Love, Marilyn: a closer look at Marilyn Monroe

The insightful HBO documentary Love, Marilyn uses Marilyn Monroe’s own words and those of people in her life to give us a candid yet sympathetic inside look at Marilyn.  The core of the film is from a recently discovered trove of Marilyn’s own letters and journals.

Her friends Susan Strasberg and Amy Greene appear in this film. Others speak from file footage, including husband Arthur Miller, acting coach Lee Strasberg and her first Hollywood agent.  For the rest, especially Marilyn herself (and biographer Norman Mailer, friends Elia Kazan and Truman Capote and frustrated director Billy Wilder), an all-star cast of readers bring their words to life. 

The readers include four Oscar winners and six Oscar nominees.  The most effective are Marisa Tomei reading Marilyn’s earnest efforts at educational self-improvement and Lili Taylor reading Marilyn’s struggles with a recipe she trying to put on the table for traditional hubby Joe DiMaggio. Everybody else (especially Evan Rachel Wood and Viola Davis) is really good, too, except for Ben Foster, who is mannered and overtheatrical when reading Mailer’s words.

There are some rel nuggets here. We see the book on human body movement that Marilyn used to create her signature jiggling walk.  We hear Kazan’s description of how Arthur Miller made a good first impression by refusing to let Marilyn take a cab to a party.  We understand how she flipped potential career-killing nude photo scandal into a huge publicity boost and better film roles.  We even hear Amy Greene relate Marilyn’s assessment of DiMaggio’s most intimate skill.

Entertaining and sometimes moving, Love, Marilyn is a worthwhile contribution to our understanding of Marilyn, the person, the actress and the phenomenon.