Photo by Jackie Craig

Christmas cards and flowers were left at Marilyn’s crypt today, including a tribute from members of Immortal Marilyn, whose donations also raised $560 for the Animal Haven charity.

Marilyn revisits Van Nuys High, 1951

A young Marilyn lived in the Van Nuys area of the San Fernando Valley, just outside Los Angeles, on several occasions during 1935-43, and attended Van Nuys High School. Now the Van Nuys Neighbourhood Council are proposing to rename the new post office after her, to be discussed at the next meeting on Wednesday, December 12th at 7pm, reports Van Nuys News Press.

“‘Marilyn Monroe is an American icon, and renaming the post office after her is going to be a part of our ongoing efforts to bring light to the history of Van Nuys.  Our community has a rich heritage of which many Valley-ites are unaware.  We will also be looking into making a life-size statue of Marilyn Monroe for either the front of the post office, or along the Erwin Street Mall,’ said Thomas.”

Singer-songwriter Lana Del Rey is seen here reading a vintage copy of Arthur Miller’s The Misfits (ie the novella on which the screenplay is based), in a photo shoot for this month’s Australian Vogue.

Smash cast members Megan Hilty, Debra Messing and Christian Borle are pictured here marking the 50th anniversary of Marilyn’s death during filming of the upcoming second series.

According to Starpulse, Messing also shared a Monroe quote on Twitter: ‘A career is wonderful thing, but you can’t snuggle up to it on a cold night.’

Hilty re-tweeted the post: ‘Can we get RIP Marilyn Monroe trending worldwide? R.I.P to this beautiful icon of the 20th century! Never forgotten!’

 I have posted two tributes to Marilyn on my personal website:

Fifty Years Ago… an extract from my novel, The Mmm Girl, in which a young Marilyn visits the grave of her beloved Aunt Ana

The Smart Dumb Blonde - my review of the recent BBC radio documentary, presented by Maureen Dowd

Film critic Mick LaSalle pays tribute to Marilyn in the San Francisco Chronicle.

“Marilyn Monroe has been dead all my life, or at least all my conscious life. Yet even so, the idea still doesn’t sit right. ‘Marilyn Monroe is dead.’ That’s like saying life and joy and sex and fun are dead. How screwed up does the world have to be that it can’t even keep Marilyn Monroe alive?

One crucial aspect of her appeal, intrinsic to that combination of physical beauty and spirit that she was, is this: Marilyn makes people watching her feel that, if she knew them, she would like them. But no, it’s more than that. She makes them feel that she would see them and their true worth, their true virtue. It’s not just men who feel this. Women feel it, too, and like her. So do children.

But the times in which she lived didn’t help at all. What a wretched irony that perhaps the most desirable woman to breathe air, at least since the invention of photography, came to prominence in the one decade most likely to suffocate her, the 1950s. The ’20s, the ’30s, the ’40s, the ’60s – anything would have been better than the ’50s, with its thuggishness and prurience, its puritanism and giddy lewdness.

Even worse is the toll that the era’s guilty lust and judgment took on her. Go to YouTube, and watch Marilyn’s press conferences. Watch her eyes – as sensitive as a snail’s feelers – as they gauge, millisecond by millisecond, every hint of hostility and condescension, every tonal implication that she was some kind of idiot.

Yet if only she could have held on a few years longer. Politics, culture and social and sexual morality were about to move in her direction, to tell her, ‘Hey, kid, you’re not the one who’s crazy.’ And the aging that she dreaded? She had nothing to fear. Already in her last photos you can see what Marilyn was going to look like at 45, 50, 55. … She would have been lovely and so wise for having survived the wars.

No, in a better world, Marilyn Monroe would not be dead 50 years ago. She would be 86 years old, perhaps only now putting her affairs in order, and looking back on a life of triumph. That’s the life we keep wanting to give her, every time we see her onscreen. It’s the life that she deserved.”

The Chicago Tribune takes a look at the various ways Marilyn’s legacy has endured – through movies, TV, music, art, literature, advertising, photography and more.

“There’s a moment at the end of the promo reel for Love, Marilyn, an upcoming Marilyn Monroe documentary that will premiere at the Toronto Film Festival, when Uma Thurman, speaking in words that were written by Monroe, almost whispers these lines:

‘Please don’t talk about me when I’m gone.’

Obviously, Monroe didn’t get her wish…

…But the most substantial musical treatments could be Dan Bern’s Marilyn in which the singer-songwriter posits that her life would have been better if the author she married had been Henry Miller rather than Arthur Miller, and T Bone Burnett’s After All These Years which Burnett has said was inspired by a story he read about exhuming Monroe years after her death:

‘Was she still as alluring, still as seductive?
Could she still drive you crazy by the look on her face?
Did she still have a whisper you could hear cross an ocean?
Was she still a scandal, still a disgrace?’…

…It’s also not hard to find fake Marilyn Twitter accounts including @TheMsMonroe, which puts its approach this way: ‘It’s 1962 and Marilyn Monroe Tweets regularly.’”

