Marilyn Monroe Bio

Marilyn Monroe Biography

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This Marilyn Monroe biography contains information believed to be accurate as extracted from sources around the internet including Wikipedia. If you believe there are errors or omissions in this Marilyn Monroe bio, please let us know so that we can correct any inaccuracies.

Marilyn Monroe Pictures

Marilyn Monroe (born Norma Jeane Mortenson; baptised Norma Jeane Baker June 1, 1926 - August 5, 1962), was an American actress, singer and film producer. She won a Golden Globe Award for best comedy/musical actress, and in 1999 was ranked as the sixth greatest female star of all time by the American Film Institute.

After spending much of her childhood in foster homes, Monroe began a career as a model, which led to a film contract in 1946. Her early roles were minor, but her performances in The Asphalt Jungle and All About Eve (both 1950) were well received, and as her career progressed she became known as a sex symbol. She was praised for her comedic ability in such films as Gentlemen Prefer Blondes (1953), How to Marry a Millionaire (1953) and The Seven Year Itch (1955), and became one of Hollywood's most popular performers.

Monroe believed the typecasting of her "dumb blonde" persona limited her career prospects, and she resolved to broaden her range. Her marriage to baseball player Joe Di Maggio failed, and following her marriage to playwright Arthur Miller, she studied at the Actor's Studio and formed Marilyn Monroe Productions. Her dramatic performance in Bus Stop (1956), was hailed by critics, and it was her performance in Billy Wilder's Some Like it Hot (1959) which won her the Golden Globe.

The final years of Monroe's life were marked by illness, personal problems and a reputation for being unreliable and difficult to work with. The circumstances of her death, from an overdose of barbiturates, have been the subject of conjecture. Though officially classified as a "probable suicide", the possibility of an accidental overdose has not been ruled out, while conspiracy theorists argue that she was murdered.

Her reputation and status have grown since her death, and today Marilyn Monroe is considered to be an iconic performer and one of the most significant cultural figures of her time. She is frequently imitated and referenced in popular culture.

Marilyn Monroe: Childhood

Marilyn Monroe - Family and early life

Monroe was born in the charity ward of the Los Angeles County Hospital. Her grandmother, Della Monroe Grainger, had her baptized Norma Jeane Baker by Aimee Semple McPherson.Her mother was Gladys Pearl Monroe (1902-1984). The identity of her father has been the subject of debate for decades, biographer Donald H. Wolfe in The Last Days of Marilyn Monroe, writes his belief that Norma Jeane's biological father was Charles Stanley Gifford, a salesman for RKO Pictures where Gladys worked as a film-cutter and indeed throughout her life Marilyn always believed that Gifford was her father. However, Monroe's official birth certificate lists Gladys's second husband, Martin Edward Mortenson, as the father.

Marilyn Monroe - Foster homes

Mentally unstable and unable to care for Monroe, Gladys placed her with foster parents Albert and Ida Bolender of Hawthorne, California, where she lived until she was seven. In her autobiography My Story, Monroe stated she believed that the Bolenders were her parents until Ida corrected her.

During one of her weekly visits, Gladys told Norma Jeane that she had built a house for them. A few months after moving in, Gladys suffered a breakdown. In My Story, Monroe recalls her mother "screaming and laughing," as she was forcibly removed to the State Hospital in Norwalk. Monroe was declared a ward of the state, and Gladys's best friend, Grace McKee became her guardian. After McKee married in 1935, Monroe was sent to the Los Angeles Orphans Home (later renamed Hollygrove), and then to a succession of foster homes.

Grace and her husband were about to move East and could not take Norma Jeane. Another family, moving to Louisiana wanted to adopt Norma Jeane, but Gladys would not allow it. Grace then approached a neighbor suggesing that her son, James Dougherty, could marry Norma Jeane so that she would not have to return to an orphanage or foster care, and in June 1942, they were married. Monroe would state in her autobiography that she did not feel like a wife; she enjoyed playing with the neighborhood children until her husband would call her home. The marriage lasted until 1946 when Monroe decided to pursue her career.

Marilyn Monroe: Career

Marilyn Monroe - Early years

Mrs. Norma Jeane Dougherty, YANK Magazine, 1945

While Dougherty was in the Merchant Marine during World War II, Monroe moved in with her mother-in-law, and found employment in the Radioplane Munitions Factory. She sprayed airplane parts with fire retardant and inspected parachutes. During this time, Army photographer David Conover snapped a photograph of her for a YANK magazine article. He encouraged her to apply to The Blue Book modeling agency. She signed with the agency and began researching the work of Jean Harlow and Lana Turner. She enrolled in drama and singing classes and had her hair cut, straightened and lightened to golden blonde.

