MARILYN MONROE CONFIDENTIAL

by Lena & William Stadiem Pepitone ‧ RELEASE DATE: May 16, 1979

MM's personal maid/confidante (1957-62) spills the beans and wraps the whole mess in pink ribbon. But of course Lena was always tidying up. Marilyn didn't like sanitary napkins. And when she ate in bed, she'd drop her lamb-chop bones on the blanket and wipe her greasy hands on the sheets Lena could rarely persuade Marilyn to bathe, except on special occasions, but she regularly bleached her pubic hair so she'd look like a blonde even in her birthday suit, which is all she wore at home. Home was hollow, with Arthur Miller closeted in his study and Marilyn in her bedroom drinking champagne--and envying Lena her husband and little boys, and confessing to her. Lena was her only friend. Confessing about the baby born after a foster-father raped the young Norma Jean, about her prostitution in the bars of L.A. long before she started sleeping her way up the Studio ladder, and, that too, plus an early lesbian affair with a drama coach. Marilyn's commitment to the Actor's Studio in New York was her idea of a purge, Lena says, but when the Millers split up, her new project was sex. Yves Montand had gone but Joe DiMaggio was in and out; there was the chauffeur, a masseur . . . and finally ""Frankie""--Sinatra, the only man she really loved besides Joe. It was with him at the Lawfords' that she met the Kennedy brothers, too boyish for her tastes, but cute: one night JFK reddened at the dinner table when his hand mosied up her thigh and found no underwear--Marilyn never wore underwear--but that's all, folks. The last, secret lover was Mexican filmmaker Jose Bolanos: Marilyn was crazy about him, according to Lena; her death could not have been a suicide, or an accident. Marilyn was ""kind, sweet, a woman who knew how to love."" Lena has a shrewd memory.

Pub Date: May 16, 1979

ISBN: N/A

Page Count: -

Publisher: Simon & Schuster

Review Posted Online: N/A

Kirkus Reviews Issue: May 1, 1979

Categories: NONFICTION