with a certain attitude of walking, I go shopping or just

looking at people living. But then you know, there will be a few

teenagers who are kind of sharp and they'll say, "Hey, just a

minute. You know who I think that is?" And they'll start

tailing me. And I don't mind. I realize some people want to see if

you're real. The teenagers, the little kids, their faces light up.

They say, "Gee," and they can't wait to tell their friends. And

old people come up and say, "Wait till I tell my wife." You've

changed their whole day. In the morning, the garbage men

that go by 57th Street when I come out the door say,

"Marilyn, hi! How do you feel this morning?" To me, it's an

honor, and I love them for it. The working men, I'll go by and

they'll whistle. At first they whistle because they think, oh,

it's a girl. She's got blond hair and she's not out of shape,

and then they say, "Gosh, it's Marilyn Monroe!" And that has

it's, you know, those are times it's nice. People knowing who

you are and all of that, and feeling that you've meant

something to them.

I don't know quite why, but somehow I feel they know that I

mean what I do, both when I'm acting on the screen or

when if I see them in person and greet them. That I really always

do mean hello, and how are you? In their fantasies they feel

"Gee, it can happen to me!"

But when you're famous you kind of run into human nature

in a raw kind of way. It stirs up envy, fame does. People you

run into feel that, well, who is she who does she think she is,

Marilyn Monroe? They feel fame gives them some kind of

privilege to walk up to you and say anything to you, you

know, of any kind of nature and it won't hurt your feelings. Like

it's happening to your clothing. One time here I am looking

for a home to buy and I stopped at this place. A man came

out and was very pleasant and cheerful, and said, "Oh, just a

moment, I want my wife to meet you." Well, she came out

and said, "Will you please get off the premises?" You're

always running into peoples unconscious. Let's take some

actors or directors. Usually they don't say it to me, they say it

to the newspapers because that's a bigger play. you know, if

they're only insulting me to my face that doesn't make a big

enough play because all I have to say is, "See you around,

like never." But if it's in the newspapers, it's coast to coast

and all around the world. I don't understand why people

aren't a little more generous with each other. I don't like to say

this, but I'm afraid there is alot of envy in this business. The

only thing I can do is stop and think, "I'm all right but I'm not

so sure about them!" For instance, you've read there was

some actorthat once said that kissing me was like kissing Hitler.

Well, I think that's his problem. If I have to do intimate love

scenes with somebody who really has these kinds of feelings

toward me, then my fantasy can come into play. In other

words, out with him, in with my fantasy. He was never there.

But one thing about fame is the bigger the people are, the

simpler they are, the more they are not awed by you! They

don't feel they have to be offensive, they don't feel they

have to insult you. You can meet Carl Sandburg and he is so

pleased to meet you. He wants to know about you, and you want

to know about him. Not in any way has he ever let me down.

Or else you can meet working people who want to know

what it is like. You try to explain to them. I don't like to disillusion

them and tell them it's sometimes nearly impossible. They

kind of look toward you for something that's away from their

everyday life. I guess you call that entertainment, a world to

escape into, a fantasy. Sometimes it makes you a little bit sad

because you'd like to meet somebody kind of on face value.

It's nice to be included in peoples fantasies but you also like

to be accepted for your own sake. I don't look at myself as a

commodity, but I'm sure alot of people have. Including, well,

one corporation in particular which shall be nameless. If I'm

sounding picked on or something, I think I am. I'll think I

have a few wonderful friends and all of a sudden, ooh, here it

comes. They do alot of things. They talk about you to the

press, to their friends, tell stories, and you know, it's

disappointing. These are the ones you aren't interested in seeing

everyday of your life.

Of course, it does depend on the people, but sometimes I'm

invited places to kind of brighten up a dinner table like a

musician who'll play the piano after dinner, and I know you're

not really invited for yourself. You're just an ornament.

When I was 5 I think, that's when I started wanting to be an

actress. I loved to play. I didn't like the world around me

because it was kind of grim, but I loved to play house. It was like

you could make your own boundaries. It goes beyond house,

you could make your own situations and you could pretend,

and even if the other kids were a little slow on the imagining

part you could say, "Hey, what about if you were such and

such, and I were such and such wouldn't that be fun?" And

they'd say, "Oh, yes," and then I'd say,

"Well, that will be a horse and this will be..." it was play,

playfulness. When I heard that this was acting, I said that's

what I want to be. You

can play. But then you grow up and find out about playing,

that they make playing very difficult for you. Some of my

foster families used to send me to the movies to get me out of

the house and there I'd sit all day and way into the night. Up

in front, there with the screen so big, a little kid all alone, and

I loved it. I loved anything that moved up there and I didn't

miss anything that happened and there was no popcorn either.

