The Last Days of Marilyn Monroe (50 page)

While neither Rosenman, Gould, nor the other members of the Fox board knew of Zanuck's plans, the ailing Spyros Skouras joined Zanuck in a secret pact to unseat the Wall Street insurgents. Zanuck controlled 280,000 shares of Fox stock and Skouras owned 100,000 shares—almost enough to dominate the proxy battle that loomed ahead.

It was shortly after Zanuck made his decision to regain control of Fox that Marilyn called him in Paris on Monday, June 11. Telling Marilyn of his plans, Zanuck assured her that when he was back in power
Something's Got to Give
would be completed, and she would be the star.

After her conversations with Skouras and Zanuck, Marilyn sent a Western Union message to Robert and Ethel Kennedy declining an invitation she had received in April to attend a party celebrating the wedding anniversary of Pat and Peter Lawford.

J
oe DiMaggio was visiting Nunnally and Nora Johnson in London when they received the news of Marilyn's problems with Fox. DiMaggio was working as a public relations representative for the Valmore Monette Corporation, an East Coast firm that supplied American military post exchanges. When the Johnsons told DiMaggio about Marilyn's dismissal, he quit his lucrative job and flew to Los Angeles. He felt it had always been Marilyn's career that stood in the way of their happiness, and by all the newspaper accounts her career was over.

“He loved her a great deal,” Valmore Monette stated, “and he told me that he had decided to remarry her. He thought things would be different than they had been before, and that everything would work out well for them now. I knew that was why he had left us and was going back out there.”

Norman Jefferies remembered working in the guest cottage when Joe DiMaggio arrived from London. “Marilyn was out, and Mr. DiMaggio sat on a ladder and talked to me while he waited for her to return,” Jefferies recalled. “Marilyn had told me a lot about him—how nice he was…. He
was very friendly, and we talked about baseball, Marilyn, the movies, Italian food—you name it.”

According to Jefferies, when Marilyn finally arrived there was a warm and heartfelt greeting. Marilyn showed DiMaggio the herb garden that she had planted herself along the brick path that led from the kitchen to the guest cottage, and they talked of the past and happier times. But when their conversation turned to plans for the future, it ended in a quarrel when DiMaggio learned that Marilyn was more determined than ever to pursue her career.

Joe DiMaggio Jr.'s fiancée, Pamela Reis, remembered having heard that there was “a bitter row” over Marilyn's career and the Kennedys. The disagreement soon turned into a violent argument as DiMaggio saw his hopes for a reunion and a real life together slipping away. It was the last bitter argument between Marilyn and the Slugger.

The next day, Thursday, June 14, Dr. Ralph Greenson drove Marilyn to the Beverly Hills clinic of Dr. Michael Gurdin, who had once been Marilyn's plastic surgeon. Gurdin was startled by Marilyn's appearance. When Marilyn removed her scarf and glasses, Dr. Gurdin noted that the film star's nose was black and blue and there was a large bruise on her left cheekbone. Greenson stated, “Marilyn had a small accident in the shower. She fell and hit the tiling.” X rays were taken to see if there were any broken bones.

“Greenson did all the talking,” Gurdin recalled. “He didn't seem anxious for Marilyn to speak.” However, when the nurse brought in the X rays, Marilyn asked, “If my nose is broken, how quickly can we fix it?” The X rays showed that there were no broken bones or cartilage, and she wrapped her arms around Greenson and said, “Thank goodness!”

Putting on her dark glasses and scarf, Marilyn left by the rear door on Greenson's arm. Gurdin later said that the injuries could have been caused by a fall, but Robert Slatzer always believed that somebody “beat the hell out of her.”

“My guess was that Joe still loved her,” Nunnally Johnson commented, “But after that Joe was under no more illusions about any sort of reunion. In short, he'd had it. So far as he was concerned, she was a lost lady, and while there might be someone to save her, he wasn't the one.”

 

Between June 20 and July 15, Marilyn launched an unparalleled media blitzkrieg with the world's leading syndicated columnists and a nonstop
series of interviews and photo sessions with
Vogue, Life, Redbook
, and
Cosmopolitan
. Calling in Pat Newcomb, she dictated 104 telegrams to the cast and crew of
Something's Got to Give
lamenting the studio's decision to shut down the film.

Marilyn exclaimed to one interviewer, “I don't look on myself as a commodity, but I'm sure a lot of people have, including one corporation in particular which shall be nameless. If I'm sounding ‘picked on,' I think I have been…. An actor is supposed to be a sensitive instrument. Isaac Stern takes good care of his violin. What if everybody jumped on his violin?”

