In my second post about the online event at Julien’s Auctions, ‘Happy 99th Birthday, Marilyn!‘ – open for bids until Thursday, June 12 – I’m looking at items pertaining to Marilyn’s public image. You can read all my posts here.
These two vintage magazines reflect the highs and lows of Marilyn’s meteoric career: in 1953, Jim Henaghan’s November 1953 cover feature for Motion Picture and Television magazine depicted Marilyn as a ‘lovable fake,’ unspoiled by the trappings of fame.
Exactly seven years later in November 1960, as she reeled from a failed marriage and the troubled Misfits shoot, notorious gossip magazine Confidential crowed: ‘Marilyn can’t ignore those stories anymore.’
SOLD for $125 each
The iconic ‘skirt-blowing scene’ from The Seven Year Itch was shot over a subway grate in Manhattan, generating immense publicity. However, the original footage was unusable due to crowd noise. Bruno Bernard‘s framed photo of Marilyn and co-star Tom Ewell from the studio reshoot in a later print is signed as from ‘the estate of Bernard of Hollywood.’
SOLD for $1,170
The scene was depicted in promotional artwork for the film’s release in 1955, one of eight lobby cards on offer this week.
SOLD for $455
A newspaper clipping from London’s Evening Standard, dated July 28, 1955, with a pithy review of The Seven Year Itch by an unnamed critic – accompanied by a caricature of Marilyn by the English political cartoonist Emmwood, whose real name was John Musgrave-Wood.
SOLD for $100
And an original still photo print produced by Twentieth Century-Fox showing a scene from the movie, with Marilyn as ‘The Girl,’ a model and would-be actress, performing a live TV commercial for Dazzledent toothpaste. On the verso, an ownership stamp reads in part ‘Myrna Elizabeth Phaire / …31, N.Y.’ – a pre-1964 address.
SOLD for $455
Marilyn clutches her broken dress-strap during a press conference at New York’s Plaza Hotel on February 2, 1956, announcing her upcoming film, The Sleeping Prince. Although it has been credibly suggested that Marilyn had planned the incident, she looks genuinely agitated here. This is an original print, but the verso includes a pencilled reference to The Prince and the Showgirl, as the film was renamed for its 1957 release.
SOLD for $455
SOLD for $455
An original print with crop-marks and negative plus larger reprint, showing a demure Marilyn during a press conference held at Los Angeles Airport as she returned after a year’s absence to shoot Bus Stop for Twentieth Century-Fox on February 26, 1956.
Sold separately, three negatives with contact sheet cutouts including crop-marks, plus later prints showing Marilyn with director Billy Wilder ($1,100) and co-star Tony Curtis ($455) during a press party at the Beverly Hills Hotel ($1,625) in July 1958, as Some Like It Hot went into production.
A later print showing Marilyn on location at Coronado Beach near San Diego with Curtis and acting coach Paula Strasberg. And a single sheet (cover only) from the New York Journal-American‘s Sunday supplement, dated March 15, 1959, with a caricature by Jacques Kapralik depicting the stars of Some Like It Hot. A short blurb appears on the verso, in which Wilder says Marilyn “is all things to all people. To men she’s the super symbol of sex. Women admire her honesty.”
Beach print SOLD for $2,275
Newspaper cover SOLD for $125
Sold separately, a selection of photos and contact sheets by Manfred ‘Linus’ Kreiner: including two original prints showing Marilyn arriving by car on a press junket for Some Like It Hot in Chicago in March 1959, with two police officers reflected in the window.
SOLD for $1,300
The second photo (from a set of two) shows Marilyn with secretary May Reis, author Saul Bellow, and others in the foyer of the Ambassador East Hotel.
SOLD for $650
And at right, the Chicago Tribune‘s Sunday supplement, dated May 17, 1959, with Earl Gustie’s photos of Marilyn on the cover. Inside there’s an article by William Leonard, headlined ‘She’s No Dumb Blonde.’
SOLD for $125
Marilyn on location in Nevada for The Misfits in 1960, photographed by Eve Arnold, in a 1967 print from Magnum Photos.
SOLD for $2,925
And last for now, three original prints of Marilyn and Jose Bolanos, her date for the evening, at the Golden Globes in March 1962, where she won an award as World Film Favourite. The photos were shot by Gene Daniels and distributed by the Black Star agency for publication in Germany’s Revue magazine.
SOLD for $4,550
The Marilyn Report 