Norma Jeane Dougherty became one of Blue Book's most successful models, appearing on dozens of magazine covers. In 1946, she came to the attention of Ben Lyon, a 20th Century Fox executive, who arranged a screen test for her. Lyon was impressed and commented, "It's Jean Harlow all over again". She was offered a standard six-month contract with a starting salary of $125 per week.

It was agreed that she would change her name, and Lyon suggested she adopt Marilyn (after the actress Marilyn Miller). She took her mother's maiden name of Monroe as her surname. She appeared in Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hay! and Dangerous Years (both 1947), but when her contract was not renewed, she returned to modeling. She attempted to find opportunties for film work, and while unemployed she posed for nude photographs.

In 1948, during a six-month stint at Columbia Pictures, Monroe had a part in a Three Stooges short and starred in the film Ladies of the Chorus. The low-budget musical was not a success and Monroe was dropped again. She met one of Hollywood's top agents, Johnny Hyde, who convinced Darryl F. Zanuck to provide supporting roles for her. She appeared in the Marx Brothers film Love Happy (1949), and in All About Eve (1950), before a featured role in the MGM drama, The Asphalt Jungle (1950). Even though the roles were small, moviegoers as well as critics took notice. Hyde arranged for her to have minor plastic surgery on her nose and chin, adding that to earlier dental surgery.

She continued to work steadily over the next two years, in minor films such as We're Not Married! and Love Nest. RKO executives used Monroe to boost the box office potential of the Fritz Lang production, Clash by Night. After the film performed well, 20th Century Fox employed a similar tactic, and she was cast as the ditzy receptionist with Cary Grant and Ginger Rogers in Howard Hawks's slapstick comedy Monkey Business. Critics no longer ignored her, and both films' success at the box office was partly attributed to Monroe's growing popularity.

Monroe played her first lead role, as a babysitter who threatens to attack the child in her care, in Don't Bother to Knock (1952). In contrast to the comedies in which Monroe would later excel, the film was a downbeat melodrama, and Monroe and the film were poorly reviewed. The film was also notable for the debut of Anne Bancroft, who later commented that playing her scenes opposite Monroe, had been a "remarkable experience... that can only happen when working with good actors. It was so real, I responded. I really reacted to her."

As Rose in Niagara.

Marilyn Monroe - Stardom

Monroe proved she could carry a big-budget film when she starred in Niagara in 1953. Movie critics focused on Monroe's connection with the camera as much as on the sinister plot. She played an unbalanced woman planning to murder her husband.

Around this time, the nude photos of Monroe began to surface, taken by photographer Tom Kelley during her unemployment. Prints were bought by Hugh Hefner and, in December 1953, appeared in the first edition of Playboy. To the dismay of 20th Century Fox, Monroe admitted it was indeed her in the pictures. When a journalist asked her what she wore in bed she replied, "Chanel No. 5". When asked what she had on during the photo shoot, she replied, "The radio".

A-list actress

Her next film was Gentlemen Prefer Blondes co-starring Jane Russell. The part was the most demanding Monroe had so far been assigned, and in addition to acting, she was required to sing and dance. The two stars became good friends, with Russell describing Monroe as "very shy and very sweet and far more intelligent than people gave her credit for". She later recalled Monroe's dedication in staying back each evening, rehearsing her dance routines after most of the crew had left. Soon after filming started, Monroe was habitually late on the set, which caused conflict with the director, Howard Hawks. Russell realized that Monroe was in her dressing room, having arrived long before anyone else, and was ready, but remained in her room due to stage fright. Russell then made a point of escorting her to the set each morning, and for the duration of production, Monroe was not late again.

Monroe's performance as gold-digging showgirl Lorelei Lee won her rave reviews, and her performance of "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" has inspired the likes of Madonna , Kylie Minogue and Anna Nicole Smith,. At the Los Angeles premiere of the film, Monroe and Russell pressed their foot- and handprints in the cement in the forecourt of Grauman's Chinese Theatre.

In How to Marry a Millionaire, Monroe was teamed up with Lauren Bacall and Betty Grable. She played a short-sighted dumb blonde, and though the role was stereotypical, critics took note of her comedic timing.These films cemented Monroe's status as an A-list actress, as she became one of the world's biggest movie stars. The lavish Technicolor comedy films established Monroe's "dumb blonde" on-screen persona.

