studio. Ryman had earlier served as a mentor to Lana Turner. But with Lana on their payroll, the studio didn’t need another sexy blonde. Then in 1950, Johnny Hyde secured a breakthrough role for Marilyn in MGM’s The Asphalt Jungle. All that year, Hyde tried to negotiate with Dore Schary to take on Marilyn permanently. But though Monroe would make two more films for MGM – Right Cross and Hometown Story – Schary wasn’t interested.

When Lana’s career began, MGM was Hollywood’s most lavish studio. Marilyn, on the other hand, made her name at Fox during the 1950s, when the studio system was in decline. She never enjoyed the protection that stars of Turner’s generation had.
In 1951, Dore Schary replaced Louis B. Mayer as head of MGM. Lana felt unsupported by Schary, and left the studio for good in 1956.

Drama Queens: Turner was generally cast in romantic dramas, but Monroe also shone in comedies and musicals. Of all the roles she played, the most similar to Lana’s characters was that of amoral Rose Loomis in the film noir, Niagara (1953.) Like Cora in The Postman Always Rings Twice, Rose persuades her lover to murder her husband. While Niagara was not as compelling as Postman, it looked spectacular and in one famous scene, Marilyn was filmed taking the longest walk in cinematic history.

Lana was also famed for her style of walking. “She would try to teach it to me, but I never quite got the hang of it,” Cheryl Crane admitted. “It was a manner of twisting the ball of the foot with each step. One unusual feature of hers that had an effect on it was that her left leg was a bit shorter than the right … She also wore high heels, usually four inches, sometimes with platforms. Hers was a rolling, subtle kind of glide, not a hip-swinging Marilyn Monroe walk.”

Lana Turner in The Merry Widow

Dancing Girls: Though Lana, unlike Marilyn, was not an outstanding singer, she danced superbly and was once nicknamed Hollywood’s ‘Nightclub Queen’. In The Merry Widow (1952), she worked with choreographer Jack Cole. “The Waltz musical sequence featured a chorus of beautiful dancers dashing about all in pink,” author Cindy De La Hoz observed. “It appears Cole looked back to his work in these moments the following year in his choreography of Marilyn Monroe’s ‘Diamonds Are a Girl’s Best Friend’ number” (in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes.)

Betty Grable: From the 1940s onward, Lana was friendly with another glamorous blonde, Betty Grable. ‘At the height of their fame, fans who ran into them would mistake them each other occasionally,’ Cheryl Crane revealed. ‘Mother happily obliged them with a “Betty Grable” autograph.’ Monroe, who was often shy around others, nonetheless bonded with Grable when they starred together in How to Marry a Millionaire (1953.)

Otto Preminger: Marilyn’s 1954 western, River of No Return, was by her own estimation, “a grade-Z cowboy movie.” Director Otto Preminger bullied Monroe, and she reputedly considered him ‘a pompous ass’. In 1958, Lana was offered a role in one of Preminger’s best films, Anatomy of a Murder. After clashing with Preminger over her wardrobe demands, however, Turner rejected the part, and later reflected, “God forbid my family should ever be so hungry that I have to work for him.”

Lana Turner and Clark Gable

Clark Gable: In 1941, Lana starred alongside the ‘King of Hollywood’, Clark Gable, in Honky Tonk, a western which became MGM’s highest grossing movie that year. She and Gable were featured on the cover of Life magazine, and went on to make three more films together. Gable and Turner were branded ‘The Team that Generates Steam’. In 1942, while they were filming Somewhere I’ll Find You, Gable’s wife, actress Carole Lombard, was killed in a plane crash. Gossip spread that Lombard had taken an early flight because she was nervous about leaving Gable ‘alone with Lana Turner,’ which she denied.

Gable was one of Marilyn’s childhood idols, and she realised her dream of working with him with The Misfits in 1960.  Sadly, it was to be the last film either star would complete. Gable died of a heart attack shortly after filming ended, and Marilyn was devastated by reports that Gable’s widow, Kay Spreckles, blamed his collapse on Marilyn’s erratic behaviour during filming. But Kay later reassured Marilyn by inviting her to the christening of Gable’s son.

Children: Lana’s chronic endometriosis made her unable to have more children, but she remained close to daughter Cheryl throughout her life. Marilyn, who also suffered from endometriosis, endured at least two painful miscarriages and would never have children of her own.

Legends: In Lana: The Memories, the Myths, the Movies, co-written with Cindy De La Hoz (author of two books on Monroe), Cheryl Crane states that her mother “thought Marilyn Monroe was a fine actress besides being a fascinating personality.”

