MM in the NYRB

February 27, 2011 7:21 AM

Marilyn by Larry McMurtry.
posted by xowie (8 comments total)

That was an enjoyable aside to read for my Sunday morning, thank you.
posted by Fizz at 8:07 AM on February 27, 2011

And this flew into my head
posted by The Whelk at 8:36 AM on February 27, 2011

I long for the day when men stop gassing on about her. I think the publication of her letters, not matter how "meticulously edited", was a sad mistake on the part of her heirs. Monroe's estate has been greedy in the extreme, missing no chance to cash in on every aspect of her life. Marilyn Monroe LLC tried to block Fragments, but finally made a deal with the heirs of her assistant.
posted by Ideefixe at 9:43 AM on February 27, 2011

I love to watch Marilyn's musical comedies with my kids. I want them to get to know her as a really terrific comedic actor, before they inevitably learn that most of the world sees her as an image first and foremost.

I grew up watching old movies with my dad so actors like Monroe and Gable and Garbo were as fresh to me as a kid as anyone contemporary--maybe even more so, as we were pretty broke and hardly ever went to the movie theater. I remember going to someone's house around middle school and admiring a Marilyn Monroe poster the girl had in her room--then being completely shocked that the girl had never seen a single Monroe film.
posted by padraigin at 11:38 AM on February 27, 2011

She's dead, what, 48 years? I appreciate Jayne Mansfield and Joan Collins more as there was no cultural mystique with either (well, Collins isn't dead yet). IMHO there is no magic to the so-called legend of Marilyn Monroe, any more than there was to that of James Dean. They fucking died. Did they leave anything real behind?
posted by nj_subgenius at 5:29 PM on February 27, 2011

Well, significantly more important and high-quality bodies of work than Mansfield left or Collins will leave should count for something.
posted by padraigin at 6:01 PM on February 27, 2011

Did they leave anything real behind?

Some Like it Hot is a pretty decent little résumé filler.
posted by Wolof at 6:49 PM on February 27, 2011 [1 favorite]

One of my most precious memories is watching Some Like it Hot with my grandmother right before she died (we also watched Animal House, but that was less meaningful). It was the only thing that made her laugh in the midst of some terrible suffering.
posted by mrfuga0 at 7:17 PM on February 27, 2011