Marilyn Monroe 1926-1962
Film historian F.X. Feeney has died aged 66, The Wrap reports. As well as being movie critic for LA Weekly, Feeney was an expert on Orson Welles and contributed to a number of books from art publisher Taschen, including their compact ‘Movie Icons‘ series, writing an introductory essay, Marilyn Monroe: Enchantress, for her 2006 monograph featuring images from the Kobal Collection – as reviewed by Sirkku on the Monroe Book Blog.
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
Last week, I was lucky enough to get a loan of Marilyn & Me, Lawrence Schiller’s deluxe photo book, published by Taschen. You can read my review here.
Norman Mailer’s 1973 book, Marilyn, will be reissued by Virgin Books as a paperback and e-book on July 19, reports The Bookseller. Serial rights have also been sold, though it’s not clear whether this new edition will be illustrated.
Mailer’s Marilyn is currently available via Kindle for £3.18 (see cover image above.) And Taschen’s deluxe 2011 book, Marilyn Monroe, with text by Mailer and photos by Bert Stern, is also being republished – albeit in a more affordable trade format – this July.
Lawrence Schiller, who photographed Marilyn on the set of her last film, Something’s Got to Give (and later served as art director on Norman Mailer’s Marilyn) has written a new book about his experiences.
Marilyn & Me: A Photographer’s Memories will be published in June, currently priced at £11.48 on Amazon UK. A deluxe, limited edition version from Taschen, available in May, will set you back a jaw-dropping £450.00 (or £337 from The Book Depository.)
‘”You’re already famous, now you’re going to make me famous,” photographer Lawrence Schiller said to Marilyn Monroe as they discussed the photos he was about to shoot of her. “Don’t be so cocky,” Marilyn teased, “photographers can be easily replaced.” The year was 1962, and Schiller, 24, was on assignment for Paris Match. He knew Marilyn already – they had formed a bond two years earlier when they met on the set of “Let’s Make Love” – but nothing could have prepared him for the day she agreed to appear in the nude for his camera during the swimming pool scene in “Something’s Got to Give”. Her chronic lateness and absence soon got her fired from the film, but the worldwide publicity the photographs garnered – her first nudes since the calendar she posed for as a young starlet – guaranteed she would be hired back. But this victory was truly a pyrrhic one: two weeks later, she was dead. “Marilyn & Me” is an intimate tale of a legend before her fall and a young photographer on his way to the top. Via words and pictures, Schiller takes us back to that time, and to the surprising connection that allowed a star of her stature to open up to a kid from Brooklyn with a lot of ambition but very little experience. Onset, backstage, in her dressing room, at her house, in her car, they made pictures, made deals, and talked and talked, quite intimately at times. When Schiller asked her if she always wanted to be Marilyn Monroe, she answered candidly, “I never wanted to be her – it just happened. Marilyn’s like a veil I wear over Norma Jeane.” A unique addition to the lore of Marilyn Monroe, Schiller’s is a story that has never been told before, and he tells it with tact, humor, and compassion. It is a story brought to life by the photographs he took – from those headline-grabbing nudes to the almost surreal pictures from the day of her funeral, the tragedy of her death hanging heavy in every frame. And if Schiller isn’t already famous from his work as a photographer, director, producer, and writer, this book will surely change that.’
Carrie White of the Huffington Post reports on the launch of Bert Stern’s new Marilyn book for Taschen, with text by Norman Mailer, at the Hotel Bel-Air, Los Angeles, where Stern photographed Monroe in 1962.
Guests included legendary music producer Quincy Jones, actresses Penelope Ann Miller and Julie Newmar (who played Catwoman in the cult 1960s TV series, Batman), and comedian Chris Tucker. (Interestingly, some guests were as shocked as me by the book’s $1,000 price tag!)
Stern was introduced by Lawrence Schiller, who photographed Marilyn during filming of the pool scene in the unfinished Something’s Got to Give.
While at the launch, Stern spoke to the Los Angeles Times about his memories of the shoot. The suite where he photographed Marilyn is now part of the hotel’s La Prairie Spa.
‘”I didn’t want any clothes. I wanted things — jewelry, scarves, objects,” said Stern of the Monroe session. As usual, she showed up three hours late but thinner then he had expected. The 36-year-old Monroe sipped on her favorite Dom Pérignon champagne, picked up a few scarves from off the bed and giddily danced around while Stern snapped away. “She was in a terrific mood, a lot of fun,” Stern said. “She wanted to be in Vogue.”
“She got fed up with the dresses and wanted to go back to less things,” recalled Stern, who didn’t want a glitzy showbiz photo. An admirer of Edward Steichen’s black and white portrait of Greta Garbo, he wanted something more intimate, that definitive, immortal picture.
“It was a once-in-a-lifetime event. I knew I’d never shoot her again.”‘
The Lady is best-known in the UK as a weekly magazine for upper-class women in search of a butler. It was with some surprise that I saw Marilyn on the cover this week (just click on the images below to enlarge.)
Norman Mailer‘s 1973 photo-biography, Marilyn, comes 8th in Bookfinder‘s list of the most in-demand, out-of-print books. The book was a bestseller on publication, and it is still easy to find used copies at reasonable prices. For those with money to spare, Taschen have republished Mailer’s original text in a deluxe package, with photos by Bert Stern from 1962.
Liz Smith reviewed the new, deluxe Mailer/Stern book, published by Taschen, in her column this week:
“Monroe’s admirers hope this latest batch of Bert Stern photos do her justice. Many of the 3,000-plus shots he took are iconic works of art, and deserve to be properly re-printed. Most who saw Marilyn in those final months said she had never looked so lovely — thin, fragile, but ravishing…It will be good, also, to have Norman’s words out there again, causing blood to boil.”
A new, limited edition book featuring photographs by Bert Stern and text by the late Norman Mailer will be published by Taschen in August. It is 278 pp long; 36.5 x 44 cm; hardcover, boxed with print. All 1712 copies are signed by Stern himself, and the price – wait for it – is a jaw-dropping £450.00.
A limited number of copies are now available here
