The Last Days of Marilyn Monroe (42 page)

Sinatra was in the process of acquiring the Cal-Neva Lodge with partners Sam Giancana and Mickey Rudin. The manager was to be Skinny D'Amato, fixer of the West Virginia primaries and former pit boss of the Havana Thunderbird for Giancana. For many years Cal-Neva had been one of the favorite haunts of Joe Kennedy, who had often vacationed there with Janet Des Rosier. Following Jack Kennedy's nomination at the Democratic convention, Joe Kennedy went to Cal-Neva for a two-week working holiday while laying plans for the campaign with Sinatra and Giancana.

According to Senator George Smathers, things weren't going well between Marilyn and Jack Kennedy. Now that Kennedy had won the nomination, Marilyn's silence about her relationship with the presidential candidate became vital. Smathers stated that an effort was made to “talk to Marilyn Monroe about putting a bridle on herself and on her mouth and not talking too much, because it was getting to be a story around the country.”

Whatever occurred at Cal-Neva had its devastating effect on Marilyn in the following days on location in Reno, when she returned to the professional agony of filming
The Misfits
. Cameraman Russell Metty told Huston that they couldn't shoot close-ups because Marilyn's eyes had that “strange look.” She began slurring dialogue and missing cues. On Friday, August 26, Paula Strasberg discovered Marilyn unconscious in her room at the Mapes. She had overdosed. Scooping out the dissolving capsules still in her mouth, Strasberg called for an ambulance. Marilyn was rushed to the hospital, where she had her stomach pumped. On Saturday she was taken to the Westside Hospital in Los Angeles, where she was placed under the care of Dr. Ralph Greenson and internist Dr. Hyman Engelberg. Recalling the incident, Jack Kennedy's friend Chuck Spalding stated that he had been asked to fly from New York to Los Angeles to make sure she was okay. “I got out there, and she was really sick. With Lawford's help, I got her to the hospital,” Spalding said. Marilyn spent a week in the Westside Hospital, where Greenson and Engelberg quickly withdrew her from her barbiturate regime. Greenson said later, “Although Marilyn resembled a hard-core drug addict, she was not the usual addict. She could stop cold with no physical symptoms of withdrawal.”

On her way back to Nevada to finish filming
The Misfits
, Marilyn stopped over in San Francisco to visit Joe DiMaggio. Marilyn told DiMaggio that she was getting a divorce from Arthur Miller when
The Misfits
was completed, and it may have raised his hopes of a reconciliation.

Marilyn returned to the Reno location on September 5, determined to finish the film. She resumed work “looking wonderfully self-possessed,” Arthur Miller related. “Her incredible resilience was heroic to me, but by this time we both knew we had effectively parted.”

In a moment of frustration Marilyn angrily stated, “It was to be ‘our movie!' But Arthur changed the script. She's [referring to Roslyn] not like me at all! She's almost incidental to the story. All he cares about are the men…. All Arthur wanted was to use me to regain his prestige! I'll never forgive him—never!”

During October, the production company finished its location shooting and returned to Paramount Studios in Hollywood to film the last scene of
The Misfits
, which also proved to be the final scene in the careers of both Gable and Monroe.

On November 4, 1960, on Paramount's stage 7, Clark and Marilyn were seated in a truck in front of a process screen:

But “Hope, Hope, Hope!” was gone.

The agony of filming
The Misfits
had come to an end, and so had the externals that remained of the Millers' marriage; however Marilyn had one more big scene to play out that day. When the Millers returned to their bungalow at the Beverly Hills Hotel, Marilyn released all her pent-up, seething rage at her husband. Arthur Miller hurriedly packed his belongings and fled into the night.

“Today Is Forever” had terminated.

“Today” had been one thousand five hundred and fifty-eight days.

“Forever” had been
The Misfits
.

O
n November 8, 1960, Marilyn Monroe was too despondent over the breakup of her marriage to go to the polls and vote for her friend John F. Kennedy. However, his narrow margin of victory over Richard Nixon succeeded in any event. Kennedy had other friends.

