The film was released in November and was a box-office success. It was nominated for a record fourteen Academy Awards. Having seen her in The Asphalt Jungle and All About Eve, Hyde knew that all of his intuitive faith in Marilyn had been correct. One of the greatest accomplishments of his life was discovering Marilyn. One of his greatest tragedies was that he wouldn’t live to see her become a star.
Sometime that December, almost two years after he met her, Hyde talked to his lawyer about changing his will so that Marilyn would inherit a third of his estate. The will had yet to be drawn up by December 16, when Hyde went to Palm Springs for a short vacation before the holidays—while Marilyn was Christmas shopping in Tijuana with Natasha. The following day he suffered a massive heart attack and was rushed back to Los Angeles. Marilyn hurried to Cedars of Lebanon Hospital to be with him, only to discover that his family didn’t want her there.
To them she was simply a mistress, typical of the type, a gold digger, a homewrecker. Finally they could exercise power over her. She had no legal rights to Hyde, and they refused to let her into his room, even though as she lingered nearby in the hallway she could hear him calling for her. The following day Hyde died.
With the loss of Hyde, Marilyn went wild with grief. He was the only person in her life who loved her unconditionally and proved it every day. What would she do without him? She had been forbidden by his family to attend the services at Forest Lawn Memorial Cemetery, but that didn’t stop her. Dressed in black with a dark veil over her face, Marilyn sat in the back with Natasha. Hyde’s son Jimmy described the scene at the cemetery to biographer Fred Lawrence Guiles. “All I can recall clearly is Marilyn screaming my father’s name over and over again. It shook everyone.”
SEVEN
IMPORTANT MEETINGS
Marilyn’s reputation for being a Hollywood whore—which stuck with her among the studio men throughout her life—was solidified by her affair with Johnny Hyde and his untimely death. Shortly afterward, his family ordered Marilyn out of the Palm Drive House. She probably could have fought them, but she didn’t. She left many of her belongings behind and moved back in with Natasha.
The death of Johnny Hyde put a mystique around his young mistress—unknown by the public but notorious in the industry. The men from the party circuit—who had not showed any particular special interest in Marilyn a few months before—were suddenly red-hot for her. The fact that a man as powerful and respected as Hyde was so passionate about Marilyn Monroe gave her a level of intrigue.
What was it about this blonde that set her apart from the many other beauties Hyde came in contact with during his long career? Why was she different from the magnificent specimens in the business who had crossed paths with Hyde? Suddenly executives in the movie business had to know. Marilyn was more afraid and more vulnerable than ever before. She became a dab of honey in the center of a circle of horny bees.
One of the men who came sniffing around her was the prestigious and powerful director Elia Kazan. He was in Los Angeles with the acclaimed playwright Arthur Miller, trying to get Miller’s screenplay The Hook produced.
Kazan, who was notorious for his lust for lovely young women, had heard about the late Johnny Hyde’s delicious young mistress and wanted to find out for himself what all the fuss was about. A friend of his, the movie director Harmon Jones, was working with Marilyn on her latest small part in As Young as You Feel, another insignificant film Fox had cast her in. This gave Kazan a chance to visit the set and see Johnny’s girl for himself. He took Arthur Miller along with him.
When Marilyn appeared on the set, Kazan and Miller watched her film the scene. It was a nightclub scene, where Marilyn walked across the floor in a black dress, grabbing the attention of an older man.
After the scene Kazan asked Marilyn out to dinner: “I wouldn’t say a word. Just be with you and then take you home.” Although Marilyn refused, he was appealing to her biggest vulnerability—the fear of being alone. He was presenting himself as her greatest desire—a father. When he invited her out again a little later, Marilyn accepted.
Before saying good-bye to Marilyn, Kazan introduced her to Arthur Miller. When they shook hands, Miller would say, “the shock of her body’s motion sped through me, a sensation at odds with her sadness.” It could have been the feeling of destiny that was giving Miller such a jolt—both their lives would be altered drastically because of this brief meeting.
