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okay. really? okay. >> she was one of the biggest movie stars of all time. >> she had looks and sexuality, she was iconic. >> she became the goddess of the silver screen. >> people think she was the most beautiful woman in the world. >> when the camera starts until it stops, i want to be perfect. >> marilyn monroe, blonde bombshell. >> get out the fire hose. >> hollywood superstar. >> mr. president, the late marilyn monroe. >> tragic victim. >> the story of marilyn monroe is an authentic tragedy. >> it's always poor marilyn, vulnerable, passive woman being destroyed by hollywood.

that's the way the story frames her. >> after a reckoning in hollywood, it's time to reframe her story. >> now you can hit pause and roll it back a bit and ask ourselves okay, what is it that we think we know. >> she was quite ahead of her time and she was very much an architect of her own fame. >> you must think i was born yesterday. >> her performances are layered, funny, tender, human. they feel modern. >> bingo. >> she had a deep inner life. she was an artist, she was a poet, she was a business woman. >> what a power broker she was, renegotiating her contract, creating her own production company, getting films made. >> it's actually rather frustrating that people can't think about her in terms of her intellect. >> i can be smart when it's

important but most men don't like it. >> what it means to have agency as a woman and what it means to be a feminist. >> marilyn makes us ask is a woman just her body, the attitude, the political reaction. what is a woman? >> in the end the way our culture talks about marilyn monroe and thinks about marilyn monroe is what it thinks about women. ♪ this is hollywood, a place, an industry, a state of mind. here magic carpets fly. let's have a good look. >> i went to 20th century fox where ben lyon was head of casting, he said who is this

girl? >> in walked the most gorgeous young girl, 20 years old. what's your ambition, to be a film star. >> they had a color test, which was unusual, i think they had high hopes for me. >> she was to walk across the room, sit down and light a cigarette. and smile. as soon as the camera started rolling, something magical happened. >> she has this fresh-faced beauty, this luminous prettiness on the screen. >> she could manifest the kind of magic, she came into the world with it. >> ben lyon was very enthusiastic. said i looked so fresh and young. they said that i had a three dimensional quality having to do with sex. >> norma jean doherty lands a one-year contract with fox, the

studio begins grooming her for stardom. >> she was what the studios called a product. someone that they could take, mold, shape, rename and create as something to be consumed by the movie going public. >> i said i don't think you can use norma jean dougherty if you're going to be a star, to me you're a marilyn. but we couldn't find a second name. said can i use my grandma's name, what was that, monroe. marilyn monroe. >> that's the perfect name for a movie star. >> there's something about mm, the double m sounds are melodious, mellive uous.

>> this is a moment that doesn't get much attention in the story of marilyn but it's revealing. >> i wanted my mother's maiden name because i felt that rightfully was my name and true things rarely get into circulation. >> the fact she chose monroe showed she wanted agency and control over her image right from the very beginning. >> it's not only her name that gets the hollywood treatment. >> every studio had a series of publicity men that we'd called flacks, who were out promoting the star. they made up stories about them, they created opportunities to get their names in the papers. they were getting them publicized. >> and the flacks will create a rags to riches story of marilyn,

the orphan girl. >> she did a chore of babysitting, the child of a talent scout. >> that's not how had happened. she wasn't babysitting. >> it's an example of turning female ambition into something fluffy and caretaking. >> marilyn was not waiting for powerful men to find her, she was pounding on the door of the studio, doing everything she could to break into the movie business. >> what's fascinating about the creation of marilyn monroe is i think she had more of a hand in it than people want to give her credit for. >> the truth about marilyn's background is something she's happy to bury. >> marilyn isn't an orphan, she's got a mother living in a

mental health facility. but that doesn't necessarily read as well as an innocent orphan girl. >> childhood was very difficult on marilyn, she was illegitimate. and that was a terrible, terrible sin in the 1930s. she didn't know who her father was, and her mother had this horrible condition. >> her mother gladys was institutionalized when marilyn was 8 years old. >> the diagnosis that was given to marilyn's mother of paranoid schizophrenia was shameful at that time. and the idea of somebody being in an asylum is not talked about. >> marilyn is sent to the los angeles orphans home. >> they had to drag me, and i kept crying, screaming i'm not an orphan. they asked where my mother was, but they said it's better you

