Who is Marilyn Monroe?
Marilyn Monroe American film actress (June 1, 1926 – August 5, 1962), 36 years.
Marilyn Monroe was born of an unknown father and a mother suffering from psychiatric disorders, the young Norma Jean has a difficult childhood: she was sent to an orphanage and placed in foster families. Married at 16 and divorced at 20, she began as a model and was hired by Fox, which gave her small roles. Norma Jean changes her name – she becomes Marilyn Monroe (named after her maternal grandmother) – and has her hair dyed blonde.
Marilyn Monroe: the most popular sex symbol of the 1950s and early 1960s, and a symbol of the sexual revolution of that era.
Then working for Columbia and then again for Fox, the young actress stood out in When the City Sleeps, a film by John Huston, and especially in Eve by Joseph L. Mankiewicz. But it was Niagara (1952), a Hathaway film, that made her a star.
New successes followed, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes and How to Marry a Millionaire, which made cinema legend an actress who seemed destined for a lackluster career. Her apparent vulnerability and innocence, her real talent for fantasy or emotion – combined with a spontaneous sensuality that makes her a “sex symbol”, the archetype of the child vamp – quickly ensure her great popularity.
Image fabricated and fueled by Hollywood
But this image, fabricated and fueled by Hollywood, hardly corresponds to the private life of the young woman. Marilyn multiplies love failures: the marriage with Joe DiMaggio, a baseball star (1954), is followed by the one with the playwright Arthur Miller (1956) which also ends in a divorce. Despite the success of Some Like It Hot (1959), undoubtedly her most successful interpretation, Marilyn sinks into depression. After filming in the Billionaire (1960) and the Misfits (1961), she committed suicide on the night of August 4 to 5, 1962 in circumstances that are still poorly understood.
Mysteries of the elite: suicide or assassination, why is Marilyn Monroe’s death so intriguing?
Eternal icon of American cinema, the life of Marilyn Monroe continues to fascinate her fans around the world. Accident, suicide or assassination…a scent of mystery still hangs over his tragic death.
On the night of August 4 to 5, 1962, Marilyn Monroe disappeared from her home in Brentwood (Los Angeles). She was only 36 years old. She was discovered inanimate, naked in her bed, her hand on her phone, by her psychiatrist Ralph Greenson, called by the housekeeper of the actress, Eunice Murray. The medical examiner then concludes to poisoning with barbiturates and a “probable suicide”. But from this time, emerges the thesis of a plot to assassinate the star.
• Suicide
Absorbed an overdose of Nembutal pills with the intention of killing himself. This is the official version that will be given of Marilyn’s death. However, the file will never be filed.
History will remember a “probable suicide”. Apart from the suspicious factors cited above, critics of this hypothesis argue that the actress did not want to die at that time.
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• Accidental death
Another hypothesis is that this overdose of Nembutal pills was unintentional. Marilyn could have accidentally ingested too much.
Or else, another theory which seems to prevail currently – that of Donald Spoto, the author of Marilyn Monroe: the biography -: an accidental death caused by a medical error of Greenson and Murray. They allegedly administered a chloral hydrate enema (to sleep), unaware that she had previously taken Nembutal.
However, the mixture of these two substances can be fatal. Don Wolfe also talks, in Murder Investigation, about an intracardiac injection of adrenaline by Greenson which allegedly failed. A treatment gone wrong? Unless it wasn’t an accident?
• Assassination
The pathologist found no trace of a pill or powder in Marilyn’s body. She would therefore not have swallowed the Nembutal herself. Suspicion reinforced by the absence of glass next to his bed (while several empty boxes of barbiturates were there). The Nembutal would therefore have been injected into him?
• Homicide disguised as an accident or a suicide
Several theories support that this death is nothing other than a homicide disguised as an accident or a suicide. Among the sponsors, we cite the FBI or the CIA, who would have liked to silence the actress, following her relationship with John F. Kennedy, so that she does not reveal anything about the family of the American president and the White House. The young woman was also tapped and the disappearance of her telephone records might not be accidental.
Others also accuse the mafia, and more specifically Sam Giancana, with whom Marilyn had spent the evening, shortly before, at the Cal Neva Lodge in Lake Tahoe.
According to Dom Wolfe, the sponsor of the homicide is none other than Robert Kennedy himself, who would have even been present during the fatal injection administered to the actress.
According to the documentary “The Marilyn Monroe Mystery: Unpublished Conversations” directed by Emma Cooper and broadcast on Netflix from April 27, 2022, the young woman was the victim of an assassination disguised as suicide. An idea supported by numerous testimonies unveiled exclusively in the document.
After investigation, the Los Angeles medical examiner notes on his file: “Probable suicide”. His death will never be elucidated, since 1962 the thesis of homicide being invoked, incriminating the FBI or the CIA.
So many questions raised that remain unanswered and contribute to the fortification of a myth.
Sources: PinterPandai, History, Vanity Fair
Photo credit: Published by Corpus Christi Caller-Times-photo from Associated Press (Public Domain), Source: Corpus Christi Caller-Times page 20 via en:Newspapers.com via Wikimedia Commons