The cover art for this 1956 issue of Time was created by Boris Chaliapin. Nicknamed ‘Mr Time’, he contributed 400 covers to the magazine and is remembered in a new exhibition at the Smithsonian National Portrait Gallery in Washington DC.

This article by Judith Chapman was published in Book and Magazine Collector (sadly now defunct) in March 1988. Click on the images to read in full.

Photo by David Hoyt Hastie

Fifty years after her death, Marilyn makes the front cover of US scandal sheet, the National Examiner. Their ‘new’ story is that she was murdered by mafioso, including Frank ‘The German’ Schweihs, at the order of the president’s father, Joseph Kennedy. (This seems somewhat unlikely, as Joe had recently suffered a  debilitating stroke and was then incapable of speech.)

The mobster’s daughter, Nora Schweihs, denied this long-standing rumour last year on the axed reality show, Chicago Mob Wives. She is now writing a book, Marilyn Monroe: Murder Cover-Up, and says dramatically, ‘My father didn’t take his secrets to the grave, he gave them to me!’

This conspiracy theory was, in fact, first mooted in Milo Speriglio and Adela Gregory‘s 1992 book, Crypt 33, now available on Kindle.

Author Caitlin Flanagan examines Marilyn’s legacy in the latest issue of US magazine The Atlantic. While I think she underestimates Marilyn as an actress, in terms of her life and impact it’s an interesting article.

“Hers is the original True Hollywood Story, and that writers keep writing it and readers keep reading it, that studios keep optioning it and adapting it, that magazines keep telling it, while all around the world millions of people do their part to keep it alive—all of this reminds us that the life was not mere, that the scope of the legend is not preposterous. Anyone who thinks the story of Marilyn Monroe doesn’t warrant attention doesn’t know much about it; at every turn and in every moment, she was doing something either to align herself with an important part of the culture or to impress herself imperishably upon it.

She was the girl who always got the fuzzy end of the lollipop, the abandoned baby and the mean foster kid and the woman who took off her clothes for the camera when she felt like it. I drive past the old Hollygrove orphanage two or three times a week, and usually I don’t give it a second thought. But sometimes I think of that 9-year-old girl, dropped off screaming but forced to stay, and I think of the astonishing fact that somewhere between Hollygrove and the Hollywood Studio Club, which she moved into at 20, she dried off her tears and stopped believing in the realities of this ugly old world, made up her own set of rules and played by them.”

Scarlett Johansson may have tried to distance herself from being compared to Marilyn (see here), but it seems that Interview magazine has other ideas. This Andy Warhol-esque cover graces the Russian edition for February, which is fitting as the Godfather of Pop Art himself was also the magazine’s founder.

Scarlett recently played another iconic star, Janet Leigh, in Hitchcock, and is currently starring as Maggie in a Broadway revival of Tennessee Williams’ play, Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.

Actress Megan Fox has been making headlines this week after a baffling interview with writer Stephen Marche, for Esquire magazine, in which he bizarrely likened her to an ‘Aztec warrior’. The piece has since been widely lampooned across the blogosphere.

Elsewhere in the article, Megan (yet again) explained why she decided to remove her Marilyn Monroe tattoo. At this point, she brought poor Lindsay Lohan (who has already suffered enough bad press to last many lifetimes) into the discussion, and everything went pear-shaped.

“She holds out her right arm to show me her tattoo of Marilyn Monroe. All that remains of Marilyn is a few drops of black against skin that is the color the moon possesses in the thin air of northern winters. She decided to get it removed, and after a single treatment the sex symbol of another age is barely recognizable. ‘I feel like I willed it be gone,’ Fox says. ‘They told me it was going to take six sessions and it’s nearly gone in one.’

The reason is that Marilyn Monroe lost control. ‘I started reading about her and realized that her life was incredibly difficult. It’s like when you visualize something for your future. I didn’t want to visualize something so negative.’

But she was a great actress, a great icon, a figure of power.

‘She wasn’t powerful at the time. She was sort of like Lindsay. She was an actress who wasn’t reliable, who almost wasn’t insurable…. She had all the potential in the world, and it was squandered,’ she says, curled defensively on the sofa. ‘I’m not interested in following in those footsteps.’

Then who?

‘Ava Gardner. She had power. She was a broad. She got what she wanted and said what she needed.’

Ava Gardner did have control, over herself and others. But even as Fox says the name, a self-aware smile plays over those ultrasymmetrical lips. Self-awareness is her most attractive feature.

It’s not like Ava Gardner ended that well, either.”

Megan responded to the article on her Facebook page:

“I attempted to draw parallels between Lindsay and Marilyn in order to illustrate my point that while Marilyn may be an icon now, sadly she was not respected and taken seriously while she was still living.

Both women were gifted actresses, whose natural talent was lost amongst the chaos and incessant media scrutiny surrounding their lifestyles and their difficulties adhering to studio schedules etc.

I intended for this to be a factual comparison of two women with similar experiences in Hollywood. Unfortunately it turned into me offering up what is really much more of an uneducated opinion.”

However, in contrast to Megan’s comments, MM was Hollywood’s most bankable star for much of her career. Her personal problems were not widely known until after her death.