forget about her. she's dead. but there is one place where the young marilyn feels happy and safe. ♪ >> movie going absolutely serves during the great depression, going is sort of a mistake. and you could get a lot for a dime or a nickel. >> i watched all kinds of movies like "cleopatra" with claudette cclaudette cobert and see it over and over again. >> she would lose herself in the movies. it allowed you to dream if you could live in those movies your life would be as beautiful and problem free as they are.

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by 1941, marilyn has left the orphanage for a foster family. she's 15 years old and coming into her own. >> she began to develop a very v voluptuous body and a very pretty face. >> she said the world opened up to her and she started hearing men call out to her and the wolf whistles, but she loved it. >> again this is a little bit of home movie footage that was

taken in marilyn's last foster home. what you see is a girl who is moving exactly like a '30s model in the movies. >> we as women are constantly constructed. we construct ourselves, we k collude in it. and you have to as a woman negotiate this, even if it's unconscious, every second of your life. marilyn learned the machinery of woma womanhood very early. >> marilyn was growing up absorbing that idea that being a beautiful woman would give you power, make you rich and famous and happy and loved. >> coming into her adult woman body was both a blessing and a curse because she knew how to harness that body as a weapon

but it was also weaponized against her. >> in 1942, marilyn's life changes overnight. >> when marilyn was just past her 16th birthday she got married to a neighbor named jim dougherty who she barely knew. >> it was the idea of heea of hr mother, grace. >> grace arranged it, she and her husband were going to west virginia and they were going to put me in a home or i can marry this boy who is 21. >> she was a pragmatist. she had lived a difficult life, and that makes you a pragmatist. you look in front of you, these are my options, that looks like the best one, i'll take that one. >> marilyn doesn't have much time to get to know her new husband. >> the die is cast, america is at war. >> jim enlists in the marines and is sent to the south pacific.

across the country men and women are being asked to serve. >> in war towns all over the united states, women are called upon to leave their homes and take jobs. employers find that women can do many jobs as well as men. some jobs better. >> marilyn starts working in an aircraft factory outside of los angeles. >> there was a photographer who arrived to take pictures of the pretty girls, morale boosting shots. >> the story that marilyn told was that he came over to her and said where have you been hiding. >> i mean this is like a dream come true to her, even though she's on the assembly line, he gets to her and he takes her picture, and he kind of stopped and came back. because she was -- and he said do you have another sweater or something, can i photograph you

on your lunch hour. and she said yes, of course i do. >> the association of bombs and bombshells was literal. what is a bombshell? it's a hollow ball in which gunpowder is scored to explode. this was explosive. this was explosive sexuality. >> marilyn now has a calling card and a new ambition. >> the rambling ambassador hotel, one of the world's great hostelries and a los angeles landmark of good living. >> at the iconic ambassador hotel, 19-year-old marilyn tries her luck with the blue book modeling agency. >> norma jean looked like the girl next door. she was beautiful, a clean-cut,

american, wholesome way. >> marilyn is turning herself into a commodity and part is reflecting back on herself some sense of having worth. >> what i see is her excitement of being in front of a camera. >> this woman is so comfortable in her skin. ♪ >> it's christmas, 1945, marilyn takes a road trip, but not with her husband. >> she'd been married a few years to a guy she liked but certainly wasn't in love with. here comes this glamorous european photographer who was a man of the world. >> 32-year-old fashion photographer andre dedines. >> he's recommended to her and

immediately taken with her. so he takes her on a trip all around the southwest. >> they went into the desert, they went to old cowboy towns, they took hundreds and hundreds of photographs. >> she was working with a photographer to learn how to inject energy into pictures. not that she was saying how to make me look pretty but how do we make a good picture. >> marilyn, oh, my god, she was a pro at it. >> some of marilyn's best work was when she was just alone with a photographer she trusted and just let herself be free. >> there's a bit of a love affair that goes on between model and photographer. and you get the idea she was really wanting to give it, really wanting to turn you on, make you proud.