Monroe's next two films, the western River of No Return and the musical There's No Business Like Show Business, were not successful. Monroe eventually got tired of the roles that Zanuck assigned her. After completing work on The Seven Year Itch in early 1955, she broke her contract and fled Hollywood to study acting with Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio in New York. Fox would not accede to her contract demands and insisted she return to work on productions she considered inappropriate, such as The Girl in Pink Tights (which was never filmed), The Girl in the Red Velvet Swing and How to Be Very, Very Popular.

Marilyn Monroe Productions

Milton H. Greene had first met Monroe in 1953 when he was assigned to photograph her for Look magazine. While many photographers tried to emphasize her sexy image, Greene presented her in more modest poses, and she was pleased with his work. As a friendship developed between them, she confided her frustration with her contract with 20th Century Fox, and the types of roles she was given. She told him that she was not adequately paid; her salary for Gentlemen Prefer Blondes amounted to $18,000, while Jane Russell, as a freelance artist, had been paid more than $100,000. Greene agreed that she could earn more by breaking away from 20th Century Fox. He gave up his job in 1954, mortgaged his home to finance Monroe, and allowed her to live with his family as they determined the future course of her career.

Truman Capote introduced Monroe to Constance Collier, who gave her acting lessons. She felt that Monroe was not suited to stage acting, but possessed a "lovely talent" that was "so fragile and subtle, it can only be caught by the camera". After only a few weeks of lessons, Collier died. Monroe had met Paula Strasberg and her daughter Susan on the set of There's No Business Like Show Business, and had previously said that she would like to study with Lee Strasberg at the Actors Studio. In March 1955, Monroe met with Cheryl Crawford, one of the founders of the Actors Studio, and convinced her to introduce her to Lee Strasberg, who interviewed her the following day, and agreed to accept her as a student.

On New Year's Eve, 1955, Monroe signed a new contract with 20th Century Fox, which would require her to make four films over a seven year period. The newly formed Marilyn Monroe Productions would be paid $100,000 plus a share of profits, for each film made, and in addition to being able to work for other studios, Monroe had the right to reject any script, director or cinematographer that she did not approve of.

Monroe's dramatic performance as Chérie, a saloon singer with little talent, marked a departure from her earlier comedies.

The first film to be made under the contract and production company was Bus Stop, directed by Joshua Logan. Logan had studied under Konstantin Stanislavsky, approved of method acting, and was highly supportive of Monroe. Monroe played Chérie, a saloon bar singer with little talent, who falls in love with a cowboy. Her costumes, make-up and hair reflected a character who lacked sophistication, and Monroe was required to provide a mediocre singing performance. Bosley Crowther of The New York Times proclaimed: "Hold on to your chairs, everybody, and get set for a rattling surprise. Marilyn Monroe has finally proved herself an actress." In his autobiography, Movie Stars, Real People and Me, director Joshua Logan wrote: "I found Marilyn to be one of the great talents of all time... She struck me as being a much brighter person than I had ever imagined, and I think that was the first time I learned that intelligence and, yes brilliance have nothing to do with education." Logan was one of many who championed Monroe for an Academy Award nomination, and he complimented her talent and professionalism until the end of his life. She was disappointed when she was not nominated for an Academy Award, but she received a Golden Globe nomination.

In The Prince and the Showgirl (1957), Monroe co-starred with Laurence Olivier, who also directed the film.

This was followed by The Prince and the Showgirl, directed by Laurence Olivier, who also co-starred. Prior to filming, Olivier praised Monroe as "a brilliant comedienne, which to me means she is also an extremely skilled actress."During filming he resented Monroe's dependence on her drama coach, Paula Strasberg, regarding her as a fraud whose only talent was the ability to "butter Marilyn up". He recalled his attempts at explaining a scene to Monroe, only to hear Strasberg interject, "Honey just think of Coca-Cola and Frank Sinatra". Monroe and Olivier also clashed, however Olivier later commented that in the film "Marilyn was quite wonderful, the best of all". Monroe's performance was hailed by critics, especially in Europe, where she won the David di Donatello, the Italian equivalent of the Academy Award, as well as the French Crystal Star Award. She was also nominated for a BAFTA.

