by Wendy Leigh
Martha
P.S. I meant to add that I love the Zsa Zsa nail polish trick because my hands are fiat and webed [sic] like duck’s [sic] feet, so please don’t feel bad about yours.
P.P.S. I also love our correspondence.
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* After Marilyn wrote to Jackie offering to dress up in a nurse’s uniform and surprise Jack, clearly confident that Jackie would agree to her ruse, she called Patty Renoir and begged her to send the nurse’s uniform, which she, Marilyn, had worn to audition for Lady of the Lamp. “She was talking a blue streak,” Patty recalled to her literary agent, Richard Winchester, “all about how now she was going to see ‘him,’ at last, how she was longing for him, how happy she was. Her voice was high with excitement, like a kid’s at Christmas.”
The Carlyle
Martha Marshall
The St. Regis
October 13, 1954
Dear Martha,
Thank you for your extremely kind and considerate note. I am sending this to you via messenger—they are a marvelous addition to our modern age—as well. I think it would be absolutely marvelous if you would dress up as a nurse and surprise Jack.* It would make an enormous difference to him. Of course, you could only stay for a few minutes—so as not to tire him out—but he would just adore it, I know.
The best time of the day is in the morning, as I am usually having my hair done at Helena Rubinstein and the sisters are always sleeping. That way Jack will be on his own and feeling low—so the surprise will be even greater!
You are one of the dearest, kindest people to go to so much trouble for us.
Love,
J
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* Jackie wrote in the Purple Diary, “Just hope Jack doesn’t have a coronary when he sees MM!”
The Carlyle
Martha Marshall
The St. Regis
October 14, 1954
Dear Martha,
You are a miracle worker! When I arrived at the hospital this afternoon, Jack was bright-eyed, bushy-tailed, and a completely new man.* I wish I knew how you managed it! You did more for Jack than any doctor could possibly do—and the result is a tribute to the magic of Marilyn Monroe.
Speaking of which, you never did tell me whether or not you have a replacement for Joe waiting in the wings???? Someone with your generous spirit richly deserves love and happiness.
Thank you again for making Jack so happy.
Love,
J
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* Jackie wrote in the Purple Diary, “This afternoon, when I saw Jack at the hospital, he looked so young, so fresh, so new. For a second, an unworthy thought regarding MM (and after all, she nearly did play Florence Nightingale, and we all know how she ministered to the sick and needy) flew through my mind. I ignored it, though. Or rather, as Scarlett would say, ‘I won’t think of it now,’ or ever. …”
508 North Palm Drive
Beverly Hills, California
Josephine Kendall
The Carlyle
October 21, 1954
Dear Josephine,
I wanted to write and say that I hope Jack’s operation was a success. He looked so sick that after I left him, I slipped into St. Patrick’s, lit a candle for him and prayed that he would get well fast.
Please let me know how he is, and you, too, of course.
Love,
Martha
1095 North Ocean Boulevard
Palm Beach, Florida
Martha Marshall
508 North Palm Drive
Beverly Hills, California
October 28, 1954
Dear Martha,
You are immensely kind to be so concerned about Jack’s operation, to have brightened his day and prayed for him. He is making a speedy recovery, so your prayers clearly worked. How I wish I could believe like you do!
You will be vastly amused to learn that before Jack was discharged from the hospital, one of his prospective visitors, his old flame, Grace Kelly (I don’t know whether or not you have made her acquaintance), called me.* In the course of our conversation, I told her of your brilliant ruse of dressing up as a nurse and visiting Jack in that guise. She was so beguiled by what you did, and the effect: I told her it had on him, that she promptly ordered a nurse’s uniform for her own visit! Jack, of course, was thrilled.
Now we are in Palm Beach, where he is convalescing. I spend much of my time walking on the beach, and wishing that his recovery will be permanent.
Warm regards and many thanks for your kindness and concern, J
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* Jack (perhaps to indicate to Jackie and his other conquests, that they were members of an elite group of women) was open—even boastful—regarding his premarital fling with Grace Kelly. (See Love, Jack, by Gunilla von Post [New York: Crown, 1977].)
Heymann cites how Grace dressed in a nurse’s uniform and was smuggled into the Hospital for Special Surgery by Jackie.
After Grace Kelly visited Jack in hospital, Jackie recorded in her diary, “Grace was excessively dewy-eyed over Jack and I suspect I made a bad move giving her access to him, even in this condition. For while I may play with the faint possibility that MM might be susceptible to Jack’s charms, I don’t take my musings at all seriously on that front. However, clearly Grace still carries a massive torch for him. But I’ll try not to dwell on it, especially now, when Jack is fighting for his life and all I want is for him to get strong and to survive.”
Grace continued to excite Jackie’s ire, even when Jackie was in the White House and Grace went there on an official visit. As Tish Baldrige recorded, Jack and Grace’s romance took place “before either of them was married; that, in my opinion, is why Jackie changed the White House meal in their honor from a four-hour black-tie dinner dance to a small eighty-minute-long seated luncheon—a bit of jealousy, perhaps. Princess Grace, we all noted, stood close to the president and gazed at him with adoring eyes. The photographs of the reunion made us shriek with laughter in the East Wing. She looked like a teenybopper up close to her favorite rock star.”
MARILYN MONROE
Cedars of Lebanon
Beverly Hills, California
Josephine Kendall
1954 north Ocean Boulevard
Plain Beach, florida
November 8, 1954
Dear Josephine,
It is past midnight, I can’t sleep, and my thoughts are jangling around in my head like an out-of-tune tamborine [sic]. I am still on heavy-duty painkillers, ones the hospital gave me, and some I bought along myself.
I have been very sick with endometriosis. They operated on me two days ago. Now I am terrified that I won’t ever be able to have a child. I want a child more than anything else in the world, at least, sometimes I think I do. Other times, I am afraid the child will turn out to be another Norma Jeane, unloved and unhappy like I was. Sometimes, I don’t know what will make me happy. When I first started making movies, I used to go up by the Hollywood sign, look down and think, “Someday I am going to own this town.” Tons of other girls, I know, say the same thing. Except, for me, it came true, which is part of the problem. The dream was far better than the reality.
Just now when I looked out the hospital window, there were no stars in the sky—but I know they will be shining up there another night and that gives me hope. I’ve got your last letters with me in the hospital; I just read them again, and they are so warm and friendly. In one, you asked me if I found a replacement for Joe. I didn’t answer that question then, but you are so kind and caring to worry about me, so tonight I will, although I shouldn’t. Years ago, I slept with a few men whom I didn’t love. I would be telling a lie if I said I didn’t, and although I did love Joe, no one has ever touched my heart the way one very special man has. I can’t tell you where and when I met him—it doesn’t matter and it was a long time ago, and I can’t even tell you his real name either, because I made a sacred promi
se that I would never tell another living soul. I call him Mr. G, but he can’t be a replacement for Joe, you see, because—please don’t be shocked—he is married. He is tall, dark, and handsome, has brown eyes and reminds me of Clark gable so much. But no matter how much I love him, and I do, we have no future together, only the present. He lives in Paris and comes to America a lot (to see me), but his wife (she is very small and blonde and French) is sick, and no matter how much he loves me, he can’t divorce her. I mustn’t say any more and I probably shouldn’t even have said this much, except you were kind and asked.
I never knew Jack dated Grace. If I were you and married to him, I would kill myself before I let her within a million miles of his hospital room, but then you aren’t me. You have nothing to worry about because you are married to him and she isn’t and never will be, and no Hollywood blonde will ever get him away from you, I know that.
You said you didn’t believe in religion but I thought you were Catholic, was I wrong? An orderley [sic] has just walked in—I’ll give him this to mail right away and will stop writing because I am sure you have better things to read than me.
Love,
Marilyn
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Jackie wrote in her diary, “Marilyn has made the sweetest confession—albeit when under the influence of… … … She is engaged in an illicit liaison with a mysterious tall dark stranger whom she has dubbed ‘Mr. G.’ She is obviously not talking about old Joe K, and he is clearly out of the picture, and has been for some time. So who could her mysterious illicit beau be? Could it be Sam Goldwyn? Nubar Gulbenkian? Paul Getty? Gary Cooper? She is achingly earnest about it, as in ‘I made a blood oath never to reveal a word about him, not even under torture’ sort of thing. She has such a vivid, Hollywood-style imagination. Still, I suppose I shouldn’t lake all this lightly, because, in reality, there is a wife and God knows how many children. None of whom stand a soupçon of a chance should Miss Marilyn gaze mistily and bustily in their daddy’s direction.… Little does Mrs. G, whoever she may be, know how insecure and fragile Marilyn really is.”
8336 DeLongpre Avenue
Hollywood, California
Josephine Kendall
1095 North Ocean Boulevard
Palm Bach, florida
November 9, 1954
Dear Josephine,
I am praying that you are out of town and haven’t read my last letter, or that it didn’t get to you yet* But when it does, please don’t ever read it. I just wasn’t myself when I wrote it—my brain had gone because of the painkillers—so I don’t really know what I wrote and didn’t mean any of it anyway.
Last night is fuzzy, but I remember writing for hours to you, and then begging the orderley [sic] to mail it at once. I wish to God he hadn’t. But he was trying to please me and didn’t know.
Anyway, please, please, please don’t read it. Just tear it up and, when I am not so sick, I’ll write a real letter to you instead.
Love,
Martha
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* The following morning, when she awoke from her drug-induced sleep and remembered what she had written to Jackie, Marilyn made a hysterical call to Patty Renoir, who recalled “I could hardly understand a single word. She was crying and crying. ‘I’ve ruined everything, everything. Now she’ll know. And he’ll kill me. He’ll never see me again, and she’ll never forgive me. I wish I were dead. I should be dead. Deserve it, want it, need it. Should be punished. Will be. I fuck up everything good I ever have,’ and on and on. I talked to her for about an hour, talked her down so she stopped crying and went calm again. Next time we talked, didn’t say a word to her about what she said before. Nor did she. Might as well have never happened. Then that’s how things always were with her.”
Marilyn by then must have known that her letter had crossed with Jackie and that she had no choice but to brazen out the consequences of her confession.
3321 Dent Place
Washington, D.C
Martha Marshall
8336 DeLongpre Avenue
Hollywood, California
November 12, 1954
Dear Martha,
Your letter so alarmed me that I am writing back instantly. You sound so sad and depressed, so I sincerely hope that this scarf will cheer you up a little and that you will soon be on the road to recovery.
First of all, I am absolutely convinced that you should never give up on becoming a mother. You would love, cherish, and nurture a child so deeply and make a perfect mother, so don’t lose heart.
As for my religion—I was, indeed, raised a Catholic. However, because of my parents’ divorce, I have always felt somewhat of an outsider in the society in which I live and my religion only intensified that feeling. Consequently, perhaps to my detriment, I allowed my Catholicism to lapse. Nonetheless, I believe in the precepts of the religion concerning divorce, particularly after my own experience in the aftermath of my parents’.
Your Mr. G sounds divine and I am flattered that you decided to confide in me. However, I am fearful of the consequence to your career in the eventuality that the affair ever becomes public knowledge. Although I suppose the studio would protect you from the resultant scandal. That concern aside, please don’t think that I am in the least bit shocked about your new romance with a married man.
How could I be, given the way in which my father cheated on my mother during their honeymoon, and later told me all about it, and his subsequent illicit affairs as well? My primary concern, Marilyn, is not about the morality of the situation—the heart, as we both know, beats to its own moral code—but that you may get hurt. Mr. G, I assume, is probably much older than you and, if he is anything like most men, can take good care of himself. Of course, I feel sorry for his wife, but French women are bred to endure their husbands’ infidelities, and who knows whether or not she has driven him to cheat. My mother certainly bore some responsibility for my father’s infidelity, so no doubt Mr. G’s wife does as well.
But please take care of yourself, dear Marilyn, in negotiating this perilous situation. You may be worldly on the surface, but knowing you as I do, I am profoundly aware that you can also be somewhat naïve. So I hope you will shield your heart as best you can. That said, please do not, under any circumstances, jump to the erroneous conclusion that I am judging you in any way whatsoever. Nothing is further from the truth, for I am sure that if I had never met Jack, I, too, might well have fallen prey to the blandishments of an older, experienced, married man. of some charm and sophistication. Consequently, I am certainly not judging you, nor would I ever, as I am much too fond of you. Please take great care, cherish your times with Mr. G, but do guard against giving away your entire heart to him.*
Warm regards,
Josephine
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* Jackie’s ability to guard her heart and restrain her emotions was masterly. Maria Mencher has made available to the editor her tapes of off-the-record interviews that she used for background on her groundbreaking 1977 biography of Jackie titled Jackie Unmasked (Düsseldorf: Muller Books, 1977). “During one of her trips to London to stay with Lee (shortly before Jackie married Ari) Jackie summoned one of her beaux, a lovestruck Philadelphia oil and steel millionaire named Gray Partland. He reserved a suite for them at the Ritz, and Jackie checked in at lunchtime. Partland arrived at the hotel at three, jet-lagged but wild for Jackie and desperate to see her. He strode into the suite, in a high state of passion, ready for Jackie to fling herself into his arms. But when he reached out for her, Jackie took a step back and said, ‘Wait. Not yet.’ Then, cool as a cucumber, she sat down at the dressing table and proceeded, extremely slowly, to apply her makeup. Partland watched, dumbstruck, unable to move, unable to touch her, as his desire mounted. Finally, after she had checked her makeup, Jackie got up and walked away from Partland, toward a closet. Then she took out a large picture hat, walked back to the mirror, where she spent an inordinately long time arranging the
hat to her satisfaction. By now, Partland—this six-foot-three Philadelphia oil and steel tycoon with money to burn and overwhelming charisma—had turned to Jell-O. Jackie smiled a slow smile, gave him an extremely direct look, beckoned, and said, ‘Now.’ Partland was hers forever.”
8336 DeLongpre Avenue
Hollywood, California
Josephine Kendall
1095 north Ocean Boulevard
Palm Beach, florida
November 18, 1954
Dear Josephine,
Thank, you for the beautiful gift and your kind and friendly letter. Reading it, I realize that you must have got my other letter before you knew not to open it. I am so embarrassed and hope you will forget whatever—and I still can’t remember what—stupid things I wrote in it.
The scarf you sent me is beautiful. It makes me feel so glad to know that someone—no—not someone—you—so far away still cares about me, even though I don’t deserve it. I never owned a Hermès scarf before. Doesn’t “Brides de Gala” sound romantic? I loved it so much that I called Paris, found out Hermès made one with Napoleon on it—why not Josephine? So unfair … So here it is and I hope you like it.
By the way, did you see Eisenhower’s historic first televised cabinet meeting last month? I think it is wonderful that television cameras can now bring us so close to the President. I never dreamed of seeing the President in action like that. I don’t like being on television myself—the lighting is difficult to control and the makeup is different—but I think it is wonderful that the people can see what the politicians are doing, don’t you? I’ve been a registered Democrat for as far back as I can remember and I want to know as much about our politicians and their ideals as possible.