By the early morning hours of November 9, it was still undetermined whether Kennedy had won the election. California, Michigan, and Illinois were still uncertain. Before retiring, Kennedy telephoned his father's longtime friend Mayor Richard Daley of Chicago, voicing his concern. Daley made a knowing reply: “Mr. President, with a bit of luck and the help of a few close friends, you're going to carry Illinois.” Mayor Daley's own initial victory in 1955 had been decided by the vast Chicago West Side river wards, which were dominated by Sam Giancana and the Mafia. Voter fraud was a way of life in Cook County. By the time Kennedy awoke the next day, he had won the election by a mere 118,574 votes out of more than 68 million cast. In Illinois, Nixon had won 93 of the state's 102 counties, but he lost Illinois by 8,858 votes because of the huge Kennedy majority in Cook County, which included Chicago.

After checking only 699 paper ballot precincts, Nixon came up with a
net gain of 4,539 votes; however, Mayor Daley stepped in and blocked an official recount. After the election, Sam Giancana often bragged to Judith Campbell Exner, “Listen, honey, if it wasn't for me your boyfriend wouldn't be in the White House.”

At his first formal news conference on November 10, the president-elect announced the reappointment of J. Edgar Hoover as FBI director. The news came as a shock to Kennedy friends and supporters who were well aware of the animosity Kennedy felt for the bureau chief. The night before the reappointment, Ben Bradlee, editor of
Newsweek
, had urged Kennedy to dismiss Hoover and assumed that he would; however, he didn't know about Hoover's expanding accordion file of Kennedy indiscretions.

Quite cognizant of his son's peccadilloes as well as the antipathy that J. Edgar Hoover held for the Kennedys, Joe Kennedy told Jack to appoint Bobby Kennedy attorney general. Only Bobby, as head of the Justice Department, could keep Hoover in check. Aware that the appointment would be controversial, Jack Kennedy tried to dissuade his father in the matter. However, Joe Kennedy was adamant.

One of the problems with the decision was the fact that the Justice Department had thirty thousand employees and a $130 million budget, and young Bobby Kennedy had never practiced law. When Ben Bradlee heard about the appointment, he asked Jack how he was going to announce it. “Well,” Jack responded, “I think I'll open the front door of the Georgetown house some morning at about two
A.M.
, look up and down the street and if there's no one there I'll whisper, ‘It's Bobby.'”

When Jack actually made the announcement from the front door of his Georgetown house, it was high noon, and he was faced with a mob of reporters. Just before stepping forward, he was heard to say to Bobby Kennedy, who was standing by his side, “Damn it, Bobby, comb your hair, and don't smile too much or they'll think we're happy about this.”

J. Edgar Hoover seethed with anger when he received the news regarding his new superior. Conservative Hoover had become FBI director a year before Bobby Kennedy was born, and now “that skinny squealing little liberal shit” was going to be his boss. The animosity increased when, shortly after Jack Kennedy took office, Bobby Kennedy forced the FBI, for the first time, to clear its press releases and speeches with the attorney general. He also mandated that all press releases be issued in the name of the Department of Justice, rather than the FBI. More vexing, Bobby Kennedy insisted that all FBI directives from the bureau chief also cross
his desk. The antagonism between Hoover and the Kennedys would climb to icy new heights during the brilliance of the thousand days and the shadows of the thousand nights.

 

After the election, Marilyn referred to Jack Kennedy as “Prez,” and she told Bob Slatzer that her concern that the election would end her relationship with JFK was unfounded. Her New York friend Henry Rosenfeld told Anthony Summers, “When he became president, she became very excited. Her opinion was that this was the most important person in the world and she was seeing him. She was so excited you'd have thought she was a teenager.”

Senator George Smathers observed, “What happened was that she, like naturally all women, would like to be close to the president. And then she began to ask for an opportunity to come to Washington and come to the White House, and that sort of thing…. She made some demands.”

Smathers recalled seeing Jack Kennedy and Marilyn together on the presidential yacht on the Potomac, and Chuck Spalding vividly recalled a private visit by Marilyn to Hyannisport, where she was welcomed as an intimate of Kennedy's.

