In an essay, ‘Monroe and Sexuality’, published in the 1986 book, Heavenly Bodies: Film Stars and Society, the British film critic Richard Dyer discusses Philippe Halsman‘s portrait of the young Marilyn among a group of aspiring actresses (Lois Maxwell, who would later play Miss Moneypenny in the Bond movie series, is at top left.)
The photo was taken for Life magazine, as part of an article headlined ‘Eight Girls Try Out Mixed Emotions’. It was published on October 10th, 1949. Dyer mistakenly dates the photo to 1950 and assumes that it was a group portrait for 20th Century-Fox. In fact, Marilyn was not at Fox in 1949 and had only appeared in four movies.
With this minor error taken into account, Dyer’s comments are nonetheless very perceptive on why Marilyn stood out from the crowd from a very early stage in her career.
“In 1950, when Monroe had been signed to a seven-year contract with 20th Century-Fox, she was photographed for the studio with a group of other contract players by Philippe Halsman. It is not only with hindsight, because she is the only one we now recognise, that Monroe stands out. We may ascribe to Halsman the fact that Monroe is placed at the front and in the centre and looks straight to camera (rather than in the various off-screen or self-absorbed directions of the other players) and thus seems to make a direct contact with the viewer’s eyes. We could go on to ascribe the very simple, relaxed pose to Halsman, the tousled, naturally falling, uncoiffed hair to an expert hair stylist, the unfussy blouse to the wardrobe department and so on. But of course we have no way of knowing who made such decisions, Monroe or someone else; the evidence in the biographies suggests that even if others did make the decisions, it was because they had already ascribed naturalness to her in their minds; and, most important, it is unlikely that anyone seeing this photo in 1950 would have sought to identify those responsible for constructing her in an image of naturalness. Indeed, what is striking about the photo is the contrast between the very obviously contrived poses of the other players, though each a very recognisable female stereotype of the period, and the apparently artless look of Monroe that makes the others seem constructed but her seem just natural. Many other Monroe pin-ups from around this time have a similar quality, and the contrast between Monroe and the others in this photo encapsulates the more general contrast that was beginning to be apparent between her pin-ups and the other available cheesecake.”
