Norma Jeane Mortenson

Norma Jeane has always bothered me. As a casual observer of pop culture, sometimes their choice of icons made sense, and sometimes they didn’t. Norma Jeane to me seemed like a nice person, a very good actress, and an attractive woman. She died before I was even school age so I never really knew how she was regarded at the time. My only information was what I read or saw on TV when they had one of their ’10 Best’ or ‘100 Greatest’ nonsense shows. Some 50 years after her death I became a frequent shopper at thrift and antique stores. Once you walk through one of those you’d think Hollywood after 100 years had only 3 Stars: John Wayne, Elvis and Marilyn Monroe. Dolls, posters, figurines, signed photos, books, records, hats coats, anything you’d ever want to remember them by! I’m a huge fan of the first two. Marilyn? I can take her or leave her.

So I’m looking at my Gab timeline and a member of the art group had posted the fun picture above of a 23 year old Marilyn at the beach. I love B&W too. And then for some reason a moment of clarity came to me after 10 or so years of wondering about it. Its like an old buddy from 25 years ago always used to say, “follow the money”. Bingo. Marilyn Monroe wasn’t the sexiest woman to ever walk the planet. She wasn’t the most beautiful. She wasn’t the greatest actress. But it was in the interest of those who owned the rights to her work and image to make us think so. As I explain in the paragraph below that I put on Gab, her dying at 36 was the best thing that could have happened. Her earning power was going nowhere but down. And worst of all, if she’d lived another 50 years, they would have had to pay her. She would have owned her contracts.

“Nice photo. My confusion (until now) was why the push in memorabilia and Hollywood history to make her out to be the be all end all in womanhood? Because there were all kind of women like Janet Leigh and Grace Kelly that were just as/more beautiful (and sane). But with her dying at her peak, her marketability was all there but not the royalty payments. Hollywood’s perfect world! They could continue to sell her the next 100 years but not have to pay her! Her dying was the best thing that ever happened to them, no more royalties. Because in the end, that’s what Hollywood is about, cheating people out of their money.”