When I was 11, the whole world which was closed to me. I

just felt I was on the outside of the world. Suddenly,

everything opened up. Even the girls paid a little attention to me

because they thought, "Hmmm, she's to be dealt with!" And I

had this long walk to school 2 1/2 miles to school, 2 1/2 miles

back. It was just sheer pleasure. Every fellow honked his

horn you know, workers driving to work, waving, you know,

and I'd wave back. The world became friendly. All the

newspaper boys when they delivered the paper would come

around to where I lived, and I used to hang from the limb of a

tree, and I had sort of a sweatshirt on. I didn't realize the

value of a sweatshirt in those days, and then I was sort of

beginning to catch on, but I didn't quite get it, because I

couldn't really afford sweaters. But here they come with their

bicycles, you know, and I'd get these free papers and the

family liked that, and they'd all pull their bicycles up around

the tree and then I'd be hanging, looking kind of like a

monkey, I guess. I was a little shy to come down. I did get down

to the curb, kinda kicking the curb and kicking the leaves and

talking, but mostly listening. And sometimes the family used

to worry because I used to laugh so loud and so gay; I guess

they felt it was hysterical. It was just this sudden freedom

because I would ask the boys, "Can I ride your bike now?"

and they'd say, "Sure." Then I'd go zooming, laughing in the

wind, riding down the block, laughing, and they'd all stand

around and wait till I came back, but I loved the wind. It

caressed me. But it was kind of a double edged thing. I did find

too, when the world opened up that people took alot for

granted, like not only could they be friendly, but they could

suddenly get overly friendly and expect an awful lot for very

little. When I was older, I used to go to Grauman's Chinese

Theater and try to fit my foot in the prints in the cement there.

And I'd say, "Oh, oh, my foot's too big! I guess that's out." I

did have a funny feeling later when I finally put my foot down

into that wet cement. I sure knew what it really meant to

me. Anything's possible, almost.

It was the creative part that kept me going, trying to be an

actress. I enjoy acting when you really hit it right. And I

guess I've always had too much fantasy to be only a housewife.

Well, also, I had to eat. I was never kept, to be blunt about

it. I always kept myself. I have always had a pride in the fact

that I was my own. And Los Angeles was my home, too, so

when they said, "Go home!" I said, "I am home." The time I

sort of began to think I was famous, I was driving somebody

to the airport, and as I came back there was this movie

house and I saw my name in lights. I pulled the car up at a

distance down the street, it was too much to take up close, you

know, all of a sudden. And I said, "God, somebody's made a

mistake." But there it was, in lights. And I sat there and said,

"So that's the way it looks," and it was all very strange to

me, and yet at the studio they had said, "Remember you're

not a star." Yet there it is up in lights. I really got the idea I

must be a star, or something from the newspapermen, I'm

saying men, not the women who would interview me and

they would be warm and friendly. By the way, that part of

the press, you know, the men of the press, unless they have

their own personal quirks against me, they were always very

warm and friendly and they'd say, "You know, you're the

only star," and I'd say, "Star?" and they'd look at me as if I

were nuts. I think they, in their own kind of way, made me

realize I was famous.

I remember when I got the part in Gentlemen Prefer

Blondes. Jane Russell, she was the brunette in it and I was the

blonde. She got $200,000 for it, and I got my $500 a week,

but that to me was, you know, considerable. She by the way,

was quite wonderful to me. The only thing was I couldn't get

a dressing room. I said, finally, I really got to this kind of

level, I said, "Look, after all, I am the blonde, and it is Gentlemen

Prefer Blondes!" Because still they always kept saying,

"Remember, you're not a star." I said, "Well, whatever I am,

I am the blonde!" And I want to say the people, if I am a

star, the people made me a star. No studio, no person, but the

people did. There was a reaction that came to the studio, the

fan mail, or when I went to a premiere, or the exhibitors

wanted to meet me. I didn't know why. When they all rushed

toward me I looked behind me to see who was there and I

said, "My heavens!" I was scared to death. I used to get the

feeling, and sometimes I still get it, that sometimes I was

fooling somebody. I don't know who or what, maybe myself.