Marilyn’s death is considered one of Hollywood’s greatest tragedies. While Lana never found lasting love, ultimately she survived. Both women came from humble backgrounds, and achieved immense fame through their beauty and talent. Like so many sex symbols, they were rarely given the respect they deserved, and their difficult private lives contrasted poignantly with the upfront glamour they projected.

19th January 2017
14

Collector’s Corner: Kimmarie DePalma

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Welcome back to Collector’s Corner!  This month we meet lifelong fan Kimmarie DePalma.

How long have you been collecting?

I was born into collecting Marilyn. My father loved Marilyn as a kid, and collected her photos and books. I grew up with framed photos of Marilyn all over my childhood home. I have a photo of myself when I was 7 years old standing next to a Marilyn picture. In 1989, I started building my own collection.

What is in your collection? Do you focus on one particular area or collect all kinds?

You can say I collect all kinds of her merchandise, but my favorite are vintage magazines.
My collection consists of magazines, collector plate sets, Marilyn Merlot wine, porcelain dolls, vinyl dolls, vintage ads, pool cues, statues, lamps, books, some signed by the authors. Photos and art. Marilyn dinnerware and champagne glasses with Andy Warhol art. Christmas ornaments, cross stitch, stamps, collector card sets and Marilyn inspired clothing by Warners.

What is your most prized possession?

My most prized item is Marilyn’s 1946 Family Circle magazine in mint condition that I won at an auction in 1993. I love that there is a photo of her posing with this magazine. I also treasure a calendar I have of her from 1953, as Norma Jeane posing with a Great Dane.

What would you like most to add to your collection?

What I want the most for my collection was sold at the Christie’s auction in 1999. Marilyn’s platinum diamond wedding band from Joe DiMaggio. When I went to Christie’s Auction in July 1999, I couldn’t stop looking at it. Joe DiMaggio was my favorite husband of Marilyn’s.

Any advice to new collectors?

My advice to new collectors is to display your collection, and enjoy it as much as possible. My collection is in storage, so I don’t get to enjoy it as much as I used to.​

What do your friends and family think of your Marilyn collection?

My friends and family are so used to me loving Marilyn. My husband, who was my boyfriend in 1999, was the one who took me to Christie’s each day ​to see her items. It was en experience I’ll never forget. Especially seeing her Happy Birthday President dress being sold for the first time. It’s always nice when someone tells me when they see Marilyn, they think of me. But- only true fans understand what’s it’s like to be in love with a girl named Marilyn.

13th January 2017
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The Weekly Marilyn Round-Up: January 13, 2017

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Friday is here again, and with it our weekly round-up of Marilyn Monroe in the news.

 

A still of Marilyn and Billy Wilder caught by Jules Schulback.

Big news today is the uncovering of gorgeous, clear, colour footage of Marilyn taken by a New York local during the filming of The Seven Year Itch in 1954.  Jules Schulback, a furrier in NYC, shot the footage of Marilyn in her terry robe on the steps and waving from a window.  He also captured Marilyn during the famous skirt-blowing scene on Lexington Avenue in the wee hours of the morning.  The footage drew a resounding gasp from Marilyn fans around the world.  The New York Times article regarding the footage shares a very short clip, although according to the article there are more than three minutes of footage.  Few outside the Schulback family have seen the footage in its entirety.  Here’s hoping we all get to see it one day!

 

Marilyn with Buddy Greco in Lake Tahoe shortly before her death.

 

Sad news this week as musician Buddy Greco passed away in Las Vegas at the age of 90.  Greco is best known in Marilyn circles as one of those present during Marilyn’s last weekend in Lake Tahoe at the Cal-Neva Lodge before her death.  The photos taken that weekend are believed to be the last ones of Marilyn alive.  Greco, who hung with Marilyn’s friends Frank Sinatra and the rest of the Rat Pack, had a long and fascinating career that included a performance with The Beatles for Queen Elizabeth and multiple hits.  His passing was reported on January 10th, 2017.

 

Kate Upton is in the news in this week’s round of Who Channelled Marilyn?  (Yes, that’s what I have decided to call this portion of the news round-up from now on!)  The model earned the popular title from ET this week for a photo shoot that was part of the Love Advent Calendar.  It’s not the first time we’ve seen Upton in the category; she appeared on the cover of the 100th anniversary issue of Vanity Fair in 2013 doing a Marilyn-esque look.  She has also been caught in a very SYI-style dress in the past.

 

That’s it for the news this week – have a great weekend!