Candle in the Wind

Hard to believe it's been 55 years since the Kennedys "murdered" Marilyn Monroe. Like Elvis and James Dean, she was an icon for people born in the 20th century. But do you think Generation Y will even care who she was?

Song of the Day: 'Heat Wave' by Marilyn Monroe

It's 95 degrees and rising in NYC. 

Gender-Bender Pop Star Marilyn Visits Namesake's Final Resting Place

Just made my pilgrimage to take flowers and send my love to Miss Monroe...feel really upset as it goes...gone but NEVER forgotten 💛🌟

Very touching to see Marilyn, who was fittingly born the year Norma Jean died, pay his respects at Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery. (Perhaps he can become bunkmates. The crypt above hers might be available now that the eBay bidder who "bought" it for $4.6 million had to cancel because of problems "paying.")

Marilyn -- whose comeback single, "Love or Money," is out now (order HERE) -- has been living it up in Los Angeles and Las Vegas with Culture Club the past week or two.

Wide Array of Marilyn Monroe's Personal Effects to Hit Auction Block

The New York Times reports that later this month, just before what would have been Marilyn Monroe’s 90th birthday (on June 1), a wide-ranging collection of her personal possessions will begin a worldwide tour before being auctioned later in the year. In addition to leather sandals the iconic actress wore while modeling and other luxury items, there are emotional letters and scribblings that hint at her private struggles.

“The amazing thing about these items is they’ve never been seen before in public since Marilyn passed in 1962,” said Martin Nolan, the executive director of Julien’s Auctions in Los Angeles, which is handling the collection and their auction, scheduled for November.

The items come from the estate of Lee Strasberg, the famous acting coach. He and his wife, Paula, were close with Ms. Monroe and she left her personal effects and clothing to him in her will, the auction house said in a news release.

See a slideshow HERE.

Auction details HERE.

Song of the Day: 'Heat Wave' by Marilyn Monroe

Maybe this heat isn't all bad ...

  

Marilyn Takes Manhattan

 

  I was daydreaming and accidentally got off the subway at Bryant Park instead of Rockefeller Center this afternoon on my way to work. Call it kismet, but my error was rewarded with this photo display in the station by the late film producer and photographer Sam Shaw, who was hired by Billy Wilder to shoot the film poster of "The Seven Year Itch." The subway grate is definitely a classic. But it's his other "candids" of Marilyn Monroe in the city that still leave me breathless.

London Calling

As Blondie returns to play live in London, Debbie Harry tells London Magazine why she’s happy to be an honorary Brit:

"It’s partially due to the fact that we were [first] signed to a British label, and a lot of people initially thought that we were British, so they took us to heart. We first came to London in 1975 – quite a while ago! It’s a city with so much culture to offer, and I have a lot of friends there.” 

 Read HERE.

The photo made me think Marilyn Monroe's final birthday party, although Debbie is 32 years older now.

Love, Marilyn

A new HBO documentary uses letters written by Marilyn Monroe to reveal a side of her we've never seen -- from her desire to learn to cook for Joe DiMaggio to her upbeat attitude shortly before her death. Premieres MOnday -- cannot wait. Read HERE.

M Train

Marilyn Monroe riding the New York City Subway, March 24th, 1955.

Let's Make It Legal Nonfiction

Because I know you too are wondering what was on Marilyn Monroe's reading list. Read HERE.

Don't Bother to Knock

Granted, none of us wants to die. But if you're gonna go, you should be as lucky as jazz pianist Hal Schaefer, whose obituary involves one of the best bits of Hollywood lore of all time, starring Marilyn Monroe, Frank Sinatra and Joe DiMaggio! The New York Times writes:

On Nov. 5, 1954, not long after Marilyn Monroe filed for divorce from Joe DiMaggio, DiMaggio was having dinner with Frank Sinatra when he heard, probably from a private investigator, that if he went to a certain apartment house on Waring Avenue in West Hollywood, he’d find her in the arms of another man. 

There are different accounts of what happened later that night, but what is certain is that a party of men, including DiMaggio and Sinatra, showed up at the address and someone broke down the door of the ostensible love nest, terrifying the woman who lived there, Florence Kotz — sometimes identified as Florence Kotz Ross — who was in bed by herself.

“Mrs. Ross was fast asleep about 11 p.m. when five or six men suddenly battered down the back door to her apartment, tearing it from its hinges and leaving glass strewn on the floor,” The Los Angeles Times reported, adding, “A bright flash of light was shone in her eyes and she was confronted with a number of men, some of whom seemed to be carrying an instrument which at first sight she believed to be an ax.” 

The incident, which came to be known as “the wrong door raid,” resulted in a lawsuit filed by Mrs. Ross against Sinatra, DiMaggio and four others, which was settled for $7,500. And where was Monroe? A female friend of hers claimed at the time that they had been together that evening, but years later, Hal Schaefer, a jazz pianist who was also Monroe’s vocal coach and who had become her confidant and romantic partner, admitted in interviews that he and Monroe were trysting in an apartment just a few yards away.  

"We were very close to making love; I don’t remember the stage we were at, but I would say half-dressed,” Mr. Schaefer recalled. He added: “And all of a sudden for some reason, Marilyn got these vibrations, and we went over to the window and saw this group standing across the street, one of whom was Joe DiMaggio and another was Frank Sinatra. They all came en masse and broke this door in, demolished it. We scrambled to get out the back way, and we made it, luckily.”

Keep reading HERE.

The Monroe Doctrine

  She was already long gone when I was born, yet it still seems incomprehensible that Marilyn Monroe was murdered by the Kennedys died 50 years ago today. I'm confident there will never be another star that holds our fascination the way she did. 

The Birthday Girl

Today would have been Marilyn Monroe's 86th birthday, making it 50 years since she died. (Insane.) These photos from her 36th and final birthday are just a few of Lawrence Schiller's rare and previously unseen images currently on display at the Steven Kasher Gallery in Chelsea.

Order Schiller's book, "Marilyn & Me," HERE. More photos here:

 

This I Believe ... Is the Cutest Thing I've Ever Seen!

With thanks to Kevin Sessums: Fall in love with Marilyn Monroe all over again with this extraordinary 1955 clip from Edward R. Murrow's "Person to Person," in which the blond bombshell is interviewed along with her production partner Milton Greene ("Bus Stop") and wife Amy at the Greenes' Connecticut home. "The Seven Year Itch" had just wrapped and Marilyn was living with the Greenes prior to marrying Arthur Miller. (She even made her own bed!) Marilyn talks about her new life in New York (she could actually go out semi-disguised and not be recognized!), which directors have been most important to her career and the dream magazine cover that has eluded her. This is a star!

'The Girl' Can't Help It

I had onions at lunch

I had garlic dressing at dinner

but he'll never know

'cause I stay kissing-sweet

the new Dazzledent way

He may not have been 39 and she wasn't exactly 22, but it's still one of my favorite scenes from one of my favorite movies. Can you name it?