I've always felt toward the slightest scene, even if all I had

to do in a scene was just to come in and say, "Hi," that the

people ought to get their money's worth and that this is an

obligation of mine, to give them the best you can get from

me. I do have feelings some days when there are scenes

with alot of responsibility toward the meaning, and I'll wish,

"Gee, if only I had been a cleaning woman." On the way to

the studio I would see somebody cleaning and I'd say,

"That's what I'd like to be. That's my ambition in life. "But I

think that all actors go through this. We not only want to be

good, we have to be. You know, when they talk about

nervousness, my teacher, Lee Strasberg, when I said to him, "I

don't know what's wrong with me but I'm a little nervous,"

he said, "When you're not, give up, because nervousness

indicates sensitivity. "Also, a struggle with shyness is in every

actor more than anyone can imagine. There is a censor inside

us that says to what degree do we let go, like a child playing.

I guess people think we just go out there, and you know,

that's all we do. Just do it. But it's a real struggle. I'm one of

the world's most self conscious people. I really have to struggle.

An actor is not a machine, no matter how much they want to

say you are. Creativity has got to start with humanity and

when you're a human being, you feel, you suffer. You're

gay, you're sick, you're nervous or whatever. Like any

creative human being, I would like a bit more control so that it

would be a little easier for me when the director says, "One

tear, right now," that one tear would pop out. But once

there came two tears because I thought, "How dare he?"

Goethe said, "Talent is developed in privacy," you know? And it's

really true. There is a need for aloneness which I don't think

most people realize for an actor. It's almost having certain

kinds of secrets for yourself that you'll let the whole world in

on only for a moment, when you're acting. But everybody is

always tugging at you. They'd all like sort of a chunk of you.

They kind of like to take pieces out of you. I don't think they

realize it, but it's like "rrr do this, rrr do that." But you do

want to stay intact. Intact and on two feet.

I think that when you are famous every weakness is

exaggerated. This industry should behave like a mother whose

child has just run out in front of a car. But instead of clasping

the child to them, they start punishing the child. Like you

don't dare get a cold. How dare you get a cold! I mean, the

executives can get colds and stay home forever and phone it in,

but how dare you, the actor, get a cold or a virus. You know,

no one feels worse than the one who's sick. I sometimes

wish, gee, I wish they had to act a comedy with a

temperature and a virus infection. I am not an actress who

appears at a studio just for the purpose of discipline. This doesn't

have anything at all to do with art. I myself would like to

become more disciplined within my work. But I'm there to give a

performance and not to be disciplined by a studio! After all,

I'm not in a military school. This is supposed to be an art

form, not just a manufacturing establishment. The sensitivity that

helps me to act, you see, also makes me react. An actor is

supposed to be a sensitive instrument. Isaac Stern takes

good care of his violin. What if everybody jumped on his violin?

If you've noticed in Hollywood where millions and billions of

dollars have been made, there aren't really any kind of

monuments or museums, and I don't call putting your footprint in

Grauman's Chinese a monument, all right this did mean a lot,

sentimentally at the time. Gee, nobody left anything behind,

they took it, they grabbed it and they ran, the ones who

made the billions of dollars, never the workers.

You know alot of people have, oh gee, real quirky problems

that they wouldn't dare have anyone know. But one of my

problems happens to show, I'm late. I guess people think

that why I'm late is some kind of arrogance and I think it is

opposite of arrogance. I also feel that I'm not in this big

American rush, you know, you got to go and you got to go fast

but for no good reason. The main thing is, I want to be

prepared when I get there to give a good performance or

whatever to the best of my ability. A lot of people can be there on

time and do nothing, which I have seen them do, and you

know, all sit around and sort of chit chatting and talking trivia

about their social life. Gable said about me, "When she's

there, she's there. All of her is there! She's there to work."

I was honored when they asked me to appear at the

President's birthday rally in Madison Square Garden. There was

like a hush over the whole place when I came on to sing

Happy Birthday, like if I had been wearing a slip I would have

thought it was showing, or something. I thought, "Oh, my

gosh, what if no sound comes out!"

