This would not have been received well by Mr. E. Rushworth, treasurer of the National Association of Schoolmasters, who gave a talk about women in 1954. He was disgusted when feminists started crying out for equal rights and pay with their male counterparts. Rushworth described the call as coming from “selfish career women, taking advantage of a delicate political balance.” He surmised that feminists were looking for “an increased economic superiority over their married sisters” and warned that they were about to overturn family life as they knew it. High on his list of concerns was the bizarre concept that if women were equal to men, it would mean that the latter would have to accept lower salaries. It did not seem to occur to him that women were expecting to have theirs increased.
The look of feminism has changed dramatically over the years, especially with the coming of women such as Madonna in the 1980s and even the Spice Girls in the 1990s. They showed young women and teenagers that it was okay to be strong and outspoken while still being sexy, and “girl power” became a mantra. Today, feminism is a very individual and personal aspect of a woman’s character. She can demand respect and equal rights, but at the same time be perfectly comfortable with her femininity. The popular turnout at women’s marches in recent years shows that the torch has passed down through the generations and “feminist” is now a celebrated title, which has also been embraced by modern men such as Canadian prime minister Justin Trudeau and actor Patrick Stewart. The latter became a staunch supporter of women’s rights after seeing his mother abused by his father when he was a boy. His dialogue about violence during a speech for Amnesty International has become a beacon for women.
It is clear that by today’s definition of what a feminist is, Marilyn could undoubtedly be counted as one. Filmmaker Gabriella Apicella argues this point and agrees that, today, Marilyn is most certainly an icon for female empowerment:
Throughout her short life, she experienced many of the fundamental oppressions that feminism strives to free all women from, and did so within the public eye. Her life has therefore taken on a symbolic significance in terms of how important it is to ensure women are not subjugated on the basis of their gender.
Being a survivor of child sexual abuse, receiving sexist treatment in the workplace, being challenged to sacrifice her career for marriage (causing the breakup of her first two marriages, and being an area of contention in her third), battling her employers for artistic freedom, fair pay, and respectful working conditions are all issues that many women have experienced, and continue to experience even in the twenty-first century.
In this one woman, so many areas essential to the continual fight for female emancipation are conflated. That she overcame struggles outside of any formal feminist movement, while maintaining her characteristically gentle and feminine demeanor powerfully demonstrates one of the facets of feminism that the popular media attempts to hide: that the fight for female empowerment is in some way ‘unfeminine.’
Marilyn may not be the first woman who comes to mind when thinking of feminist icons; however, as an example of a woman who was attempting to live freely, against all the odds that a repressive and abusive male-dominated society threw at her, who achieved immortality in the film industry, Marilyn Monroe deserves to be as well known for her brain and character, as she is for her face and figure.”
DESPITE THEIR IMPENDING FINAL divorce, Marilyn and Joe DiMaggio continued to remain friends. Agent Jay Kanter remembers a happy occasion when he, his wife Judy, Milton, Amy, Marilyn, and Joe were all invited by Sammy Davis Jr. to attend a charity performance he was giving at the Apollo in Harlem. The singer wanted to present his famous guests onstage, so the Greenes and Kanters all walked out first. A ripple of approval echoed around the theater, and then Marilyn appeared and the audience burst into rapturous applause. Everyone was thrilled to see the actress, but when Joe DiMaggio appeared onstage just moments later, there was a near riot of excitement. “The applause was twice as loud for him,” said Kanter. “He was a real hero in that neighborhood.”
The Seven Year Itch premiered on June 1—Marilyn’s twenty-ninth birthday—and her date once again was Joe DiMaggio. This seemed ironic, since it was this very film that had been rumored to have helped tear them apart. After the premiere, DiMaggio had organized a birthday party for Marilyn at his hangout, Toots Shor’s, and the two attended together. Inside, they were seen laughing and joking with other guests, but then the evening soured and they both left abruptly and separately. Later Marilyn told author Maurice Zolotow that a rekindling of the romance was completely out of the question. When pushed further, the actress revealed that she would like to remain friends with the baseball player, but she would absolutely never marry him again.