For George Barris of
Cosmopolitan
she posed on a windswept beach wearing a Mexican sweater, champagne glass in hand, and stated that at age thirty-six, “As far as I'm concerned, the happiest time is
now
. There's a future, and I can't wait to get to it!”

At an extraordinary session for
Vogue
, photographer Bert Stern was enchanted. “Marilyn had the power,” Stern later rhapsodized. “She was the light, and the goddess, and the moon—the space and the dream, the mystery and the danger!”

When Richard Meryman interviewed her for
Life
, he was mesmerized by her enthusiasm and expressiveness, “Her inflections came as surprising twists and every emotion was in full bravura, acted out with exuberant gestures,” Meryman reflected. “Across her face flashed anger, wistfulness, bravado, tenderness, ruefulness, high humor and deep sadness. And each idea usually ended in a startling turn of thought, with her laugh rising to a delighted squeak…. I felt a rush of protectiveness for her; a wish—perhaps the sort that was at the root of the public's tenderness for Marilyn—to keep her from anything ugly and hurtful.”

When Meryman recalled asking her if many friends had called up to rally round when she was fired by Fox, “there was a silence, and sitting very straight, eyes wide and hurt, she answered with a tiny ‘no.'” However, she had millions of anonymous friends acquired in the darkness of movie theaters around the world, and Fox was soon bombarded with letters and telegrams protesting the studio's actions. Marilyn received help from another unexpected source: when Dean Martin learned that the studio was replacing Marilyn with Lee Remick, he notified his agent at MCA that he was going to walk off the film if it wasn't completed with Marilyn Monroe. In a series of heated meetings between Fox executives and MCA to force Martin to accept a replacement, the agency supported Martin's position, and much to the Fox publicity department's chagrin, the news of Dean Martin's decision made bigger headlines than Marilyn's dismissal.

In mid-June, Zanuck arrived in New York and conferred with his attorney, Arnold Grant, while secretly buying additional shares of Fox stock to ensure success in his forthcoming boardroom battle to regain control of the studio. “We had no knowledge of what Zanuck was up to,” Milton Gould later stated. “He spent weeks buying up thousands of shares of stock in order to win enough votes to unseat us.”

 

During the summer of 1962, the attorney general's helicopter often descended on the Fox lot. Bobby Kennedy would leap out wearing blue jeans and a T-shirt, followed by Secret Service agents wearing blue suits and ties, and they would hurry to Jerry Wald's office for preproduction meetings on
The Enemy Within
. On these visits Kennedy frequently spent the night at the Beverly Hilton Hotel, which was only a few minutes away.

On Saturday, June 23, two weeks after Marilyn's dismissal from Fox, Bobby Kennedy flew to Los Angeles and Peter Lawford arranged for Marilyn and Kennedy to meet. Kennedy was to attend a dinner party at the Lawford beach house, and Marilyn was invited. According to Patricia Seaton Lawford, the purpose of Bobby Kennedy's visit was to stop Marilyn from trying to contact the president. She had been trying to reach him at the Oval Office and at Hyannisport, abandoning her code name, stating, “This is Marilyn Monroe, and I expect to speak with Jack!” If she wanted to save her career, she would have to become cooperative—to remain silent.

Shortly before Marilyn was to meet Bobby Kennedy at the Lawfords', dress designer Jean-Louis's assistant, Elizabeth Courtney, recalled, “I never saw her so nervous about a party. We altered three dresses before Marilyn found the right one.” When Marilyn left the room during one of the fittings, Courtney asked Hazel Washington what was going on. “She's seeing the man, honey,” Hazel answered.

“Who is it?” asked Courtney.

“Kennedy,” Hazel said.

“You mean the president?” wondered Courtney.

“No, the other one—the brother,” was the reply.

Marilyn arrived at the Lawfords' party two and a half hours late.

The following day, Sunday, June 24, Bobby Kennedy paid a visit to Marilyn's home. Neighbors saw his arrival in the Fifth Helena cul-de-sac, and Mrs. Murray stated that he arrived alone, driving himself in a convertible. “He was casually dressed,” she recalled, “looking boyish in slacks
and an open shirt.” Norman Jefferies was working on the house that day and had been told he'd have to “clear out before Kennedy came.” But he recalled that Kennedy arrived just as he was leaving. Marilyn showed Kennedy her new kitchen, and then they went outside by the pool and spoke for over an hour. “Marilyn did not seem bubbly or excited by his visit,” Mrs. Murray said.

