| Seen here leaning against the diving board atthe secluded Hotel Bel-Air, MARILYN MONROE poses for one of thethousands of photo sessions that she happily endured to achieve stardom.What set Monroe apart from all the other screen goddesses in film historywas her tender-hearted innocence amid all that sensuality. As history hasshown, her great success did not bring her happiness. "That's thetrouble- a sex symbol becomes a thing. I just hate being a thing,"she bemoaned. Her hoss at Fox, Daryl Zanurk. unwilling to stray from asuccessful formula, kept her typecast in the same roles. When Monroe balked.she was suspended by the studio and went to New York to study Method actingat the Actors Studio. After she married baseball's Joe DiMaggio, Zanuckagreed to give her more input in her project selections. Her comedic flairsurfaced in two Billy Wilder films, The Seven Year Itch (1955) andSome Like It Hot (1955)). Unfortunately her insecurities and dependenceon drugs, together with other personal problems, were taking a toll onher prrofessional life. In 1962, unable to remember her lines, Monroe wasreplaced by Doris Day in Something's Got To Give, and the film wasrenamed Move Over Darling. When Marilyn Monroe, the actress, diedin 1962, Marilyn Monroe, the legend, was born. | MAMIE VAN DOREN was the B-movies' platinum-blondsex kitten. Van Doren outlived all her competition and estahlished a loyalcult following with camp classics like High-School Confidential(1958), Girlstown (1959) and Sex Kittens Go To College (1960). ELIZABETH TAYLOR could not escape the animal print craze of thefifties. It was a style well suited to her image as a beautiful, pamperedfeline, alwavs on the prowl for adoration. The photograph was hyped withthe slogan "If you can't drive a Jaguar, wear one." |