‘Please don’t tweet about me when I’m gone?’“

Photo by Mr Ramano

Scott Michaels, founder of FindADeath.com and the LA-based Dearly Departed Tours, has launched a petition to have Marilyn’s star moved from the Walk of Fame on Hollywood Boulevard to Grauman’s Chinese Theatre, where her iconic handprints are sited.

“50 years after her death, Marilyn Monroe is still the biggest movie star of all time.  She is also one of the most famous people in history.

Marilyn Monroe has a star on the Hollywood Walk of Fame in front of the McDonalds restaurant on the 6700 block of Hollywood Blvd.

This particular location on the Walk of Fame is narrow, littered with spilled food and drink, and crowded with threatening and agressive panhandlers.

People come from all over the world to visit the Hollywood Walk of Fame, and it’s close to impossible to photograph Marilyn’s star..

Considering the millions of dollars Marilyn Monroe generates for Hollywood, don’t you think she deserves better than this?

Please join Scott Michaels in urging the Hollywood Chamber of Commerce to move Marilyn Monroe’s star to the front of Grauman’s Chinese Theater, one of her favorite places.

She deserve that much.”

You can sign the petition here.

John Gilmore, author of Inside Marilyn Monroe, has written a lovely tribute to Marilyn on her birthday.

“Fans rejoice that her beaming spirit so divinely captured through the magic screen has filled the years immeasurably.  The wonder of her sparkling achievements lives with us, the Marilyn the world knows and loves, and carries in their hearts; not as a lost soul careening in the constellations, but like the spirit of Mozart seizing us through his music, or Van Gogh pulling us into his dazzling, pulsing paint, right to the other side of the mirror.  No magician on earth can weave a more spectacular spell than what Marilyn bestowed of her radiance, her gentleness, and a profound, vibrant humanity.  She never has to hide again.  She is everywhere in the world.”

Read Gilmore’s essay ‘SHE’, in full at The Damned Interviews

Staff at Westwood Memorial Park, Los Angeles, noticed a number of floral tributes placed by Marilyn’s crypt on her recent birthday. The heart-shaped daisy wreath, at right, was donated by members of Immortal Marilyn, who also raised $311 for the Animal Haven charity.

Carol Channing, who first played Lorelei Lee in the Broadway musical, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, paid tribute to Marilyn’s big-screen portrayal in a rededication ceremony for MM in Palm Springs yesterday, reports Broadway World.

“Miss Channing recalled seeing Miss Monroe for the first time from the stage, ‘second row center,’ sent by the studios to watch Carol in the role she created for the Great White Way as Lorelei Lee in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Channing recalled, ‘The audience and the cast found it hard to focus on anything but Marilyn, with the possible exception of our piano player … he only asked if she had a brother.’ When asked about the role that propelled her to international acclaim going to Miss Monroe on film, Carol said ‘She created her own brilliant and unique take on Lorelei, a completely different version of this girl who brought virginity to every man she met.’”

On the eve of Marilyn’s birthday, a new waxwork has been unveiled at Madame Tussaud’s in New York, reports Broadway World.

“As part of the festivities, Madame Tussauds New York is also encouraging guests to wish Marilyn a Happy Birthday! Guests who follow and tweet @nycwax and @MarilynMonroe using the hash-tag, #HappyBirthdayMarilyn have a chance to win a Marilyn Prize Pack. Four winners will be randomly selected from eligible tweets on June 4th. Each prize pack will include Marilyn collector’s items and four tickets to Madame Tussauds New York.”

A young Marilyn in Palm Springs, 1940s

Marilyn’s star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars (first unveiled in 1995) will be rededicated on her birthday, June 1st, reports KESQ.

“The city just assembled a 26-foot-tall statue of Monroe last week and, for the June 1 star rededication, Manhattan in the Desert deli and bakery will provide a birthday cake big enough to serve 250-300 people, walk organizers said.

The ‘Forever Marilyn’ statue — it depicts the star trying to hold her dress down as it is blown up by a rush of wind from a subway vent in ‘The Seven Year Itch’ — will be unveiled Thursday at Palm Canyon Drive and Tahquitz Canyon Way.”

Saturday, May 19, marks the 50th anniversary of Marilyn’s sultry performance of ‘Happy Birthday’ to President John F. Kennedy at Madison Square Garden. And what better way to celebrate than by tasting the new ‘Presidential Bombshell’ ice cream from L.A. Creamery, reports the Contra Costa Times.

‘”We all know and love Marilyn Monroe,’ explained Stephen Bikoff, L.A. Creamery’s co-founder and chief creative officer. ’We thought, this was one of her last public appearances, and it was an interesting thing; Hollywood and politics converges into this night. We just picked a fun flavor for it, vanilla ice cream, which was Marilyn’s favorite, mixed with a truffle fudgecake because it was JFK’s birthday.’”

P.S. The Biography Channel website has also paid tribute to that historic evening…

Gossip singer Beth Ditto performed Elton John’s tribute to Marilyn, ‘Candle in the Wind’, at last night’s opening ceremony for the Cannes Film Festival.

Beth’s cream ruched dress is similar to the one worn by Marilyn in her 1952 photo session with Philippe Halsman.

Watch video here

More photos of Beth here