Marilyn Monroe - Later years

In 1959, Monroe scored the biggest hit of her career starring alongside Jack Lemmon and Tony Curtis in Billy Wilder's Some Like It Hot. After shooting finished, Wilder publicly blasted Monroe for her difficult on-set behavior. His attitude softened soon, and he hailed her as a great comedienne. Some Like It Hot is consistently rated as one of the best films ever made. Monroe's performance earned her a Golden Globe for best actress in musical or comedy.

After Some Like It Hot, Monroe shot Let's Make Love directed by George Cukor and co-starring Yves Montand. Monroe was forced to shoot the picture because of her obligations to Twentieth Century-Fox. While the film was not a commercial or critical success, it included one of Monroe's legendary musical numbers, Cole Porter's "My Heart Belongs to Daddy".

Arthur Miller wrote what became Monroe and her co-star Clark Gable's last completed film, The Misfits. The exhausting shoot took place in July, in the hot Northern Nevada Black Rock desert, and RenoNevada. The rodeo and bar scenes were shot in Dayton, Nevada. Monroe, Gable and Montgomery Clift delivered performances that are considered excellent by contemporary movie critics. Tabloid magazines blamed Gable's death of a heart attack on Monroe, citing her tardiness and quoting Gable's widow Kay Spreckels Gable, who claimed that her husband did his own stunt work out of the frustration of waiting for Monroe. Exacerbating the situation was Gable's advanced age, plus long history of alcohol and tobacco use, and previous heart attacks. Monroe was invited by Kay to the baptismal ceremony for her and Clark's son John Clark Gable. She attended.

In 1962, some of the most famous photographs of Monroe were taken by Bert Stern as a feature for Vogue magazine. This photo shoot was her last and it is known as "The Last Sitting".

Monroe returned to Hollywood to resume filming on the George Cukor comedy Something's Got to Give, a never-finished film that has become legendary for problems on the set and proved a costly debacle for Fox.

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After shooting what was claimed to have been the first ever nude scene by a major motion picture actress, Monroe's attendance on the set became even more erratic. On June 1, her thirty-sixth birthday, she attended a charity event at Dodger Stadium.

Financially strained by the production costs of Cleopatra, starring Elizabeth Taylor, Fox dropped Monroe from the film and replaced her with Lee Remick. However, co-star Dean Martin, who had a clause in his contract giving him an approval over his co-star, was unwilling to work with anyone but Monroe. She was rehired.

Monroe conducted a lengthy interview with Life, in which she expressed how bitter she was about Hollywood labeling her as a dumb blonde and how much she loved her audience. She also did a photo shoot for Vogue and began discussing a future film project with Gene Kelly and Frank Sinatra, according to the Donald Spoto biography.

Monroe was planning to star in a biopic of Jean Harlow, as well as starring alongside Jack Lemmon in Irma La Douce, a Billy Wilder comedy that eventually starred Shirley MacLaine. Other projects under consideration were What a Way to Go! (in which Shirley MacLaine replaced her), Kiss Me, Stupid, a comedy starring Dean Martin and Kim Novak, and a musical version of A Tree Grows In Brooklyn.

Before the shooting of Something's Got to Give resumed, Monroe was found dead in her Los Angeles home on the morning of August 5, 1962. She remains one of the 20th century's legendary public figures and archetypal Hollywood movie stars.

Dougherty and Monroe ca. 1943.

Marilyn Monroe: Marriages

Marilyn Monroe - James Dougherty

Monroe married James Dougherty on June 19, 1942. In The Secret Happiness of Marilyn Monroe and To Norma Jeane with Love, Jimmie, he claimed they were in love, but dreams of stardom lured her away. In 1953, he wrote a piece called "Marilyn Monroe Was My Wife" for Photoplay, in which he claimed that she threatened to jump off the Santa Monica Pier if he left her. In the 2004 documentary Marilyn's Man, Dougherty made three new claims: that he invented the "Marilyn Monroe" persona; studio executives forced her to divorce him; and that he was her true love and her "dedicated friend for life."

Dougherty's actions seem to contradict these claims: he remarried months after Monroe divorced him; his sister told the December 1952 Modern Screen Magazine that he left Monroe because she wanted to pursue modeling, after he initially gave her permission to do so; he confirmed Monroe's version of the beginning of their relationship in an A&E Network Monroe documentary that his mother had asked him to marry her so that she would not be returned to an orphanage. Most telling, the 6 August 1962 The New York Times reported that, on being informed of her death, Dougherty replied "I'm sorry," and continued his LAPD patrol. He did not attend Monroe's funeral.