PREDICTABLY, THE CRITICAL RECEPTION for The Seven Year Itch was much warmer than it had been for There’s No Business Like Show Business. Film Bulletin described it as “a brilliantly produced version of the hit play, chockful of laughs and with the Monroe name insuring rousing returns in all situations…. Marilyn is a delight [and] everything about the film glitters.” Motion Picture Daily was just as complimentary: “The big achievements in humor come from the tour de force acting job turned in by Ewell and the infectious, polished performance of Miss Monroe. In this picture she has grown up a good deal as an actress and her natural beauty is enhanced as a result.”
Another positive review came from the Harrison’s Reports journal. It described The Seven Year Itch as “a top-notch sophisticated comedy, based on the highly successful stage play of the same name…. Marilyn Monroe, aside from her obvious physical attributes, is exceptionally good as the curvaceous blonde, a naïve yet knowing character who is sociable without being designing, but whose natural sexiness plays havoc with Ewell’s vow to remain a faithful husband during his wife’s absence. It is the best role Miss Monroe has had to date, and her deft handling of the characterization proves her ability as a comedienne.”
To celebrate the release, Twentieth Century Fox installed a fifty-two-foot-high cutout of Marilyn in the skirt-blowing scene in Times Square. There to unveil it was none other than TV star Roxanne, the same actress who had spectacularly criticized Marilyn to Earl Wilson in 1954. Passersby were asked what they thought of the photo, and while some expressed a desire to look just like Marilyn, others thought the whole thing was vulgar and in bad taste. The actress herself tended to agree with the latter, not because Marilyn was in the least bit ashamed, but because it was exactly the image she was trying to walk away from.
Knowing that was the case, it is not out of the question to think that possibly the executives at Fox were deliberately trying to provoke her, by displaying the giant cutout in the city Marilyn had “escaped” to. She must surely have been buoyed a few days later, though, when a poll was released that named her the tenth most admirable woman in the world. Whatever Fox thought of her, the men and women of the United States classed her inspirational enough to be on a list that included Queen Elizabeth II, Eleanor Roosevelt, and Mamie Eisenhower.
Several days after the installation of the huge cutout, builders were seen taking it down again, and people wondered if the mixed reaction was the cause. Not so, the workmen told reporters; it was merely being replaced by a photo that was more flattering. That may have been the case, but staff at Loews Theatre admitted to reporters that various complaints had been received from people who thought the picture to be in questionable taste. Whether any of these individuals was Marilyn was never revealed.
Theaters around the world thought up fun and innovative ways of publicizing The Seven Year Itch. In Miami, one cinema manager staged a contest to find the best Marilyn look-alike, one wearing the customary white dress blown around by a wind machine. The winner received an all-expenses paid holiday “at a swank hotel.” F. J. Bickler, manager of the Fox Wisconsin Theater in Milwaukee, decided to give his customers what he called a “lie detector test.” In the foyer, staff asked customers if they intended to see The Seven Year Itch. If they said no, they were then handed a s
mall folder complete with photos of the skirt-blowing scene on the cover. The notion was that if you smiled at the photo, you’d enjoy the movie too. It was a somewhat half-baked idea, but it created just the right publicity to get an audience into the auditorium.
Many theaters used large cardboard cutouts of Marilyn to advertise the film, including the Criterion in Oklahoma City, which installed a huge, forty-foot example. But the manager of Loew’s Poli Theatre in Worcester, Massachusetts, went one better. Taking an actual white skirt, he glued it onto the lower half of the cutout and used a fan to blow it skyward. The cutouts worked well until one cinema in Englewood, New Jersey, reported that theirs had been kidnapped from the foyer. It was never found, and skeptical movie magazines claimed the story was a publicity stunt.
