7 Facts about the Dark Biography of Marilyn Monroe — an Actress Hounded by Her Problems All Her Life

The iconic photo of the flowing dress, the cute giggle that marked her appearances in films, and the memorable day she sang Congratulations to the President of the United States himself, John F. Kennedy — Marilyn Monroe is still remembered today for the many glorious moments of her career. However, few really knew her. And despite the incredible success, shy and insecure Norma Jeane lived all the time inside the brilliant Marilyn Monroe.

O incredible.club decided to revisit the actress’s biography and prepared 7 facts that show this insecure side of her and prove that the people who lived around Marilyn didn’t know much about her – which maybe, in some way, have ruined her life. Follow!

Marilyn, or rather Norma, as the actress was called before her career, was the third daughter of Gladys Baker. However, the girl’s father was never revealed. The girl practically did not know her mother, since, shortly after her birth, she was taken in by a foster family, which was already raising several more children. Gladys lived with her foster family for a while to help raise Marilyn, but because of her job in Hollywood, she only saw her daughter on weekends. When she stabilized financially, Gladys took her daughter back to be able to raise her, but shortly afterwards, unfortunately, the mother of the future star was diagnosed with paranoid schizophrenia and spent practically the rest of her life in hospitals. Therefore, until the end of her life, Gladys had virtually no contact with Norma, who, until the age of majority, moved from family to family, even living in an orphanage.

It was due to her troubled childhood that the little girl thought about becoming an actress, since the world around her had not been so friendly to her:

“When I was 5 years old, I think that’s when I started wanting to become an actress. I liked to play. I didn’t like the world around me, because it was something unpleasant, I liked playing house. It was like I could make my own boundaries. Some of my foster families used the movie theater to get me out of the house, and there I sat in front of that big screen, alone. So I fell in love with cinema,” shared the actress.

At age 16, Marilyn had to marry her neighbor, a 21-year-old. She had to do this because the family she was living with had moved out of state, and under California law at the time, the girl could not be taken along. So, shortly after turning 16, the marriage was arranged so that she would not return to the orphanage. The actress shared that her first marriage was very calm and that she and her husband talked very little. A year after the wedding, her husband enlisted in the navy and she started working at an aircraft factory.

This work was fundamental for her career, since it was in it that the future star was noticed by a photographer who offered her a job as a model. Marilyn accepted and her career began to take off quickly: small acting contracts, a change of look, a stage name and… a divorce, her husband did not accept her new lifestyle.

A similar situation would be repeated years later in her second marriage, this time to baseball star Joe DiMaggio. The athlete had strong attacks of jealousy, which did not match the fact that he was married to one of the most desirable women of the time.

The iconic flowing dress scene in Sin Lives Next Door it was the last straw for Joe’s obsessive jealousy. Interestingly, the recording session for this scene lasted several hours and attracted a crowd of onlookers, causing even more jealousy in Joe and the marriage ending.

Marilyn’s third marriage — to director Arthur Miller — also ended in divorce. According to rumors, the director’s creative crisis contributed to the ruin of the relationship and, in addition, he felt financially dependent on his wife and Marilyn considered herself unworthy of being his muse.

Marilyn had several procedures done to improve her appearance, but coupled with her obsession with beauty, she seemed to lose more and more of herself. To make the forehead appear taller, the hairline was lifted using a special procedure. The hair was bleached to a platinum blonde hue. Dental malocclusion was corrected, along with the addition of a silicone prosthesis in the jaw and a correction of the shape of his nose was also made.