As Arthur Schlesinger later observed, “If anything untoward happened at all, it did not interfere with Kennedy's conduct of the Presidency.” Nor, apparently, did the presidency interfere with anything untoward. Marilyn oftentimes had to outwit the Secret Service and the press who surrounded Kennedy by wearing a black wig and horn-rimmed glasses. Carrying a steno pad and disguised as a secretary, she visited Kennedy incognito at the Carlyle and on Air Force One. Her calls to the White House were placed through the president's appointments secretary, Kenny O'Donnell, using the code name “Miss Green.” And, according to Schaeffer Air Ambulance pilot Bob Neuman, there were untoward emergency flights to clandestine rendezvous in Palm Springs and Cabo San Lucas.

In November 1960, a series of publicity stills for
The Misfits
were taken at the Paramount Studios still gallery. Standing in the shadows behind the bright lights was Pat Newcomb. A Byzantine series of events and relationships had brought the spin doctor back into Marilyn's employ after the
Bus Stop
incident: Rupert Allan, who was associated with Pat Newcomb at the Arthur Jacobs public relations firm, handled the press relations for some of Hollywood's top stars. Allan's clients had included
Sinatra and Grace Kelly as well as Marilyn. Sinatra was a close friend of Princess Grace, and frequently visited her in Monaco and participated in her charity galas. When Princess Grace complained to Sinatra about her European press representatives, it was arranged that Rupert Allan would take over Monaco's press relations. Allan was made an offer he couldn't refuse, which included considerable tax advantages, provided that he maintained residency in Monaco for the majority of the year. Though it has been written that it was Allan who suggested Newcomb as his replacement with Marilyn, Allan later stated that he disliked Newcomb. He referred to her as a “pill-pusher” and said, “Pat Newcomb is the last person I would have recommended.” With Allan gone, it was Sinatra who persuaded Marilyn to hire Newcomb. Sinatra knew she was close to the Kennedys, and that his pal Jack Kennedy was worried about Marilyn's knowledge of dark secrets concerning important people in high and low places. Having majored in psychology at Mills, and being a protégée of Pierre Salinger and a close friend of Bobby's, Newcomb was the perfect person to keep an eye on Marilyn.

When Marilyn returned to New York she had to announce the breakup of her marriage, and Newcomb traveled east with Marilyn to handle the press. The imminent divorce was revealed on November 11, and Marilyn was beseiged by newsmen for comments. She emerged tearfully from her apartment with Newcomb at her side to say there would be a friendly divorce. Miller, meanwhile, had moved his blank paper and pipe cleaners back to the convenience of the Chelsea, and several days after the divorce announcement he arrived at the Fifty-Seventh Street apartment to pick up his typewriter and books. Marilyn remained in her room. After he gathered his things, Lena Pepitone recalled, Miller left without saying a word. When he had gone, Marilyn emerged from the bedroom and entered Miller's study, which had been closed for nearly the entire time the Millers occupied the apartment. The room was bare. Only a photo of Marilyn remained hanging on the wall. “He really wants to forget,” she said. “I guess I'm gonna have to forget, too.”

 

On November 17, Marilyn was awakened at 4
A.M.
by a journalist with the news that Clark Gable had died from a massive heart attack. She was too grief-stricken to speak, and when Pepitone arrived at the apartment in the morning she found Marilyn alone in a state of shock. “Oh, God, why is he dead?” she sobbed. “I loved him, Lena. He was so nice to me.
He was always smiling, always encouraging. He was the biggest star of all, but he respected me. I just saw him. He kissed me good-bye. My friend…”

Vicious rumors began circulating in the press that Marilyn was responsible for Gable's death. A fallacious item in a gossip column stated that Kay Gable believed Marilyn had contributed to her husband's condition: “The tension and exhaustion Marilyn had caused by her lateness and unprofessionalism had prolonged the picture for weeks and brought on Gable's fatal heart attack.” Feeling that there might have been some truth to the rumor, Marilyn began suffering remorse.

