Marilynn Monroe -- 50 years ago

In the following piece Ron Vazzano, a writer buddy, reflects upon morning of August 5, 1962, when Marilyn Monroe was found dead.  On the same day, thousands of miles away from Brentwood California, in Tehran,  my family and I were having breakfast in our kitchen when we heard the shocking news from the radio in our kitchen.

Here is Marilynn Monroe and Ron Vazzano (what Ron says is very close to my heart)

On August 5, 1962, Marilyn Monroe was found dead in the bedroom of her Brentwood home, due to an apparent overdose of barbiturates. Whether they were taken with intent or accidentally, was said to be uncertain. But certainly on that morning as I awakened from the couch of a Staten Island bungalow to the first words of the day, “Marilyn Monroe is dead,” no one was calling it murder

Since then, many have come to believe that she was in fact murdered. It’s a belief that has arisen periodically over the past half century, whenever something newly alleged regarding the circumstances surrounding her death, comes to the forefront. That we still care, is a further testament to the place she holds in that pantheon of tragic figures that have passed through our collective memory.

As a sixteen year old boy at the time, and especially one coming of age on the streets of the Lower East Side, I should not have mourned her passing. It certainly wasn’t a macho heterosexual male thing to do. Besides, Sophia Loren was the preferred sex symbol in that Italian-American neighborhood of my youth. And when Ursula Andress would later appear that year in the first James Bond film Dr. No, and then later in a Playboy spread, (Ursula “Undress” we punned) well, now we were really talking sex.

But Marilyn was not just about sex, beauty, and stardom. She was also about a sense of innocence and vulnerability. Though I was hardly sitting there that morning contemplating that mix, and how no other person I could think of had ever wrapped all that into one persona. I was upset. And trying not to show it. And of course, persona is the operative word here. The public never really gets to know the real person.

Marilyn was also a talented actress having honed her craft at the legendary Lee Strasburg Studio over the years. A favorite performance of mine, was her role in the “Seven Year Itch.” A piece from a Muse-Letter written several years ago on the 50th anniversary of that film, is reprised here as it originally appeared.

If Marilyn were alive today she would be eighty-six; an image impossible to fathom. And one might wonder what she would have made of all the MM wannabes that have passed through our midst these last five decades in movies, music and the pop culture in general.

Where they all fall short, is that they work so hard at it. All trying to be so bombastic. All screaming out: “Look at me! Aren’t I gorgeous! Aren’t I outrageous! Aren’t I something!” And that is ultimately what might be the real secret to the long lasting appeal of Marilyn Monroe. Norma Jean Baker never seemed to be working hard at being Marilyn Monroe. She just was. And as is the case with any great work of art, it all seems so inevitable. You look and you think, “Yes. Of course.” I sensed that at sixteen. I know it now.

The Obamas, not keeping up with the Kardashians... (Read the story)

Why is Obama laughing whole heartedly? (Read the story)


I read in the news that a 41-year-old Colorado woman, Cyndy Snider, started an online petition asking the TV network E! to drop the reality show "Keeping Up with The Kardashians." This stirred my emotions. The Kardashians' reality show is a controversial issue for me and maybe for most Armenians. On one hand, I like the exposure the show gives to Armenians. On the other hand, I agree that it is mindless, and emphasizes vanity and maybe even vulgarity.  But then aren't most of today's shows mindless? 

Today Kim Kardashian is one of the most popular celebrities and the very best known Armenian in the United States or maybe in the whole world. I personally love the fact that Kim and her sisters flaunt their Armenian heritage. We Armenians, whom William Saroyan once called "a group of unimportant people," get a lot of free press through the Kardashians. As the saying goes: "There's no such thing as bad publicity." 

Didn't Marilyn Monroe make a name for herself just as Kim Kardashian is doing now?  Hasn't Monroe's legacy lasted until today? In Chicago, they just erected a 26-foot giant sculpture of her in the famous pose from "The Seven Year Itch." 

A month ago when President Obama was a guest of Jay Leno on NBC's The Tonight Show, the Kardashians were one topic of their conversation.  It was very amusing to see that the President dodged Jay Leno's question about whether the President's daughters watched "Keeping Up with The Kardashians." Finally he admitted that he'd never seen it, but the girls may have watched it without his knowledge.  It was one of the cutest conversations I remember seeing on Leno's show.