10 surprising facts about the life of Marilyn Monroe
Fragmented family, stuttering, platonic relationships, millionaire clothes and even espionage. Learn about the little-known facts about the actress ...
Marilyn Monroe was a woman who conquered the hearts of her fans thanks to her beauty and artistic talent. Despite the fact that years have passed since her death, she is still remembered as one of the most enigmatic actresses in Hollywood cinema.
Her real name was Norma Jean Baker. She was born on June 1, 1926. Her life was full of successes, but also of difficult stages that forged her personality.
If you want to know more about the life of Marilyn Monroe, here are 10 surprising facts that perhaps no one had told you about her.
She spent her childhood from house to house
Marilyn's childhood was very difficult because she could not have a stable family. Her mother could not take care of her because she was admitted to a psychiatric hospital due to her schizophrenia. Her father dropped out after the divorce.
Due to this situation, little Marilyn spent her childhood with adoptive families and she lived for seasons in various orphanages until before getting married.
She got married at 16
Before she turned 16, Marilyn Monroe lived with a friend of the Grace Goddard family. However, they decided to move to West Virginia and were unable to take her.
She did not want to return to the orphanage, so she decided to take the only option she had: to get married. The actress married her neighbor 18 days after her 16th birthday. It was 20-year-old James Dougherty.
"I thought he was very young, but we talked and got along pretty well," said Dougherty after receiving the proposal.
Choosing your stage name
Norma Jean Baker chose to carry the surname Monroe because it was her mother's surname when she was single. As for Marilyn's name, a studio executive suggested that she adopt that name because of her physical resemblance to fellow actress Marilyn Miller.
No one believed that Gladys Baker was his mother
Gladys Baker, Monroe's biological mother, was absent during her daughter's childhood due to her mental health condition that led her to the mental hospital. At one time Gladys Baker worked at RKO as a movie cutter and seeing her daughter become a star, she told her friends and co-workers that she was her real mother. Due to Baker's mental background, no one believed her because they thought that statement was the work of her schizophrenic delusions.
Marilyn Monroe showed her interest in intellectual men
Monroe was a person fond of books and culture. She also showed it in the type of men she laid eyes on her. Such is the case of her marriage to the writer Arthur Miller, whom she married in 1956.
But, in addition, she Monroe had a kind of fascination for Albert Einstein, one of the most intelligent men in history. According to data from Mental Floss magazine, the actress kept a photograph of the scientist at her home.
Her house was full of microphones
The actress's home, located in Brendtwood, California, was a modest estate later acquired by the actor's marriage of Michael Irving and Veronica Hamel, following the death of Marilyn Monroe.
The microphones were discovered by the couple thanks to a home remodel, finding a sophisticated government-grade wiretapping system inside.
The value of her clothes represented a fortune
One of the dresses the actress wore had an estimated price of $ 1,267,500, which set the world record for the most expensive garment ever sold. This beautiful see-through sequin dress was the one Monroe wore to sing JFK happy birthday in 1956 and was purchased by a collection company.
As a whole, there were many garments that exceeded their prices and managed to set themselves as world records. Much of her clothes were worn by other celebrities, such as Britney Spears, who received a gift of jeans from the Tommy Hilfiger company, valued at $ 37,000.
Marilyn posed for Playboy magazine
Playboy magazine chose Marilyn to illustrate her pages with her beauty. She in fact she was chosen to launch the first issue of the magazine.
However, at that time women were not as well paid as they are now, so Monroe was paid only $ 50 for her nude photographs. These were taken in 1949 by photographer Tom Kelley, according to reports from Beliefnet magazine. The photographs were published until 1953, which was the year the first Playboy magazine appeared. Its founder, Hugh Hefner, acquired the photographs for $ 500, earning a large sum of money from the great success of the magazine's first edition.
The breakup between Marilyn Monroe and Joe Dimaggio
The second marriage of the actress to Joe Dimaggio lasted only 8 months and although the reasons for their separation are not fully known, it is very likely that one of them has to do with the "subway scene" during the filming of the movie The Seven Year Itch.
It was in this scene where, accidentally, the skirt of Monroe's dress was lifted and as the event was witnessed by a large crowd of people, her husband was upset to think that she had exposed herself by showing her charms to a large group of people. . It was precisely this image one of the most popular photographs of the actress, with which she is still remembered today. They later divorced and Monroe argued that she filed for divorce for "mental cruelty."
Marilyn Monroe was a stutterer as a child
The actress had speech problems during her childhood and part of her adolescence, but according to Vogue magazine, she was treated by a therapist who trained her to adopt the guttural style and it was precisely this style that characterized her voice as an actress, and even as a singer.
However, in her adulthood, she was presented with the same problem while she was filming the movie Something's Got to Give, which caused her to lose the role of hers by being excluded from the film.
Without a doubt, Marilyn was an actress who left her mark in the history of cinema and will always be remembered as a strong woman who broke with the schemes of the traditional woman of her time.