Pepitone said, “She was so gentle, so sad. But somehow she got it into her head that she was responsible for Gable's heart attack. It became impossible for her to sleep without ever-increasing doses of sleeping pills. For days she would lie on the bed, her eyes bulging out, wringing her hands in frustration.”

Having lost Montand to Signoret, Miller to his farm, Jack Kennedy to his ambitions, and her fantasy father to the grim reaper, Marilyn felt totally alone. To try to cheer her up, Pepitone talked her into getting out of the apartment—to go shopping. It seemed like a good idea. It wasn't. It was Christmastime again, and the brightly decorated streets highlighted her gloom. Aglow with the Christmas spirit, tourists and families and lovers were out buying presents for relatives and friends. Not much had changed since Union Station, when Norma Jeane was the isolated observer of the human family.

When Marilyn got back to the apartment, Pepitone recalled, she was weeping. There was no tree, no gifts, no relatives. Worried about Marilyn, Pepitone decided to stay on until she had gone to bed. When she checked on Marilyn later in the evening she found her at the bedroom window, which was wide open—her hands grasping the outside molding. It looked as though she was about to jump to the street thirteen floors below.

Pepitone described running toward Marilyn and grabbing her around the waist.

“No, no—let me die! I want to die! I deserve to die!” Marilyn screamed.

As Pepitone restrained her and tried to quiet her down, Marilyn sobbed, “I can't live anymore. It's Christmas! Who do I have? I have no one! What have I got to live for?”

Pepitone held Marilyn for a long time, until she stopped shivering and sobbing. Christmas Eve was spent watching out for the film star.

On Christmas day, Joe DiMaggio sent Marilyn several large poinsettia
plants, and that night he appeared at her door. Pepitone recalled that DiMaggio stayed in New York for several days, and Marilyn's spirits began to improve. He frequently appeared at dinnertime and would leave early the next morning in the service elevator to avoid being seen.

“She was happy just to have Joe around,” Pepitone said, “and it was obvious to me that they still loved each other. So one day I came out with what was on my mind and said, ‘Why don't you marry Marilyn again? She loves you. It would be wonderful for her.'” Pepitone recalled DiMaggio saying that he loved Marilyn more than any other woman, but they had too many differences that they just couldn't work out as long as she had her career.

After DiMaggio returned to Florida, Pat Newcomb suggested that the best day for Marilyn to get a Mexican divorce from Arthur Miller would be January 20, 1961. It was President Kennedy's inauguration day and the press would have its attention distracted by this momentous event. Newcomb and Marilyn, along with her attorney Aaron Frosch, flew to Juarez, hoping the news wouldn't leak out until she returned to New York.

At eight in the evening, a Mexican judge was persuaded to reopen his office, which had closed for the day. He quickly granted the divorce on the grounds of “incompatibility of character.” Marilyn signed the papers without reading them. By the time Marilyn left the judge's office the building was surrounded by paparazzi, and she had to fight her way through the crowd to the car that would drive her back to the airport.

During a stopover in Dallas, Marilyn and Newcomb watched a telecast of the inauguration as they waited in the terminal for the flight back to New York. Among those who had received invitations to the inaugural ball was Arthur Miller. Arthur attended with Inge Morath and Joe and Olie Rauh. Miller's single most vivid memory of the historic event was the sight of “Frank Sinatra and his pack in a special box overlooking the festivities. Lounging in magisterial isolation above the excited crowd, Sinatra seemed not so much to rise to the honor of presidential favor as to deign to lend his presence to the occasion.”

In the divorce settlement, Miller waived his right to contest a unilateral filing. He took custody of their dog, Hugo, and Marilyn gave him the Roxbury farm, where for almost four decades Miller has lived with his third wife, Inge Morath, whom he married in 1962.

After DiMaggio's visit, Marilyn had no one to turn to except her psychiatrists. While she continued to visit Marianne Kris in New York, she often telephoned Ralph Greenson in Los Angeles. Paula Strasberg became
deeply concerned about her, and Susan Strasberg recalled that Marilyn was “withdrawing like a sick animal into a kind of semihibernation.” She no longer visited the Strasbergs to escape her pain and sense of hopelessness, but stayed in her apartment listening to the blues on her record player: