The Silver Age of Hollywood Movies, 1953: 1963 - Vol I: Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn had a simply horrible childhood. She was raised by her grandmother and mother, who were both out-and-out fruitcakes. Never once was Marilyn ever shown any maternal love by either - never hugged, never kissed, never complimented. Marilyn's mother treated her more than an unwelcome stranger than a daughter. Marilyn's fathers were all worthless bums, who played no part in her life. When Marilyn's mother finally went "around the bend," Marilyn was placed in an orphanage and was passed around to a number of families, who returned her to the orphanage whenever it became inconvenient to keep her around.

The only reason Marilyn married her 1st husband was to keep out of the orphanage. She had little in common with Jim Dougherty and when they parted, she made a number of similar bad marriage choices, being beaten black and blue regularly by the male chauvinist pig and former baseball player Joe DiMaggio and largely ignored by the playwright Arthur Miller. If Marilyn got any enjoyment out of her various marriages, they was little evidence of it.

When Marilyn reached her teenage years, she made her decision to be an actress. Although having little talent for the profession, Marilyn did have a great body and made her way to the top "on her back," sleeping with anyone who could advance her career. Her cutesy face, waddling walk, and baby-girl breathless voice typified the ideal bimbo men went wild over at that time and for no good reason other than that, she became a star. Her claim to fame was based totally on a screen presence, for she had no real acting ability. She was unable to remember a 3-word line, and would have to reshoot a scene 25 times or morebefore she was able to get it right. She was overly-sensitive and would run sobbing to her dressing room at the last little criticism. She would also regularly "pop her cookies" before going on set, so great was her fear of the camera. Unable to sleep at night, she swallowed downers by the handful and did the same thing with uppers during the day. She soon turned into both an alcoholic and drug addict.

When Marilyn hit middle age, not only did her looks and body start to go, but the cutesy airhead bimbo image she had tried so hard to cultivate was quickly becoming passé. And although Marilyn's movie career and status as a sex symbol was clearly over, her big scene was still to be played out. Marilyn had once again fallen in love with some "bad apples" and this time it was with the Kennedy brothers: Jack, the President of the United States, and Bobby, the Attorney General of the United States. They were both "hit-and-run bums," like their father, and after they had "blown Marilyn off," she was "pissed" enough to go public about what she knew about them, and she knew a lot. And that quickly brought the curtain down on Marilyn's misterble life.

Although in life Marilyn was a sexy movie star who was renowned at her time for her beauty and sexiness, ironically it was in her death that she ensured her immortality, as it became one of the great conspiracy murder-mysteries of all time. The manner of Marilyn's death elevated her to a bigger than life cult icon and guaranteed that she would not soon be forgotten, as so many other glamour girls were of her era. So turn the page and be there alongside Marilyn on her journey to immortality.