Marilyn Monroe was one of the most celebrated actresses. She had a rough childhood she was in and out of foster homes. Her mother was in several relationships and that confused Marilyn about who her real father was. Her Mother was very attractive and worked as a film cutter for RKO studios. She had a mental illness and was admitted to mental institutions. She was in and out of mental institutions for the rest of her life.
When Marilyn was 9 years old she was forced to go to and orpahage she spent the next to years of her life. When she got out of the first orphanage she was put into another foster home. In 1942 when she was 16 she got married to an aircraft plant worker 21 year old Jim Dougherty. They wre only married for four years before they got divorced. By the time they got divorced Marilyn was modeling swim suits and she had her hair bleached blonde. Some various pictures made their way into the publics eye and some of them were seen by the head of RKO studios Howard Hughes. She signed a $125 dollar a month contract. And after that contract expired she signed again and that was in creased by $25 dollars. She starred in her first film in 1947 with a bit part in The Shocking Miss Pilgrim.
She had a few bad films so Twentieth Century Fox wouldn't renew her contract so she went back to school to be a model. Then Columbia Studios chose her to portray Peggy Martin in Ladies of the Chorus. She was in United Artists' film Love Happy in 1949 . She posed nude that year for the famous calender shot which was later debuted in Playboy in 1953. That picture really boosted her career and she was Playboys first centerfold. 1950 was a good year for her because the notices she got for her small parts in two of the five films. The films were THe Asphault Jungle with MGM, and All About Eve with Fox. She got Oscar nominations for the two part, she was remembered for her dumb blonde roles. In 1952 she starred in don't Bother To Knock in that movie she was kind of unstable mentally. The critics didn't like her to well in that film. She played in Monkey Business that was where she was first seen as a platinum blonde. That look is how she got her trademark.
The next year she started seeing the Baseball great Joe DiMaggio. Her and Joe got married on January 14, 1954. They got divorced later that year the two were only married 8 months. Marilyn got suspended by Fox studios for not coming to work on the film How to Be Very Popular. That would make her second suspension, the first suspension was for not reporting to the production of The Girl In Pink Tights . She lost both roles to another person. She appeared in The Seven Year Itch in 1955 which was on of the most memorable scenes in the film because it showed her standig over a subway grating that caused her dress to blow up over her head . It was her only film that year. In 1956 she proved that she could play a dramatic role to the critics. She also got married to Aurthur Miller, they got divorced in 1960. She flew to Britain to make The Prince and the Show Girl which didn't go to well at the box office. In 1958 she took a year off in 1958, she returned to the silver screen to make the delightful comedy , Some Like It Hot with Tony Curtis and Jack Lemmon. It was a smash hit with Lemmon and Curtis they pretende to be Ladies in an all girl band so they could get a job. That was her only film for that year.
In 1960 she appeared in George Cukor's Let's Make Love with Tony Randall and Yves Montad. She had an affair with Yves while she was making this movie. The next year she made what was her final film. The Misfits was the last film for Clark Gable who died of a heart attack later on that year. The film was popular with critics and the public. She was chosen for the film Something's Got To Give. But her absense caused a delay in the film so she fired in June. Her career was finished studios and didn't want to take a chance with her cause it would cost them alot of money because of delays. She went to her home in L.A. on August 5, 1962 her houskeeper found her lying face down in her bed naked. She was the victim of a sedetive overdose. She died at the age of 36.
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