Marylin Monroe

Hello, our presentation is about Marilyn Monroe.

Norma Jean Baker, better known as "Marilyn Monroe", was born June 1st1926 in Los Angeles, CA to Gladys Baker.

Marilyn's mom, Gladys, worked as a film cutter at RKO studios.

Soon people discovered Gladys had a psychological problem and admitted her into a mental institution.

Norma Jeane spent most of her childhood in foster homes and orphanages until 1937, when she moved in with family friend Grace McKee Goddard.

Unfortunately, Grace's husband was transferred to the East Coast in 1942 and the couple couldn't afford to take 16-year-old Norma Jeane with them.

Norma Jeane had two options: return to the orphanage or get married.

She chose the last option: In June 1942, she got married to her 21-year-old neighbour Jimmy Dougherty, whom she had been dating for 6 months.

"She was a sweet, generous and religious girl," Jimmy said. "She liked to be cuddled."

Jimmy and Norma Jeane were extremely happy together until Jimmy joined the Merchant Marines and was sent to the South Pacific in 1944.

After Jimmy left, she moved in with her mother-in-law and got a job on the assembly line at the Radioplane Munitions factory in Burbank, CA.

Several months later, photographer David Conover spotted her while taking pictures of women for Yank magazine.

Yank magazine was a weekly magazine published by the United States military during World War II.

He couldn't believe his luck: she was a "photographer's dream."

Conover used her for a shoot and then began sending modelling jobs her way.

The camera loved Norma Jeane, and within two years she was a well-known model who appeared on dozens of magazine covers.

After a while Norma Jeane dyed her hair blonde because she was told that they were looking for models with lighter hair.

Norma Jeane also changed her name: she named herself Marilyn because she always loved the name..

She chose the last name Monroe because that was the last name of her beloved grandmother.

She also began studying the work of legendary actresses Jean Harlow and Lana Turner and started to participate in drama classes with dreams of stardom.

------------------------------------------- 3 minuten

However, Jimmy's return in 1946 meant Marilyn had to make another difficult choice: this time between her marriage and her career.

She chose for her career and divorced Jimmy in June 1946.

In 1946, she came to the attention of Ben Lyon, an executive at the film company 20th Century Fox, who arranged a screentest for her.

Lyon was impressed and commented, "It's Jean Harlow all over again".

Jean Harlow was a successful actrice in the 1930s.

In August that same year, Marilyn signed her first studio contract at Twentieth Century Fox.

She was offered a standard six-month contract with a starting salary of $125 per week.

After the first two years at the film company, Marylin’s contract wasn’t being renewed because she had no great success at all: she only got small roles in several B-movies.

Because of that, Marilyn returned to modeling.

She tried to find opportunities for film work, and while she was unemployed she posed for nude photographs.

In 1948 Monroe signed a six-month contract with film company Columbia Pictures, but that didn’t work out either: she only starred in a low-budget musical, Ladies of the Chorus.

The film was not a success and also this contract was not being renewed.

After that she appeared in a small role in the film Love Happy, which brought Monroe to the attention of Johnny Hyde, an agent, who agreed to represent her.

After that Hyde got Marilyn to star in two successful movies.

Because of the success in these movies, Hyde negotiated a seven-year contract for her, again at 20th Century Fox.

In March 1952, Monroe faced a scandal when one of her nude photographs from 1949 was featured in a calendar.

The press speculated about the identity of the anonymous model and said that the nude model looked a lot like Marilyn.

As the studio discussed how to deal with the problem, Monroe suggested that she should simply admit that she had posed for the photograph, but that she should tell the world that she had done so, only because she had no money to pay her rent.

Luckily, Marilyn received some sympathy for being seen as a struggling actress.

------------------------------------------- 3 minuten

Marilyn made her first appearance as an actress on the cover of a magazine called Life in April 1952, where she was described as "The Talk of Hollywood".

Another cover story was the one for True Experiences magazine, which showed a smiling Monroe and besideher picture a quote that said:

"Do I look happy? I should — for I was a child nobody wanted. A lonely girl with a dream — who awakened to find that dreams come true. I am Marilyn Monroe. Read my Cinderella story."

It was also during that time that she began dating a baseball player, Joe DiMaggio.

Two years later, in January 1954, Marilyn and Joe got married.

But during their Tokyo honeymoon, Joe was very uncomfortable with thousands of men yelling and giving attention to his new bride.

Unfortunately, Marilyn's fame and sexual image haunted their marriage.

Nine months later on Marilyn and Joe divorced.

After the divorce Marilyn decided to get into serious acting.

She moved from Hollywood to New York to study under Lee Strasberg at his Actor’s Studio.

In 1956 she started her own motion picture label, Marilyn Monroe Productions.

And this with success: in 1959 she received theGolden Globe for Best Actress in a the comedy movie some like it hot.

A few months later, Marilyn married playwright Arthur Miller.

Also their marriage stranded.

They divorced in January 1961.

To the outside world, Marilyn seemed a beautiful and happy woman, but on the inside she was very lonely.

She did not know who to trust anymore and had difficulties with herself.

On August 4th, 1962 the 36 year old Marilyn died in her sleep in Brentwood, CA.

There still are many discussions about her cause of death.

Some say it was suicide, because there were three empty bottles of sleeping pills next to her bed.

Some say that the president John F. Kennedy’s wife murdered her, because rumour had it that Marilyn had an affair with her husband.

Either way, the world was shocked.

Because of her vibrantspirit and her beauty they couldn’t believe that she was gone.

Marilyn was buried on the 8th of August.

During her career she made 30 films and left one unfinished.

She was more then a beauty queen.

The name Marilyn “Monroe” means these days: beauty, sensuality and sparkle.

Now we are going to show you a little clip of Marilyn Monroe singing Happy Birthday for the then-President of the United States, John F. Kennedy at a celebration for his forty-fifth birthday:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w3IzpazVl-I

As you can hear, Marilyn sung this song in a very sultry voice.

This was our presentation, are there any questions?

------------------------------------------- 3 minuten + film = 4,5 minuut.