I'm about 1/3 the way through the new biography "The Secret Life of Marilyn Monroe" by Randy Taraborrelli. It's a New York Times best seller. On the back from King Features Weekly Service is:
"Groundbreaking ... More books about Monroe will no doubt be written, but it is against this one that all others will be measured."
The book delivers the details of the tough, sad, emotional draining, tormented, stressful, life that you would not want to see any child having to go through, as in the childhood and early teens, that Norma Jeane (who became Marilyn Monroe) went through. But the inspiring thing is what she tried to do with her life, and the pitfalls along the way, the fight she had to wage with Hollywood, to move out of the "dumb blond" image they wanted to cast her as, besides the "sex godess" they wanted to make her into. Behind the scene that few out in the world knew about with her mentally ill mother, and the fear she had of inheriting that mental sickness. All the stress and pressure from both sides, and the off-beat, out of sink two men she married (baseball's Joe DiMaggio and Arthur Miller) who abused her in many ways as the book brings out. All of this finally led to her sleeping pill habit and to her finally taking an overdose of them that put her to rest from this physical life, at age 36.
Marilyn's life was tragic, sad, and also kinda inspiring, especially coming from the circumstances of her
childhood, and misuse by Hollywood and DiMaggio and Miller.
Marilyn was much more talented than many people think, and she finally got to show that versatility of talent in a few movies towards the end of her short life.
One is especially moving in its story, a 1956 Fox color movie called "BUS STOP." It's set in a "western" setting. Marilyn takes on an accent (literal voice accent) that shows she had the talent to be an all around actress, she even has to learn for this movie how "not to sing" very well.
The movie has a serious lesson to it all. It shows how a man should not be this kind of man, and not to rough-shod it over a woman, push his weight around, and put force on a woman, not the force of physical violence in this movie, but a force of rough dominant personality. It's a movie that shows these kinds of men do not truly win the heart of the woman they want. It shows these types of men must sooner or later be beaten down, if a change in attitude and personality desirable for both the decent man and woman (even a woman from a not the greatest background, but who really wants the right man in her life, so she can find true happiness) is to find favor with.
The movie shows a man that needs to change, can change his ways and mannerisms, that should be the right way to live with fellow man, and the woman of his dreams.
All the actors do a very fine job in the roles they play, and certainly Marilyn and Don Murray (as the rough cowboy that needs to learn many things) show the great talent they had for the persons they play in this movie.
It is a family movie, that I can recommend for children 8 years and older. The lessons in the movie a well brought up 8 year old should be able to see clearly.
Yes sir, a movie of Marilyn's that I recommend you have in your library (as well as "River of no Return") and as Randy Taraborrelli says in his book about Marilyn, a movie you should watch many times, over your life time. And I fully agree.
Oh yes, it has a good ending, as it can when people start to act, and speak, and do what they should to win favor with other men and women.
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