While there's no record of what was discussed during the private meeting between the film star and “the General,” one can surmise what was discussed by the effects. The next day, Monday, June 25, Bobby Kennedy called Judge Rosenman and, according to Fox archives, studio head Peter Levathes was told to renegotiate Marilyn's contract for the completion of
Something's Got to Give
. “I got word to try and negotiate with Miss Monroe from New York. I don't know whether it was from Milton Gould or Judge Rosenman,” stated Levathes.

Sixteen days after her humiliating dismissal, the studio did an amazing about-face and was asking her to return.

On Thursday, June 28, Marilyn Monroe had a meeting with Peter Levathes to discuss her terms for resuming work on
Something's Got to Give
. As he arrived at her home, chilled caviar and trays of canapés and cocktails awaited him, and a punctual Marilyn Monroe emerged to greet him. She was uncharacteristically businesslike. In one of her better offscreen performances, she was the new no-nonsense Monroe. Whitey Snyder and Sidney Guilaroff had worked all afternoon creating a startling, severe look for the actress, who wore a conservative Norman Norell dress of sober beige complemented by her horn-rimmed glasses. Levathes admitted to being impressed by this savvy superstar, who appeared to be the exact antithesis of the image created by his own studio's negative press campaign.

At the time, Levathes was unaware that Pat Newcomb was behind the door, listening to every word and making notes of the meeting. “I found, surprisingly, that she was an astute businesswoman in many ways,” Levathes said later, “She was very rational. You couldn't have had a better meeting with an actress. She had a kind of renewed interest in the project that was infectious. I was finally confident that the picture would be made. In fact, I even authorized a new rewrite of the script incorporating Marilyn's ideas.”

As June came to an end, an agreement was in the works for the resumption of
Something's Got to Give
, and the studio agreed to renegotiate Marilyn's contract into a million-dollar deal—$500,000 for
Something's
Got to Give
, plus a bonus if it was completed on its new schedule, and another $500,000 or more for a new musical called
What a Way to Go
, to be produced by Arthur Jacobs. It was much more money than Marilyn had ever made in the past. Incredibly, Fox agreed to junk the Walter Bernstein rewrites and revert to the Nunnally Johnson script that Marilyn preferred, and the studio agreed to replace George Cukor with a director approved by the star.

It was an astonishing victory for Marilyn that had been brought about by a call from Bobby Kennedy to Samuel Rosenman—but at what price? Had she agreed to forever refrain from contacting JFK? When she signed the new contract, how much of her heart would be on the dotted line?

 

In early July, Bobby Kennedy again visited Los Angeles on his way to Nevada, where he was to meet General Maxwell Taylor, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, and view the first hydrogen bomb test in the continental United States—then a top secret. Exactly one month before Marilyn Monroe's death, a Fourth of July barbecue was held at the Lawfords', which was attended by both Marilyn and Bobby Kennedy. It was a conciliatory gathering. To all appearances the differences between the Kennedys and Marilyn had been mended. Bobby and Marilyn walked on the beach together, and the film star listened attentively as the attorney general discussed sensitive world matters, atomic testing, and politics.
^*

Fox planned to resume filming
Something's Got to Give
, starring Marilyn Monroe, in the third week of July, but inexplicably, once the new contract had been drawn, Marilyn's attorney, Mickey Rudin, began a delaying tactic. Fox wanted to get the contract signed and the film back into production as quickly as possible, but the contract sat on Rudin's desk unsigned.

Numerous calls to Rudin by Fox attorneys went unreturned. The studio planted an item with columnist Earl Wilson stating, “Mickey Rudin is deliberately dragging his feet on the new pact with Monroe. Once the million-dollar contract was drawn up, Marilyn Monroe's attorney, Rudin, seems to be in no rush to ratify it.”

But it was Marilyn who was in no rush to sign the contract. Learning that Zanuck was about to launch his D-Day invasion of the Fox board at
meeting scheduled for July 25, she was playing her waiting game. However, there was no way to foresee the outcome of what promised to be a formidable boardroom battle. There was no guarantee that Rosenman, Gould, and Loeb wouldn't prevail, or that Marilyn's career wouldn't remain hostage to the Kennedy faction. Until Zanuck made his move on the twenty-fifth, Marilyn remained a Rosenman pawn. And it was Marilyn's gambit to delay signing the contract until the Kennedys were in check.