Nonetheless, the comparison has been seized upon by the media, eager for any dirt on the troubled Lindsay. Another writer, Stephen Rodrick, made the Monroe comparison last week in an article about Lohan, reports the Huffington Post:

“‘There’s talent in there,’ Rodrick, who describes Lohan as ‘fragile’ and a ‘tornado’,explains to the NYT. ‘She has that undefinable It quality. You can see it at certain moments in the film. The frustrating/tragic thing, and Lindsay would be the first to admit it, is getting that talent out of her over the past few years has been nearly impossible. That’s why I called the piece The Misfits, after Marilyn Monroe’s last film, one that [Paul] Schrader and the crew were constantly talking about on set. You can’t argue that Lindsay has the talent or resume of Monroe, but there is that same feeling of talent slipping away, perhaps permanently.’”

Here’s a final word from Monroe fan Ashlee Davis:

“It bothers me to no end that these celebrities have to drag Marilyn’s character down with their loose comparisons and constant ‘channeling’ of her image. Marilyn wasn’t cheap, but her image is often sold that way, and it’s not because of her own doing – it’s because of the cheap mockery. These users take no care to respect Marilyn as a person while poorly mimicking her or even just talking about her in order to seem relevant. Lindsay Lohan, Megan Fox, Lady Gaga, Courtney Stodden – all of these women drag Marilyn’s memory through the mud when they reduce her to a visual icon, re-post fake quotes to millions of fans, and paint her as nothing more than a tragic victim of Hollywood. Any comparisons drawn between Marilyn and any of these people should be left at the fact that they are using her for visual inspiration and failing to recreate any of her natural beauty or class.”

‘American Blondes’, my essay comparing Marilyn Monroe with Lana Turner (originally posted here), is republished in the latest issue of the excellent Mad About Marilyn fanzine, which also features Marilyn’s 1956 interview with Elsa Maxwell; a profile of photographer Gene Lester; and a feature on the Moon of Baroda diamond.

If you would like to subscribe to Mad About Marilyn, please email [email protected]

Sam Shaw, photographer and friend to Marilyn, was born almost 100 years ago, on January 15, 1912. A newly relaunched Shaw Family Archives website have announced a variety of exciting projects marking this important anniversary. including: 100 Photos for Press Freedom, a magazine tribute; a statue based on Shaw’s most famous shot of Marilyn, on location for The Seven Year Itch, to be placed in the French city of Boulogne-Sur-Mer; the ongoing ‘Marilyn in New York‘ subway exhibit; and Shaw’s inclusion in the Ferragamo Museum’s Monroe exhibit, which ends on January 28th.

Interestingly, the Shaw family recently collaborated with art publisher Taschen on a tribute to James Bond. Imagine what they could do for Marilyn!

Thanks to Chris at Club Passion Marilyn

The Mexican edition of Playboy‘s latest issue features a different cover shot of Marilyn. Meanwhile, ‘Sunset Gun’ blogger Kim Morgan, whose wonderful tribute is a highlight of the magazine special, spoke to the Winnipeg Free Press about writing for Playboy, and what MM means to her.

“I wouldn’t say that I was being simply protective, though I do feel loyal towards her. I think there’s more complexity to how one approaches Marilyn, whether they know it or not, which is why she remains powerful to this day. And I mentioned Candle in the Wind briefly, a well-meaning song, in opposition to the song that runs through my piece, Bob Dylan’s She Belongs to Me, even though Dylan didn’t write it for MM. But to me, that song feels like Marilyn in all her beauty, complications, mystery and art. ‘She’s an artist.’ Marilyn was an artist.”

While I’ve said here before that I’m not Hugh Hefner’s greatest fan, we do share a liking for a certain iconic blonde. In recent years, it has become something of a tradition for Marilyn to feature in Playboy‘s Christmas issue.

‘The Nude Marilyn’ graces the December issue, due out on November 20th in the US and elsewhere thereafter. A selection of (mostly familiar) nudes and semi-nudes from Earl Moran, Tom Kelley, Lawrence Schiller and Bert Stern are included, as well as tributes by the late novelist John Updike, film critic Roger Ebert and blogger Kim Morgan (aka Sunset Gun.)

You can check out the photos on Playboy‘s website, while the article can now be viewed in its entirety at Everlasting Star (thanks to Megan.)

Joan Juliet Buck, daughter of Jules Buck – who produced an early Monroe movie, Love Nest - recalls her own sighting of Marilyn – sans girdle – in the October edition of Harper’s Bazaar in the US. (Thanks to Colby George for spotting this!)

Marilyn Monroe: Gone But Not Forgotten is a UK ‘bookazine’ special, published by Instinctive Product Development and currently on sale at WH Smith for £5.99. Photos include a few by Carl Perutz, and the text is by Jessica Bailey. Six free 7×5″ postcards and a folder are also included.

My review of Lawrence Schiller’s Marilyn & Me: A Memoir in Words and Photographs has been published in Issue 25 of the Mad About Marilyn fanzine, which also includes an in-depth profile of photographer Earl Thiesen and ‘I Dress for Men’, an article penned by Marilyn herself in 1953.

You can read my review in full here. For more details on Mad About Marilyn, contact [email protected]

Decades before Jane Fonda’s workout video inspired women worldwide to tone up, Marilyn was an early Hollywood fitness devotee, who lifted weights, jogged and followed a high-protein diet.

Her diet and fitness secrets were discussed in the Daily Mail this week. You can also read an original article by Marilyn herself, ‘How I Stay in Shape’ (from Pageant magazine, 1952) here.

Today’s San Diego Reader, and The Mirror feature vintage news reports on Marilyn’s death, while NBC has revealed a TV broadcast on the tragedy. Time has posted a variety of articles about Marilyn from their archives – some written during her lifetime.