A hush like that from the people warms me. It's sort of like

an embrace. Then you think, by God, I'll sing this song if it's

the last thing I ever do. And for all the people. Because I

remember when I turned to the microphone I looked all the way

up and back, and I thought, "That's where I'd be, way up

there under one of those rafters, close to the ceiling, after I

paid my $2 to come into the place." Afterwards they had

some sort of reception. I was with my former father-in-law,

Isadore Miller, so I think I did something wrong when I met the

President. Instead of saying, "How do you do?" I just said

"This is my former father-in-law, Isadore Miller." He came

here an immigrant and I thought this would be one of the

biggest things in his life, he's about 75 or 80 years old and I

thought this would be something that he would be telling his

grandchildren about and all that. I should have said, "How do

you do, Mr. President," but I had already done the singing,

so well you know. I guess nobody noticed it. Fame has a

special burden, which I might as well state here and now. I don't

mind being burdened with being glamorous and sexual. But

what goes with it can be a burden. Like the man was going to

show me around but the woman said, "Off the premises." I

feel that beauty and femininity are ageless and can't be

contrived, and glamour, although the manufacturers won't like

this, cannot be manufactured. Not real glamour, it's based on

femininity. I think that sexuality is only attractive when it's

natural and spontaneous. This is where alot of them miss the

boat. And then something I'd just like to spout off on. We are

all born sexual creatures, thank God, but it's a pity so many

people despise and crush this natural gift. Art, real art,

comes from it, everything.

I never quite understood it, this sex symbol. I always thought

symbols were those things you clash together! That's the

trouble, a sex symbol becomes a thing. I just hate to be a

thing. But if I'm going to be a symbol of something I'd rather

have it sex than some other things they've got symbols of!

These girls who try to be me, I guess the studios put them up

to it, or they get the ideas themselves. But gee, they haven't

got it. You can make alot of gags about it like they haven't

got the foreground or else they haven't the background. But

I mean the middle, where you live.

All my stepchildren carried the burden of my fame.

Sometimes they would read terrible things about me and I'd

worry about whether it would hurt them. I would tell them, don't

hide these things from me. I'd rather you ask me these

things straight out and I'll answer all your questions. Don't be

afraid to ask anything. After all, I have come up from way down.

I wanted them to know of life other than their own. I used to

tell them, for instance, that I worked for 5 cents a month and

I washed one hundred dishes, and my step kids would say,

"One hundred dishes!" and I said, "Not only that, I scraped

and cleaned them before I washed them. I washed them and

rinsed them and put them in the draining place, but I said,

"Thank God I didn't have to dry them." Kids are different

from grown ups. You know when you get grown up you can

get kind of sour, I mean that's the way it can go, but kid's

accept you the way you are. Fame to me certainly is only a

temporary and a partial happiness, even for a waif and I was

brought up a waif. But fame is not really for a daily diet,

that's not what fulfills you. It warms you a bit but the warming is

temporary. It's like caviar, you know, it's good to have caviar

but not when you have it every meal every day.

I was never used to being happy, so that wasn't something I

ever took for granted. I did sort of think, you know, marriage

did that. You see, I was brought up differently from the

average American child because the average child is brought up

expecting to be happy. That's it, successful, happy, and on

time. Yet because of fame I was able to meet and marry two

of the nicest men I'd ever met up to that time.

I don't think people will turn against me, at least not by

themselves. I like people. The "public" scares me but people I

trust. Maybe they can be impressed by the press or when a

studio starts sending out all kinds of stories. But I think when

people go to see a movie, they judge for themselves. We

human beings are strange creatures and still reserve the right to think

for ourselves.

Once I was supposed to be finished, that was the end of me.

When Mr. Miller was on trial for contempt of Congress, a

certain corporation executive said either he named names and I

got him to name names, or I was finished. I said, "I'm proud

of my husband's position and I stand behind him all the

way," and the court did too. "Finished," they said. "You'll never

be heard of."

It might be a kind of relief to be finished. It's sort of like, I

don't know, what kind of a yard dash you're running, but

then you're at the finish line and you sort of see you've made

it! But you never have. You have to start all over again. But I

believe you're always as good as your potential.

I now live in my work and in a few relationships with the few

people I can really count on. Fame will go by and, so long,

I've had you fame. If it goes by, I've always known it was

fickle. So at least it's something I experienced, but that's not where I live.

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