Marilyn Monroe Part II

Norma Jeane grew bored with married life very soon though she was fond of James and with America at war, he joined the Merchant Marine.  He was away on active service, and she took a job in a munitions factory.  There, she was photographed by a Unit of the Air force, who were taking “morale boosting”, shots of pretty girls… Her special quality began to develop, and although they didn’t use any of her photos, it gave her confidence to quit her job and try her luck at modelling.

She dyed her brown hair blonde, and began to get work … but her husband was angry at the thought of her working in such a job.  However she was defiant and determined to get out of domestic working class life. She appeared in men’s magazines and in advertisements, and worked hard.  In 1946, she was moving towards getting into an acting career and got a contract with 20^th Century Fox.  She decided to divorce her husband who wanted her to stay at home.   When taken on by the studio, she didn’t get any acting work at first but had to study acting, singing and dancing and she was now using the name Marilyn Monroe…

She got a few bit parts but her contract was soon dropped.  She became more fiercely determined to succeed as an actress, and began to take lessons at the Actors Laboratory.  She hoped to get into stage acting but her future was to be on the screen.  She met Johnny Hyde, an older man who was Vice President of the William Morris Talent agency, and became his mistress.  It was a help towards getting work but when Hyde asked her to marry him she refused as she wasn’t in love with him.  He paid for her to have some minor plastic surgery....

She posed for some nude modelling shots... and finally in 1950 Hyde got her a long term 7 year contract….with 20^th Century Fox again.  He died shortly afterwards of a heart attack, leaving her alone and still struggling to make it.