She became a beauty icon, but she was still ashamed of herself. The wife of photographer and personal friend of Marilyn, Milton Green, said:

“She suffered from dyslexia and a stutter more severe than anyone could have imagined. She was plagued all her life by horrible nightmares that contributed to her constant insomnia. She had bipolar disorder and was often out of touch with reality. And that’s not counting the fact that she constantly suffered from excruciating pain during her period due to endometriosis. She had rashes and hives, eventually contracting chronic colitis which caused her abdominal pain and nausea. She’s overcome all of that, plus the well-known problems of her childhood — a mother in a psychiatric hospital, a father she never knew, and constantly moving between foster homes and an orphanage. And then there were different medications she took to deal with the pressure of Hollywood: to calm down or to get energy.”

However, the actress discovered in herself the acting ability thanks to which everyone knew and delighted her. In minutes, she transformed from a discreet woman into an attractive one, mesmerizing everyone around her with her smile. That chameleon effect really came from someone with an innate talent for acting.

Stage fright always remained with Marylin, as she was a very shy person by nature. But even when she was already known, the actress continued to take acting courses, and behaved as modestly as possible within the student circle. That’s how Sam Kashner described it in his article Marilyn and Her Monsters🇧🇷

“She was always late for class, usually arriving before the classroom doors were locked. The teacher was strict about not letting him in in the middle of an exercise or, God forbid, in the middle of a scene. She would walk in with no makeup on, her shiny hair hidden under a scarf, and try not to draw attention to herself. She usually sat in the back of one of the dark rooms at Malin Studios on 46th Street, in the heart of the theater district. When she raised her hand to speak, she spoke in a weak and low voice. Marylin didn’t want to draw attention to herself, but it was hard for the other students not to notice that the most famous movie star in the world was in the same acting class as them.”

Even when Marilyn was already very popular, she received a small salary in relation to the size of her career. This happened because she signed a long-term contract, which was not aimed at increasing the actress’s fee, therefore, she received less attention than other stars of the same level and still could not choose who to work with and who to avoid.

Another reason for the actress’s insecurity is that Marilyn really wanted to have children, but suffered from endometriosis and that made pregnancy difficult. She had three miscarriages, but she didn’t give up hope. The fourth pregnancy has always been the subject of rumors and discussions. Photographs from the 1960s show the star with a rounded belly. At that time, it was rumored that Marilyn was not pregnant by her then-husband, director Arthur Miller, but by famous singer Yves Montand. However, what happened and why the pregnancy didn’t work remains a mystery to this day.

The image of the seductive blonde began to bore the actress, and at the height of her career she felt that she could try other, more dramatic and more serious roles. Attempting to make changes in the direction of her professional career led to several scandals with studio executives unwilling to let go of the lucrative brand that Marilyn represented.

Including, the actress had several small clashes while working on some productions. For example, when the star was filming the movie Prince Charming along with famous actor Laurence Olivier, who also served as director and producer of the feature. As it turns out, Laurence didn’t take his partner seriously and pissed her off terribly when he said, “All that’s required of you is to be attractive!” — Marilyn replied that he didn’t know how to respect actors and that he was very arrogant.

Years later, Marilyn found her own production studio, but the venture was not very successful. She realized then that in order to stay relevant in Hollywood, she had to remain a “silly blonde” and conform to the standards of that time.

The life story of the actress gave her name to a special term in psychology. Through the Marilyn Monroe syndrome, psychologists try to explain the state when a person’s emptiness and loneliness are disguised behind social success and well-being. Nobody tries to get to know that person better, because he brings a light that hides his personal pain.

The term was first used in the book Lovesick: The Marilyn Syndrome from Dr. Elizabeth Macavoy. Even before dying physically, Marilyn was already dead internally in her emptiness and loneliness – says Elizabeth in her book. Behind all the glitz, spotlights and the famous “Happy Birthday Mr. President,” in which she sang so boldly to John F. Kennedy, was a woman who had long been broken. She understood that happiness is what everyone expected to see in her movies, but her reality was selfish and disappointing.

But even so, little Norma managed to offer herself and the world an incredible artist who marked the history of cinema, who, despite having a short trajectory, inspired thousands of people around the world.

What is your favorite film by the actress? Tell us in the comments section.