All language subtitles for Reframed.Marilyn.Monroe.S01E01.1080p.iP.WEB-DL.AAC2.0.HFR.H.264-AEK_track4_[eng]-en

OK.

SHE EXHALES

Rolling? OK.

She is one of the biggest
movie stars of all time.

She had looks and sexuality.

She was iconic.

She became the goddess
of the silver screen.

People think she was the most
beautiful woman in the world.

When the camera starts
until it stops,

I want to be perfect.

Marilyn Monroe -
blonde bombshell...

Get out the fire hose.

..Hollywood superstar...

Mr President,
the late Marilyn Monroe.

..tragic victim.

The story of Marilyn Monroe
is an authentic tragedy.

When we talk about Marilyn Monroe,

it's always about
"poor Marilyn, poor Marilyn,"

this vulnerable, passive woman who
is being destroyed by Hollywood.

That's the way the story frames her.

After a reckoning in Hollywood,

it's time to reframe her story.

Now we can hit pause
and roll it back a bit,

and ask ourselves,

"OK, what is it
that we think we know?"

She was quite ahead of her time,

and she was very much
an architect of her own fame.

You must think I was born yesterday.

Her performances are layered,

they're funny, they're tender,
they're human,

they feel modern.

Bingo!

She had a deep inner life.

She was an artist.

She was a poet.

She was a businesswoman.

What a power broker she was,
renegotiating her contract,

creating her own production company,
getting films made.

It's actually rather frustrating
that people can't think about her

in terms of her intellect.

I can be smart when it's important,

but most men don't like it.

Marilyn challenges what it means
to have agency as a woman

and what it means to be a feminist.

Marilyn makes us ask,
"Is a woman just her body?

"Is it an attitude?
Is it a political reaction?

"What is a woman?"

In the end, the way our culture
talks about Marilyn Monroe

and thinks about Marilyn Monroe
is what it thinks about women.

This is Hollywood.

A place, an industry,
a state of mind.

Here, magic carpets fly.

Let's have a good look.

I went to 20th century Fox,

where Ben Lyon was head of casting.

And he says, "Who is this girl?"

In walked the most gorgeous
young girl, 20 years old.

And I said, "What's your ambition?"

She said, "To be a film star."

And then they made a Technicolor
test, which was unusual.

I think they had high hopes for me.

She was to come in,
walk across the room,

sit down and light a cigarette,

and smile.

As soon as that camera
started rolling,

something magical happened.

And she has this kind of
fresh-faced beauty,

and this kind of luminous
prettiness on the screen.

She could manifest
that kind of magic.

She came into the world with it.

Ben Lyon was very enthusiastic

that I looked so fresh and young.

They said that I had
a three-dimensional quality

having to do with sex.

SHE GIGGLES

Norma Jeane Dougherty lands
a one-year contract with Fox.

The studio begins
grooming her for stardom.

She was what the studios
called a product.

Someone that they could take,

mould, shape, rename,

and create as something

to be consumed
by the movie-going public.

I said, "I don't think you can use
a name Norma Jeane Dougherty

"if you're going to be a star.

"To me, you're a Marilyn."

But we couldn't find a second name,
and she said,

"Mr Lyon, could I use
my grandmother's name?"

I said, "What was that?"
Said, "Monroe.

"Marilyn Monroe."

Now, that's a perfect name
for a movie star.

There's something about "MM."

Those double-M sounds
are melodious,

mellifluous.

This is a moment that doesn't
get very much attention

in the story about Marilyn, but I
think it's incredibly revealing.

I wanted my mother's maiden name

because I felt that
rightfully was my name,

and true things rarely get
into circulation.

The fact that she chose Monroe
shows that she wanted to have agency

and control over her image
right from the very beginning.

It's not only her name
that gets the Hollywood treatment.

Every studio had a series of
publicity men that we call flacks,

who were out promoting the star.

They made up stories about them.

They created opportunities
to get their names in the papers.

They were getting them publicised.

And the flacks will create
a rags-to-riches story of Marilyn,

the orphan girl.

"Her story is one of struggle,
hunger, and perseverance.