Another theater in Portland, Oregon, allowed Marilyn fans to place their footprints in cement, just as she herself had done several years before. For fans who wished to be just like their idol, a photo of Marilyn’s footprints was there for comparison, while a radio commentator lay on the ground to record it all for posterity. In yet another cinema’s competition to find a Marilyn Monroe look-alike, the winner was given the job of riding up and down the sidewalk in a boardwalk stroller, handing out back scratchers to the public—presumably to cure their own “seven-year itch.”
Another—almost unbelievable—story came from Yankton, South Dakota, where theater manager Clyde Crump made the decision to send his customers sugar pills in little envelopes. Once opened, a note revealed the words: “Little Pills for All Your Ills! Your pill should dissolve in water for two and a half hours, during which time visit the Yankton Theater. When you return throw the pill away, because you won’t need it after seeing Marilyn Monroe in The Seven Year Itch!”
The vast and varied ways of publicizing the film were exciting for the studio and press alike. “Every day, in every way, exploitation gets better and better,” wrote a reporter for the Motion Picture Herald, “when good men use their heads, hearts and hands, to obtain results.”
It wasn’t just exhibitors who saw an opportunity, however. One enterprising tradesman decided to cash in on the scene between Marilyn and the plumber, where she gets her big toe stuck in the bathtub faucet. Teaming up with the manager of a Lexington, Kentucky, theater, George Pridemore set up a makeshift bathroom in the lobby, complete with a real-life model with her toe jammed up the faucet. Audio pumped into the venue declared, “If this ever happens to you, like it happens to Marilyn Monroe (of all people!) in The Seven Year Itch, starting tomorrow at Schine’s Kentucky, call George Pridemore Plumbing!”
Newspapers also serialized the story of the film, long after its initial release, and Sam Shaw’s photographic book, Marilyn Monroe as The Girl, helped draw in even more fans. While Marilyn would not live long enough to know it, The Seven Year Itch—along with the white, halter-neck dress she wore during the subway-grate scene—would go on to become the most iconic of all her films. Pictures of the actress standing on the grating are still used on everything from clothing, mugs, clocks, and key rings to compact mirrors and storage boxes.
Back in 1955, the publicity campaign paid off considerably. “Weekend business of Twentieth Century Fox’s The Seven Year Itch at Loew’s State was reported to have topped the house record,” reported Motion Picture Daily. “The picture pulled $50,000 for the three days, it was said, with early morning lines forming at the theater’s box office.”
The excitement surrounding the film helped the studio, theater managers, and plumbers alike, but the person most thrilled was Marilyn. While she was still anxious to never play a fluffy role again, the success of the movie gave her power and confidence like she had never had before. She was determined, therefore, to use her leverage to its full advantage.
FOR MARILYN, 1955 WAS a year for making or renewing friendships with great people. Gone were the Hollywood hangers-on, and in came a variety of writers, theater actors, poets, and even fans. Authors Truman Capote and Carson McCullers were gossip buddies, while lenswoman Eve Arnold discussed great literature while snapping her photograph.
Marilyn herself was somewhat astounded that highbrow and creative people were anxious to get to know her. When Earl Wilson told her that Lawrence Langner, founder and director of the Theatre Guild, had begged him to get her autograph, Marilyn was shocked. Not only was Langner involved with the guild, but he was also an established playwright and producer in his own right. The literary great was not too embarrassed to tell Wilson that the last time he’d asked an actress for her autograph was in 1908. He then wrote a beautiful note. “Dear Marilyn: We need you for our Shakespeare Theatre. Yours admiringly, Lawrence Langner.” He then suggested that perhaps Marilyn would act in A Midsummer Night’s Dream. “What a dream!” he wrote. Langner wasn’t the only unlikely fan. Poet Robert Frost and author Aldous Huxley were desperate to meet Marilyn, and John Steinbeck, Pulitzer Prize–winning author of The Grapes of Wrath, wrote to her in April 1955. His mission was to request an autograph for his nephew, Jon, but it was clear that after meeting her in person, he was just as impressed by Marilyn as the young fan was.