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here you see the world's largest motion picture studio, with its acres of sound stages spread out under the bright california sun. now let's enter the gate. >> by the end of 1946, marilyn is four months into a contract with 20th century fox. in just a year, she's gone from young model to aspiring starlet. but if she's going to break out, she will need to impress studio head darryl zanuck. >> in many ways, darryl zanuck is almost cliche of an old-school movie mogul. he's short. he's aggressive.

and he's always chomping on a cigar. this is somebody who has a reputation as being exacting, and sometimes brutal. >> it's difficult to overstate how patriarchal the hollywood studio system was in the '30s, '40s, and '50s. it was absolutely male dominated. >> at the top of every one of the big studios is a very powerful, controlling man, the people that we call moguls. louie b. mayer, jack warner, darryl zanuck. they are considered despotic monsters, and tough, tough businessmen, because they knew the things the public wanted were stars and stories. and they ran it like a factory. and they rolled those things out. four or five, six hundred of them a year. >> there were only a few large studios, and those studios made the movies, period. it was sort of like the mafia,

in that they controlled everything. >> the studio system operated a pool of aspiring talent, what they called stock contract players. >> being a contract player didn't mean that you were going to be a star. you were shuffled from one movie to the next. and often, you were a glorified extra, essentially. >> hollywood has always been a difficult place for women. hollywood treats women as disposable, as you don't bring any talent to the screen, you bring beauty. >> when you weren't working, they stuck you in front of the camera and you posed for all kinds of pin-up pictures. i didn't really feel specifically like a commodity at the time. it's only on looking back that i

see that when i was referred to as the girl. put the light on the girl, move the girl to the left. it's only when i look back on it now that i see that perhaps i was thought of as a commodity. >> i never heard a woman's brain praised in that period. that was not considered a feminine virtue. it took a while for women to be appreciated as thinking beings . >> to darryl zanuck, marilyn is nothing special. >> darryl zanuck -- basically, he didn't like marilyn. he called her straw head. he never got her message. and if a studio head doesn't like you, you got problems,

honey. >> to begin with, zanuck sees marilyn as -- i believe he said that her talent was all below her navel and above her waist. basically, that she was tits and ass, and that was it. >> if marilyn wants to keep her contract, she will have to fight for it. >> she kind of had a sort of whatever means necessary, i will find my way to this. that meant doing the right photo shoots or taking acting classes. >> she wasn't just sitting idly by waiting for the studio to tell her what to do. she was going to fox every single day. >> i said, why do you work so hard? the other kids that are on the contract sometimes i call at 11:00, 12:00, they are still sleeping from being out the night before. she said, mr. lyon, i work so hard because maybe one day opportunity will knock, and i want to be prepared.

>> and the knock comes in may 1947. marilyn lands a speaking role as evie, a waitress with a sharp tongue. >> hi, evie. >> high, small change. >> wait, i got money tonight. am i going the see you later? >> if i'm not too tired. >> but evie, i thought we had a date. >> look, this tray weighs a ton. >> she has confidence that is starting to emerge. she commands the screen when she's on it. >> oh, miss. >> she certainly has poise. you can see the beginnings of a bombshell, but nothing like the bubbliness that you would see later on. >> two double cokes. >> who's paying? >> i told you i got money. >> and now you're blowing it on two cokes. >> double. >> my, my. >> it's now up to darryl zanuck to decide whether to keep marilyn on contract.

>> there are a lot of beautiful girls in the world and marilyn is still just a bit player. he's not that fond of her. >> he thought she was just another pretty face, and they are a dime a dozen and he had literally hundreds of other girls he thought were just as pretty. >> darryl zanuck, a great spotter of stars, said no. >> and he dropped her. >> when marilyn was dropped by fox, she was devastated. but she was tenacious and vowed that she would work even harder. plop plop fizz fizz, with alka-seltzer plus cold & flu relief. also try for fizzy fast cough relief!

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released by 20th century fox, 21-year-old marilyn monroe decides to pursue another one of hollywood's biggest players. >> joe skank had a huge estate. and he would just hold saturday night parties. and a lot of people from hollywood would be there. and marilyn is invited to his parties. a lot of contract girls are. >> it was understood tacitly among the studio heads that these girls were there for the men at studios to date. and then once their contract was up, they would be discarded and in would come a fresh new crop. >> as a pretty young girl, you

learn that there's a lot of predatory men out there. our bottoms were patted. we were oh, sweet little thing, cute little thing. passes were made. >> this was completely normal in hollywood. it was something that happened all the time. it happened openly. >> i think marilyn accepted that she was going to have to date people in order to get what she wanted. and i don't think she ever should have had to choose that, but at least there was a decision in it on her part. >> marilyn knew that this party put on by joseph skank could be an opportunity to get ahead in her career. >> joseph skank was a very, very prominent, powerful man in hollywood. and he understood how to make a female movie star.

>> skank loved marilyn, thought she was amazing. and she became his favorite girl. >> marilyn knew that this was a very powerful connection to make. and the two ended up forming a sort of intimate relationship. >> she understood that you either said i don't like these rules and therefore i'm not playing your game, and therefore you give up your dreams of a career. or you recognize that those are the rules of the game, and you decide how you are going to deal with it. >> skank is on the board at 20th century fox. but instead of pulling strings with darryl zanuck to get marilyn her job back, he puts in a word with another pal. the boss of a rival studio. harry cohn, who was the head of columbia pictures introduced, understood, and manipulated the star-making process. >> cohn offers marilyn a

six-month contract. but he insists on big changes before he'll cast her in a movie. >> i think the platinum blonde was inspired by jean harlow. it was the ultimate hollywood look. the ultimate star image. it's almost unearthly. almost like an angel, with like glowing hair. >> blondness is hugely valued in american movies and culture of the time. often associated to purity and innocence, but also associated to sexiness and sometimes even pornography. >> for marilyn, the platinum was the step into a different stratosphere of like, i am now this kind of created persona. >> cohn's same formula had

transformed spanish dancer margarita cansino into hollywood star rita hayworth in the 1930s. >> she was what they would have called ethnic in those days, meaning she was latina. and they dyed her hair. she underwent electrolysis to raise her hair line so she looked more waspy. and it turned her into a huge box office star. >> hollywood studios are pressuring people to meet an ideal. in some cases, it's about enhancing beauty. in other cases, it's about wiping away ethnic traces. >> for marilyn, going blonde, it was like the hollywood star building machine. and she saw what it could do for her. >> it gave marilyn an extra charge in her looks. it took her to another level.

>> now that she looks the part, marilyn will make sure that she can play it. >> most of the stories that are told about marilyn's career, particularly in the early years, are about the role that powerful men played in her story p. but there were a couple of important women in her life as well. >> she was introduced to natasha lytess, the head of drama at columbia pictures. and they just instantly hit it off. i think natasha bringing with her a wealth of knowledge about theater was very enticing to marilyn. she wanted to get this kind of serious education about acting, about theater, and natasha was able to do that for her. >> she really saw something special in her as an actress.

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within a month of signing with columbia pictures, 21-year-old marilyn monroe lands her first starring role, as a burlesque dancer in a low-budget musical. >> this was the most demanding role that she had had yet. and it required her both to sing and dance. ♪ ♪ here to sing and dance for you ♪ >> marilyn just loved getting into the trenches there and working on her skills. >> during the musical number, i tried to be more outgoing because that's when i have to express. ♪ anyone can see i love you ♪ ♪ anyone can see i care ♪ >> it was the first time marilyn sung on screen, and she is quite remarkable. >> marilyn plays chorus girl peggy martin, who's courted by a lovestruck fan.

>> you'll be sure to send this right away, won't you? >> wouldn't you rather deliver it in person? >> no thanks, i -- miss martin? >> yes. >> it's a very sweet role. >> well, aren't you going to give me the orchid? >> the orchid? oh, yes, yes. the orchid. >> in spite of the fact that she's a sexy striptease dancer. ♪ >> one of marilyn's numbers in "the ladies of the chorus" is somewhat of a creepy song. ♪ every baby needs a da-da-daddy to keep her worry-free ♪ >> she's being positioned as a gold digger. so the idea is that every woman needs a man to support her. ♪ but where's the one for me ♪ >> what's interesting about wanting a daddy is it's twofold. it's i am brazenly sexual but

i'm really just a little girl. ♪ every baby needs a da-da-daddy could myda da-daddy be you ♪ >> she manages to be sexually attractive and the object of the male gaze in all the ways she needs to be, but she's also making fun of it. ♪ ♪ the wolves are awful hungry in our neighborhood ♪ >> and that is the moment at which marilyn discovered how this performance was going to work for her. ♪ could my da-daddy be you ♪ >> shortly after finishing "ladies of the chorus," marilyn is summoned to a meeting with the head of columbia pictures, harry cohn. >> although it was just a b movie, it was a movie and she had the main role. and so i think she probably thought that it was going to be her big break. >> but renewal of her contract comes at a price. >> harry cohn invited her onto

his yacht. and that is not a code that anybody even today requires any help deciphering. >> cohn was a major womanizer. oh, my goodness. par excellence. >> he often exploited young women. and if they didn't return his affections, then he would make their lives hell. >> she knew that if she said no to him that she would be thrown out. but she had integrity. she just asked him, will your wife join us? it was very pointed, and he was furious. and he threw her out of the office. then i think that's why he didn't renew her contract at the end of the six months. >> this is the patriarchy, this is how we do things, little girl. you want to be famous? you know, play with me.

>> it is not the case that she was simply sleeping with any powerful man that she encountered in order to get where she wanted to go. because she turned down harry cohn, who is one of the most powerful men in hollywood. >> it's not until four years later that marilyn will find the courage to speak out. in 1952 she co--authors an article with journalist flora belle murer called "wolves i have known." >> it's a great title. and that will show you a woman that came up with that title, that's a poet. >> the first real wolf i encountered should have been ashamed of himself because he was trying to take advantage of a mere kid. >> kiss me. >> her wolves are sexual predatory men, and the drawing of a wolf is often like the tongue hanging out, the eyeballs bulging, very open about the

sexual desire. [ wolf howling ] >> she already understands the idea of being hunted. >> i don't think that sexual harassment was a term in anyone's vocabulary in the 1950s. it was just something that you put up with. >> bring on the women! >> there is something very accurate about the feeling of being pursued by a wolf, how dangerous that feels. >> he gave me a script to read and told me how to pose while reading it. all the poses had to be reclining. >> although the words i was reading didn't seem to call for that position. >> she really could have faced a serious backlash because of course the powerful men didn't want to be called wolves and they didn't want their behavior to get called out. >> she exposed fissures in the

cracks of society like nobody else. and that to me is a trailblazing accomplishment. >> she said, watch out for the wolves in hollywood, honey. if they don't get what they want, they will cancel your contract. you taste my banana pudding. it's on. it's on. it's on. [laughter] ♪ ♪ i was gonna say, will you marry me? [screaming and cheering] [screaming and cheering] is my makeup messy? yes, it's messy! [laughter] ♪ ♪ [ coughing/sneezing ] dude, you coming? alka-seltzer plus powermax gels with more concentrated power. because the only thing dripping should be your style! plop plop fizz fizz with alka-seltzer plus. also try for fast sinus and pain relief! (woman 1) i just switched to verizon business unlimited. it's just right for my little business. unlimited premium data. unlimited hotspot data.

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that's the way a lot of us think about schwab's drugstore. kind of a combination office, coffee klatch and waiting room. >> immortalized in "sunset boulevard", it's a hangout every hollywood actor knows well. >> it was a place where people who wanted to break into movies could hang around, interact, exchange gossip. they would handle mail for people, people could leave messages for each other. >> we were young and struggling. we used to sit in schwab's drugstore and fantasize about the future, having the glorious careers and oscars. >> marilyn was at schwab's one day waiting for a break, and somebody told her that groucho marx was casting for a new movie. she ran to the phone booth and got on the phone, found the producer and said "i hear you're

casting. i want to get a chance at this part." >> groucho marx said that he wanted an actress who could make my elderly libido rise. he tested three different actresses. then marilyn fit the bill. >> she entered the room with so much awareness of her sexuality and willingness to have it out there. >> her role is 40 seconds, and her job is to make everyone's jaw drop. >> is there anything i can do for you what a ridiculous statement. >> i want to you help me. >> what seems to be the trouble? >> some men are following me. >> really? i can't understand why. >> she was a product of the times. you couldn't show sex in any of its sort of natural form.

>> i advise you to leave. >> i'll take you down to the bus station. oh, if i'm not back tonight, go ahead without me. >> so you've got it in this exaggerated, unnatural form. >> that's been the history of all my romances. >> she was letting the world know, she carried this aura of sexuality and everybody got it. went wow, who's that? >> eager to capitalize on marilyn's scene-stealing potential, the producers send her on a publicity tour to promote the film. >> this was to happen in the summer on the east coast, but marilyn wasn't aware that during the summer it does get very, very hot on that side of america. she believed it would be snow on the ground. >> marilyn arrives to the sweltering heat of new york, wearing a thick, wool suit. >> marilyn and the publicity agent decided to make the most of her faux pas. gave her some ice creams to hold

and a fan and photographers captured her peeking out of the train. >> on the tour, she knows exactly how to present herself and when to be funny. she's extraordinary. >> she's very, very smart about publicity and very funny. >> marilyn always seemed to know what publicists wanted, what photographers wanted. so whenever she was presented with an opportunity, she made the most of it. >> she's just slowly walking up the ladder of success. >> before leaving new york, marilyn finds time to meet with an old friend, photographer andre de dienes. >> they happened to be in the same place at the same time, so

they went to the beach and took photographs in the surf. >> since their road trip four years earlier, marilyn has transformed. she's no longer a naïve young model. she is a rising star. >> i see pure joy. you can just sort of see the comet, a little light up there in the skies is starting to twinkle. >> this is something unique. something in the way she and the camera related to each other. the camera was her lover, truly. >> people talk about these pictures as the moment when she was becoming marilyn. creating marilyn might be a more active way of putting it. she was finding her power. she was finding her talent. she was learning how to own her career.

>> becoming marilyn means that she's about to get everything that she had ever wanted. becoming marilyn is not a tragedy. it's a triumph. next on "reframed: marilyn monroe." >> her performances are like watching magic. >> she was so comedically gifted. >> she began to understand that she could fuse it with sex. >> how do you put it around your neck? tiffany's. >> are you sure they won't recognize me? >> it could have ended her career. >> she ended up being the first centerfold of "playboy". >> we are all born sexual creatures, thank god. >> it's 100,000 screaming fans. >> it's j. lo before there was

j. lo. >> the marriage of marilyn monroe and joe dimaggio. >> he felt that once they were married her sexual appeal belonged to him. >> her third husband, they, too, separated. >> marilyn monroe. >> and it's just like oh, my god. >> i think she was playing with him. >> she stood up to the old hollywood guard. >> gee. >> we're not machinery. we are not. >> women didn't make their own movies. are you crazy? >> i have director approval, and that is true. >> she got everything she wanted. >> people think "some like it hot" is the greatest comedy of all time. >> she was at the height of her success and all of the sudden the curtain came down. it's like wait a minute, the movie's not over. it's hard to know where to