But it was Kazan whom Marilyn started dating. If he was expecting a fling with a sexy piece, Kazan was astonished to find much more—which he only felt comfortable enough to admit privately in a letter attempting to explain Marilyn to his wife: “You couldn’t help being touched. She was talented, funny, vulnerable, helpless, in awful pain, with no hope, and some worth and not a liar, not vicious, not catty, and with a history of orphanism that was killing to hear. She was like all Charlie Chaplin’s heroines in one.”
It wasn’t long before Kazan achieved what every man in Hollywood had been trying to do. He was having an affair with Marilyn—taking Johnny Hyde’s place in bed. At this time Marilyn, of course, needed a protector. Someone who was respected in show business. It was only an illusion that Kazan would really protect her—but for now that illusion was enough.
A few nights later Arthur Miller encountered Marilyn again, this time at the home of Charles Feldman, a Hollywood lawyer, agent, and producer who was part of the party-circuit set that passed girls around like hors d’oeuvres on a serving tray. Kazan decided not to attend the party because he had made a date with yet another woman. (He was in the land of beauties, three thousand miles away from his wife on business, and he was going to take full advantage of it.)
* * *
At the party Miller regarded Marilyn differently than the others. True, he lusted after Marilyn, but he also felt her humanity. Since most of the women at the party were more conservatively dressed, Marilyn stood out, wearing a skintight gown that—in contrast with her girlish face and innocent demeanor—seemed outlandish and vulgar.
Unlike Elia Kazan, Arthur Miller was not a great seducer. He was awkward and uncomfortable with women. But something about Marilyn made him open up. Miller sat quietly with Marilyn and told her about his life and, his frustrations, the marital dissatisfactions he was going through with his wife, Mary.
Miller had been brought up in a traditional Jewish family in Brooklyn, New York. At the age of twenty-five Miller married Mary Slattery, a woman he considered sensible but stubborn. They had two children, a boy and a girl. His life was “all conflict and tension, thwarted desires, stymied impulses, bewildering but unexpressed conflicts.” He felt he was wasting his life. Elia Kazan summed up his exasperation, “He had sex on his mind constantly. He was starved for sexual release.”
From a young age Miller was ambitious with his writing. In 1949, at the age of thirty-three, he wrote his breakout work, Death of a Salesman. Considered a masterpiece at the time, it was a tremendous hit and won him a Tony Award, the New York Drama Critics Award, and the Pulitzer Prize. Some friends noticed that with success he had become pompous and preachy, but Marilyn was turned on and took it as intelligence.
Marilyn kicked off her shoes and curled her legs under her, listening to him intently. Instead of making a pass, Miller grabbed one of her toes and held it gently. The esteemed playwright might as well have been holding her heart.
Moved by her sensitivity and eager to flatter her, Miller suggested she go back East and study acting, that she would be wonderful in the theater. Marilyn was overwhelmed that someone could envision her on Broadway. “People who were around, and heard him, laughed,” she said.
“But he said, ‘No. I’m very sincere.’”
Even though Marilyn was sleeping with Kazan at the time, Miller was indeed lusting after her. In After the Fall, his autobiographical play about his relationship with Marilyn, Miller confessed, “The first honor was that I hadn’t tried to go to bed with her! She took it for a tribute to her ‘value,’ and I was only afraid
! God, the hypocrisy!”
While Marilyn was overwhelmed that he admired her mind, Miller was flattered that she’d be available for sex. Their initial attraction was based on the fact that they were each other’s fantasy come to life.
Kazan would remain in Los Angeles for a while. Miller flew back to New York a few days earlier than planned, fleeing from his feelings for Marilyn. Marilyn and Kazan saw him off at the airport. Miller, although frustrated, was in a monogamous relationship with his wife. But he was now tortured by his desire for Marilyn. “Flying homeward, her scent still on my hands, I knew my innocence was technical merely, and the fact blackened my heart. But along with it came the certainty that I could, after all, lose myself in sensuality.”
Invigorated by Miller’s interest, Marilyn set out to improve her mind, to feel worthy and gain the respect of the intellectuals she was starting to come into contact with. “Oh, I started going to UCLA,” she explained later. “I had never finished high school. I took a course in Background in Literature. Arthur sent me a list of books I should read and I started to read to find out such things as the history of this country.”