One group of admirers consisted of six youngsters who followed Marilyn wherever she went: in and out of taxis, going to the theater, walking home, going shopping—if Marilyn was doing it, they were recording it. These fans became known as the Monroe Six and christened the actress Mazzie as a term of endearment. The photographs taken by the group are remarkable. Because they were amateur snappers, there is no trace of the polished pictures so often posed for by the star. Instead, they reveal a real human being—a messy-haired, dressed-down actress, going about her life. Whereas Los Angeles provided no real opportunity for the fans to have daily access to Marilyn, Manhattan provided the polar opposite, and as time went on, she came to love the Monroe Six as her walking companions. Marilyn told columnist Hedda Hopper that the group even sent her flowers when she was ill and cut out articles for her scrapbooks.
Her fans provided a particular kind of friendship—a safety net of sorts while making her way around the city—but Marilyn also craved companionship of people with a shared interest. This was given to her by way of a rainy Manhattan day when she was out for a walk with photographer Sam Shaw. Shaw had known and photographed Marilyn many times, and she was comfortable in his company. When he suggested sheltering at the home of friends, she trusted his judgment and happily went along. When the door was opened into the apartment of Norman and Hedda Rosten, a cold and wet Marilyn was quickly introduced as Marion and shown to the living room to dry off. Over the course of the afternoon, the Rostens and their visitor spoke about poetry, the couple’s daughter, their lives, and finally careers. Marilyn explained that she was an actress, but even at that point in time, neither Hedda nor Norman recognized her. It was not until “Marion” told them her stage name was Marilyn Monroe that they finally realized it.
The friendship between Marilyn and the Rostens grew quickly, and they would often spend the weekend on Long Island together, talking about books, playing badminton, drinking champagne, and enjoying each other’s company. Marilyn also attended various events with Norman and Hedda, either alone or together, such as a performance by pianist Emil Giles at Carnegie Hall. On that particular occasion, Norman and Marilyn went alone and at the intermission they spoke to Giles himself. He seemed enamored of her and insisted that one day she must visit Russia. Marilyn assured him she would and then they spoke about Dostoyevsky.
When Rosten adapted Joyce Cary’s book Mister Johnston into a play, Marilyn volunteered straightaway to become an investor. It wasn’t a huge success, but it gave actor Earle Hyman the vital stage experience he needed to become a member of the Actors Studio. There, he encountered Marilyn and she took him under her wing, welcoming him warmly and even raising her hand to defend his talents when another actor criticized him. “I thought she was extremely brave to stand up and say that and I never forgot it,” he said.
The friendship of Norman Rosten and his family was quite significa
nt to Marilyn. The Rostens provided security, welcomed her into their home, and genuinely cared about her. The actress adored the happiness her New York friends brought into her life: “For the first time I felt accepted, not as a freak, but as myself,” she said. The fact that Norman was a poet was an added bonus. For many years, Marilyn had enjoyed writing poetry, and although it was a deeply personal subject to her, she had spoken briefly about it in 1951: “You get such wonderful thoughts and ideas at night when you are alone. I like to let my moods come and go then—and that’s when I like to write poetry.” In another interview from the same period she admitted, “My poems are kind of sad, but then so is life.”
During small gatherings at the Rosten house, there would sometimes be impromptu poetry readings. Rosten remembered that Marilyn once read a W. B. Yeats poem titled “Never Give All the Heart.” The words seemed to mesmerize her:
Never give all the heart, for love
Will hardly seem worth thinking of
To passionate women if it seem
Certain, and they never dream
That it fades out from kiss to kiss;
For everything that’s lovely is
But a brief, dreamy, kind delight.
O never give the heart outright,
For they, for all smooth lips can say
Have given their hearts up to the play.
And who could play it well enough
If deaf and dumb and blind with love?
He that made this knows all the cost
For he gave all his heart and lost.
She read it slowly and with great thought to every word. When she had finished, the whole room was quiet, and the actress looked to be in a world of her own.
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