Marilyn Monroe - Joe DiMaggio

In 1951, Joe DiMaggio saw a picture of Monroe with two Chicago White Sox players, but did not ask the man who arranged the stunt to set up a date until 1952. Monroe wrote in My Story that she did not want to meet him, fearing a stereotypical jock. They eloped on 14 January 1954. During their honeymoon in Japan, she was asked to visit Korea. She performed ten shows over four days for over 100,000 servicemen. Biographers have noted that DiMaggio, who stayed in Japan, was not pleased with his wife's decision during what he wanted to be an intimate trip.

DiMaggio biographer Maury Allen quoted New York Yankees PR man Arthur Richman that Joe told him everything went wrong from the trip to Japan on. On September 14, 1954, Monroe filmed the skirt-blowing scene for The Seven Year Itch in front of New York's Trans-Lux Theater. Bill Kobrin, then Fox's east coast correspondent, told the Palm Springs Desert Sun in 2006 that it was Billy Wilder's idea to turn the shoot into a media circus, and that the couple had a "yelling battle" in the theater lobby. She filed for divorce on grounds of mental cruelty 274 days after the wedding.

In February 1961, Monroe was admitted to the Payne Whitney Psychiatric Clinic. She contacted DiMaggio, who secured her release. She later joined him in Florida, where he was serving as a batting coach at the New York Yankees' training camp. Bob Hope jokingly dedicating Best Song nominee The Second Time Around to them at the 1961 Academy Awards.

According to Allen, on 1 August 1962, DiMaggio  - alarmed by how Monroe had fallen in with people he considered detrimental to her well-being  - quit his job with a PX supplier to ask her to remarry him.

After Monroe's death, DiMaggio claimed her body and arranged her funeral. For 20 years, he had a half-dozen red roses delivered to her crypt three times a week. Unlike her other two husbands or those who claimed to have been her lovers, he never talked about her publicly or otherwise exploited their relationship.

In 2006, DiMaggio's adopted granddaughters auctioned the bulk of his estate, which featured two letters Monroe penned to him and a photograph signed "I love you, Joe."

Marilyn Monroe - Arthur Miller

Miller and Monroe at a press conference after their wedding

On June 29, 1956, Monroe married playwright Arthur Miller, whom she first met in 1951, in a civil ceremony in White Plains, New York. City Court Judge Seymour Robinowitz presided over the hushed ceremony in the law office of Sam Slavitt (the wedding had been kept secret from both the press and the public). In reflecting on his courtship of Monroe, Miller wrote, "She was a whirling light to me then, all paradox and enticing mystery, street-tough one moment, then lifted by a lyrical and poetic sensitivity that few retain past early adolescence". Nominally raised as a Christian, she converted to Judaism before marrying Miller. After she finished shooting The Prince and the Showgirl with Laurence Olivier, the couple returned to the United States from England and discovered she was pregnant. However, she suffered from endometriosis, and the pregnancy was found to be ectopic. A subsequent pregnancy ended in miscarriage.

Miller's screenplay for The Misfits, a story about a despairing divorcée, was meant to be a Valentine gift for his wife, but by the time filming started in 1960 their marriage was beyond repair. A Mexican divorce was granted on January 24, 1961. On February 17, 1962, Miller married Inge Morath, one of the Magnum photographers recording the making of The Misfits.

In January 1964, Miller's play After The Fall opened, featuring a beautiful and devouring shrew named Maggie. Simone Signoret noted in her autobiography the morbidity of Miller and Elia Kazan resuming their professional association "over a casket." In interviews and in his autobiography, Miller insisted that Maggie was not based on Monroe. However, he never pretended that his last Broadway-bound work, Finishing the Picture, was not based on the making of The Misfits. He appeared in the documentary The Century of the Self, lamenting the psychological work being done on her before her death.

From the television feed of Kennedy's birthday gala where Monroe sang "Happy Birthday, Mr. President".

Marilyn Monroe: The Kennedys

On May 19, 1962, Monroe made her last significant public appearance, singing "Happy Birthday, Mr. President" at a televised birthday party for President John F. Kennedy at Madison Square Garden. The dress that she wore to the event, specially designed and made for her by Jean Louis, sold at an auction in 1999 for USD $1.26 million, establishing a new world record for the most expensive piece of clothing ever sold at an auction.