"She did a chore of baby-sitting
one night and found herself

"guarding the offspring
of a talent scout."

That is not actually
how it happened.

She was not discovered,
and she wasn't baby-sitting.

It's actually a really striking
example of turning female ambition

into something which is passive
and fluffy and caretaking.

Marilyn was not waiting
for powerful men to come find her.

She was pounding on the door
of the studio.

She was doing absolutely everything
that she could

to break into the movie business.

What's fascinating about
the creation of Marilyn Monroe

is that I think she had more of
a hand in it than people

want to give her credit for.

The truth about Marilyn's background

is something she's happy to bury.

Marilyn isn't an orphan.

She's got a mother who's living
in a mental health facility,

but that doesn't necessarily read
as well as an innocent orphan girl.

Childhood was very difficult
on Marilyn.

She was illegitimate,

and that was a terrible,

terrible sin in the 1930s.

She didn't know who her father was,

and her mother had
this horrible condition.

Her mother, Gladys,
is institutionalised

when Marilyn is eight years old.

The diagnosis that was given
to Marilyn's mother,

of paranoid schizophrenia,

was shameful at that time.

And the idea of somebody being in
an asylum is not talked about.

Marilyn is sent to the
Los Angeles Orphans' Home.

They had to drag me,

and I kept crying, screaming,
"I'm not an orphan."

And I would ask where
my mother was, but they said,

"Well, it's better
you forget about her.

"She's dead."

But there is one place
where the young Marilyn

feels happy and safe.

Movie-going absolutely surged
during the Great Depression.

Going is sort of an escape.

And you could get a lot
for a dime or a nickel.

I watched all kinds of movies,

like Cleopatra with
Claudette Colbert,

and I'd see it over and over,
and over and over again.

She would just sort of
lose herself in the fantasies,

dashing villains and femme fatales,

and then, it allowed you
to dream that

if you could live in those movies,

then your life would be as beautiful
and problem-free as they are.

By 1941, Marilyn has left
the orphanage for a foster family.

She's 15 years old
and coming into her own.

She began to develop
a very voluptuous body

and a very pretty face.

She said the world opened up to her,

and she started hearing men call out
to her and the wolf whistles,

but she loved it.

Again, this is a little bit
of home movie footage

that was taken
in Marilyn's last foster home.

What you see is a girl
who's moving exactly like

a '30s model in the movies.

We, as women,
are constantly constructed.

We construct ourselves.
We collude in it.

And you have to, as a woman,
negotiate this,

even if it's unconscious,

every second of your life.

Marilyn learned the machinery
of womanhood very early.

Marilyn was growing up absorbing

that idea that being a beautiful
woman could give you power.

It was the thing that was going
to make you rich and famous,

and happy and loved.

Coming into her adult woman body
was both a blessing and a curse,

because she knew how to harness
that body as a weapon,

but it was also weaponised
against her.

And in 1942,

Marilyn's life changes overnight.

When Marilyn was just past
her 16th birthday,

she got married to a neighbour
named Jim Dougherty,

who she barely knew.

The marriage is the idea of
her foster mother, Grace McKee.

Grace arranged it.

She and her husband
were going to West Virginia,

and they were going to
put me in a home,

or I could marry this boy
who was 21.

She was a pragmatist.

She had lived a difficult life,
and that makes you a pragmatist.

You look in front of you,
and you say, "These are my options.

"That looks like the best one.
I'll take that one."

Marilyn doesn't have much time
to get to know her new husband.

The die is cast. America is at war.

Jim enlists in the Marines
and is sent to the South Pacific.

Across the country, men and women
are being asked to serve.

In war towns all over
the United States,

women are called upon
to leave their homes and take jobs.

Employers find that women
can do many jobs as well as men,

some jobs better.

Marilyn starts working
in an aircraft factory

outside of Los Angeles.

There was a photographer
who arrived to take pictures

of the pretty girls,
sort of morale-boosting shots.

The story that Marilyn told was
that he came over to her and said,

"Where have you been hiding?"

I mean, this is like
a dream come true to her,

even though she's on
the assembly line.

He gets to her,
and he takes her picture.