Miller wrote to Marilyn from New York, “Bewitch them with this image they ask for, but I hope and almost pray you won’t be hurt in this game, nor ever change.”
Marilyn wrote back to Miller declaring that she needed someone to respect. “Most people can admire their fathers. But I never had one.”
In his reply, Miller didn’t encourage her to look up to him; instead he suggested she admire Abraham Lincoln, recommending that she read Lincoln’s biography by Carl Sandburg. Though overwrought with guilt over his passion, he did not discourage her from keeping open the line of communication between them.
* * *
After Johnny Hyde’s death, without anyone looking out for her career, Darryl F. Zanuck cast Marilyn in a string of very small parts in forgettable movies. For example, in We’re Not Married she’s plays Joyce, a pawn to make an almost-divorced Macdonald Carey’s wife (Claudette Colbert) jealous. In Love Nest Marilyn is a WAC who moves into her married army buddy’s new apartment building. Most likely she would have finished off the entire seven-year contract in roles like these, and a lesser personality than Marilyn would have been overlooked in these forgettable roles. Instead people walked out of the movie theaters remembering “that blonde.”
But, after a suggestion made by her journalist friend Sidney Skolsky, another studio, RKO, became very interested in Marilyn’s potential, and asked to borrow her for their production of Clash by Night—a dramatic film about working-class people in a fish-canning town. Although not a success on Broadway, Clash by Night was written by the well-respected playwright Clifford Odets.
RKO was giving the screen adaptation a first-rate production, casting Paul Douglas and Robert Ryan in the leading roles, along with Barbara Stanwyck as Mae, a fallen woman who marries for stability but has an affair with a man she finds more exciting. The great filmmaker Fritz Lang was set to direct. Marilyn had the supporting role of Peggy—the girlfriend of Mae’s macho brother, Joe. Peggy is an earthy, high-spirited young woman who tries to assert her independence in a town where men slap their women around.
Marilyn’s Peggy is part tough cookie and part vulnerable little girl—but remarkably lusty and uninhibited. She swills beer, eats with gusto, and licks her fingers. In this small part Marilyn is juicy without the usual glamour trappings. Her hair is short and curly, and she’s costumed in baggy blue jeans, a plain two-piece bathing suit, and drab dresses.
Even at this early stage in her career, Marilyn was already getting the reputation for being extremely difficult to work with. She was late every time she was called for a scene. Cast and crew members would remember the torment she went through before facing the cameras, vomiting before each call, her sensitive skin breaking out in red blotches.
Barbara Stanwyck remembered Marilyn as being awkward: “She couldn’t get out of her own way. She wasn’t disciplined, and she was often late, but she didn’t do it viciously, and there was a sort of magic about her which we all recognized at once.”
On the set, however, Stanwyck was more annoyed by Marilyn than taken by her magic. The actress Jane Russell recalled: “I was riding with the director Nick Ray on the RKO lot when we passed a girl wearing very ‘stressed’ blue jeans and a man’s shirt tied under her bosom and showing quite a lot of midriff. Nick stopped the car and said, ‘I’d like you to meet this kid.… She’s having a tough time on her picture with the lady star (Stanwyck), who is being very sarcastic to her.’” As she walked alongside, he called, “Marilyn, I want you two to meet. Jane, this is Marilyn Monroe.” Stanwyck found Marilyn’s unprofessionalism annoying, along with Natasha’s meddling. She was probably even more peeved at the media’s attention to the new blonde star.
When reporters visited the set, they would pass over the seasoned professionals, announcing: “We wanna talk to the girl with the big tits.” Marilyn resented it to a degree too, but it was expected of her, so she continued to give it.
In spite of the friction on the set, critics were surprised by Marilyn’s intelligent performance. Alton Cook wrote in the New York World-Telegram: “This girl has a refreshing exuberance, an abundance of girlish high spirits. She is a forceful actress too.… Her role here is not very big but she makes it dominant.” It was becoming more and more difficult for Zanuck and the executives at Fox to ignore the fact that Marilyn was capturing the attention of the media and the public.