It has been claimed that Monroe was involved with both Robert Kennedy and John F. Kennedy. Jeanne Carmen, who claimed to have been a friend of Monroe's, also claimed she dated both. The affair with President John F. Kennedy was more lust-related, while the one with Attorney General Robert Kennedy was based on intellectual attachment. Monroe was devastated by each relationship, which both men failed to break the news to Monroe that they no longer wanted an affair with her. DiMaggio told both his son and attorney that "the Kennedys killed her."

Marilyn Monroe: Death and aftermath

On August 5, 1962, LAPD police sergeant Jack Clemmons received a call at 4:25AM from Dr. Hyman Engelberg proclaiming that Monroe was dead at her home in Brentwood, Los Angeles, California. Sergeant Clemmons was the first police officer to arrive at the death scene. Many questions remain unanswered about the circumstances of her death and the timeline from when Monroe's body was found.

The official cause of Monroe's death was classified, by Dr. Thomas Noguchi of the Los Angeles County Coroners office, as "acute barbiturate poisoning", which he recorded as a "probable suicide". Eight milligram percent of chloral hydrate and 4.5 milligram percent of Nembutal were found in her system after the autopsy. Her death was classified as "probable suicide," but because of a lack of evidence, investigators could not classify her death as suicide or homicide. Also, some conspiracy theories involve John and Robert Kennedy with her death, while other theories suggest CIA or mafia complicity. As a side note, toxicology tests revealed that Monroe also had a slight iron deficiency in her blood.

On August 8, 1962, Monroe was interred in a crypt at Corridor of Memories, #24, at the Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery in Los Angeles, California. Lee Strasberg delivered the eulogy.

Marilyn Monroe - Administration of estate

In her will, Monroe left Lee Strasberg 75 percent of the residuary estate. She expressed her desire that Strasberg, or, if he predeceased her, her executor, "distribute [her personal effects] among my friends, colleagues and those to whom I am devoted."

Strasberg willed his portion to his widow, Anna. She declared she would never sell Monroe's personal items after successfully suing Odyssey Auctions in 1994 to prevent the sale of items, which were withheld by Monroe's former business manager, Inez Melson. However, in October 1999, Christie's auctioned the bulk of the items Monroe willed to Strasberg, netting US $13,405,785.

Anna Strasberg is currently in litigation against the children of four photographers to determine rights of publicity, which permits the licensing of images of deceased personages for commercial purposes. The decision as to whether Monroe was a resident of California, where she died, or New York, where her will was probated, is worth millions.

On May 4, 2007, a judge in New York ruled that Monroe's rights of publicity ended upon her death, thus allowing the family of photographer Sam Shaw to sell photos of Monroe.

On March 17, 2008, a federal judge issued a decision in favor of two photo archives in the tangled, long-running legal battle over who controls the likeness of Monroe.

A judge found that CMG and Marilyn Monroe LLC had been inconsistent in their arguments that Monroe was domiciled in California when she died. U.S. District judge Margaret M. Morrow applied a concept called judicial estoppel, which is designed to prevent parties from changing positions when it suits their legal advantage. Based on the fact that in the first 20 years after her death in 1962 the estate filed suits and legally took the position that she was domiciled in New York. http://www.thearchivesstore.com/news.html

The Greene, Kelley and Harold Lloyd archives now license photographs of Monroe and other celebrities for commercial use through a new company called http://www.legendslicensing.com with a division called Marilyn Monroe Licensing Group. As of June 2008 legends has been healing the years of abuse and bad blood that has been created by the MMLLC & CMG.

The Monroe lawsuit has never been challenged on the basis of domicile. Marilyn Monroe LLC successfully lobbied for a change in the right of publicity law in California last year. A similar law failed to pass in New York State in 2007 & they are trying to do it in 2008. The opposition is substantial because the language in the current bill S6005-A would be against New York's 1st amendments rights. Most media outlets ASMP and the New York Times have in opposition. If such a law were to pass in New York, it could give CMG new grounds to continue fighting its case for control over Monroe's likeness. In effect, the ruling tossed ownership rights to the public, said Jonathan Polak, who leads the intellectual property group at Sommer Barnard. "Marilyn Monroe is one of the heavyweight celebrities in the licensing business and she has generated significant licensing revenues, but the court has essentially unleashed the right of publicity for Marilyn to the public domain," Polak said.

Marilyn Monroe: Quotes

Marilyn Monroe - Quotes about Monroe

- Army Archerd

- Clark Gable

- Joe DiMaggio

- Jestina Roberts

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