* * *
Emboldened by her growing popularity, Marilyn once again decided to try to meet her father. She knew that he had bought a dairy farm in Hemet, near Palm Springs, and for moral support, she asked Natasha Lytess to drive up with her.
Marilyn brought along the latest magazine with her on the cover. During the long drive Marilyn and Natasha discussed her “father issues.” As they approached the farm, Marilyn got nervous and decided to call Gifford first.
Marilyn and Natasha pulled over to a pay phone and she shakily called the man she knew to be her father. When she had him on the line she introduced herself, Gladys’s daughter, his daughter, adding that she was “Marilyn Monroe now.…”
Gifford cut her off sharply: “Look, I’m married and I have a family. I don’t have anything to say to you. Call my lawyer.” Once again he hung up. Marilyn was devastated. Part of the reason for becoming a movie star was so that people would accept her. Now here was someone she wanted recognition from most, treating her as a nuisance. “It did her no good,” Natasha said. “It broke her heart.”
* * *
Marilyn’s career was about to explode, and the tremors were being felt all over Hollywood. It wasn’t easy for Zanuck to admit he had been so wrong about her—but the bottom line for Fox was money. If Marilyn Monroe films were going to bring the studio profits, they were going to use her. Zanuck started looking around for a film for Marilyn to follow up her serious part in Clash by Night. He decided on a very dramatic role in Don’t Bother to Knock, with a screenplay written by Daniel Taradash, based on the novel Mischief, by Charlotte Armstrong.
In Don’t Bother to Knock, Marilyn plays the part of Nell, a disturbed young woman recently released from a mental hospital, who gets a job babysitting for a wealthy couple who are staying at an upscale New York City hotel.
After Nell is spotted in the window from across the courtyard by Jed (Richard Widmark), an airline pilot who has just been dumped by his girlfriend, he shows up at her room with a bottle of rye. After some flirting, Jed becomes aware of Nell’s strange, disconnected behavior, and it becomes apparent that this damaged girl is the last person who should be caring for a child. As she retreats further and further into a psychotic fantasy world, Nell begins to believe that Jed is her fiancé who died in a plane crash over the Pacific.
From the beginning the director, Roy Ward Baker, didn’t want Marilyn for the part, feeling “she looked too beautiful and it was impossible to make her unbeautiful for the beginning.… The s
tory never would have happened to a girl who looked like Marilyn Monroe whether she was nuts or not.”
Although Zanuck was trusting Marilyn with a lead, the production surrounding the movie would be modest. Don’t Bother to Knock was to be shot inexpensively in black-and-white; all the action takes place in the interiors of the hotel; and the production had a working schedule of twenty-eight days. This meant that Baker would have to shoot quickly. Marilyn wouldn’t be able to indulge her already maddening habit of asking for many takes as she explored the character in front of the camera—with Lytess coaching from the sidelines. As a result, much of what we see in Don’t Bother to Knock is Marilyn’s performance in the first take—demonstrating that, at least at the time, she could work somewhat professionally without endless retakes.
But there was still the unusual practice of having a drama coach on the set. Marilyn wanted, needed, someone there to tell her she was performing up to par. The industry was still ambivalent about her as an actress. Natasha was solid, and Marilyn fed off of her strength.
In spite of Baker’s original misgivings, Marilyn’s performance is mostly instinctively convincing. She makes Nell’s outer layer shy and reserved as she tentatively ventures out in public, reacting with her uncle, the parents of the young girl she’s to babysit, and the child herself. Although still relatively inexperienced (and not yet acquainted with the Method style of acting she would learn at the Actors Studio), Marilyn would intuitively use the dark memories of her mother, the fears of insanity, and the basic sense of aloneness and abandonment to make the character of Nell real for her.
In the last seven minutes of the film, Marilyn does some of the best dramatic acting of her career. Her youthful face is blank with confusion. The vulnerability, the childlike wonderment and the wounded spirit, that would become a part of her screen persona, usually wrapped in sexuality, is used to convey madness.
Marilyn Monroe Page 7