And he kind of stopped
and came back,

because she was pew, pew, pew!

And he said, "Do you have another
sweater or something?

"Can I photograph you
on your lunch hour?"

And she said, "Yes, of course I do."

The association of bombs
and bombshells is literal.

What is a bombshell?

It's a hollow ball in which
gunpowder is stored to explode.

So, this was explosive.

This was explosive sexuality.

Marilyn now has a calling card
and a new ambition.

The rambling Ambassador Hotel,
one of the world's great hostelries

and the Los Angeles landmark
of good living.

At the iconic Ambassador Hotel,

19-year-old Marilyn tries her luck
with the Blue Book Model Agency.

Norma Jeane looked like
the girl next door,

and I thought I could make her
into something quite marketable

in a short length of time.

She was very beautiful in a
clean-cut, American wholesome way.

Marilyn is turning herself
into a commodity,

and a part of her, presumably,
is also using it to reflect back on

herself some sense of having worth.

What I see is her excitement
of being in front of a camera.

This woman is so comfortable
in her skin.

It's Christmas, 1945.

Marilyn takes a road trip,

but not with her husband.

She'd been married for a few years
to a guy that she liked,

but she certainly wasn't
in love with,

And here comes this glamorous
European photographer

who's a man of the world.

32-year-old fashion photographer
Andre de Dienes.

De Dienes is recommended to her,

and he is immediately
taken with her.

So, he takes her on a trip
all around the Southwest.

They went into the desert.

They went to old cowboy towns.

They took hundreds
and hundreds of photographs.

She was working with a photographer
to learn how to inject energy

into pictures, not that she was
saying "how to make me look pretty,"

but she was saying,
"How do we make a good picture?"

And, Marilyn, oh, my God.

She was a pro at it.

Some of Marilyn's best work
was when she was just alone

with a photographer she trusted,

and just let herself be free.

There is a bit of a love affair
that goes on between

model and photographer.

And you get the idea she was
really wanting to give it,

really wanting to turn you on,

make you proud.

They slept together during the trip.

And I think that that shows
that she was really looking beyond

her marriage by that point.

She was actually clearly
seeing the doors

were opening in front of her.

You kind of see that
in these pictures,

these vistas that are opening
in front of her.

Six months later, Marilyn serves
her husband with divorce papers

and sets her sights on a new,
exciting future.

Here you see the world's
largest motion picture studio

with its acres of soundstages spread
out under the bright California sun.

Now let's enter the gate.

By the end of 1946,

Marilyn is four months into
a contract with 20th Century Fox.

In just a year,
she's gone from young model

to aspiring starlet.

But if she's going to break out,

she'll need to impress
studio head Darryl Zanuck.

In many ways, Daryl Zanuck
is the almost cliche

of an old-school movie mogul.

He's short.

He's aggressive.

And he's always chomping on a cigar.

This is somebody who has
a reputation as being exacting

and sometimes brutal.

It's difficult to overstate
how patriarchal the Hollywood

studio system was
in the '30s, '40s, and '50s.

It was absolutely male-dominated.

At the top of every one of the big
studios is a very powerful,

controlling man, the people
that we call moguls -

Louis B Mayer, Jack Warner,
Darryl Zanuck.

They're considered despotic monsters
and tough, tough businessmen

because they knew that
the things the public wanted

were stars and stories.

And they ran it like a factory,

and they rolled those things out,

four, five, six hundred
of them a year.

There were only a few large studios,

and those studios
made the movies, period.

It was sort of like the mafia,
in that they controlled everything.

Studio system operated
a pool of aspiring talent,

what they called
stock contract players.

Being a contract player didn't mean
that you were going to be a star.

You were shuffled from
one movie to the next,

and often, you were a glorified
extra, essentially.

Hollywood has always been
a difficult place for women.

Hollywood treats women
as disposable,

as, "You don't bring any talent
to the screen.

"You bring beauty."

When you weren't working,
they stuck you in front of a camera,

and you posed for all kinds
of pin-up pictures.

I didn't really feel specifically
like a commodity at the time.

It's only on looking back
that I see that,

when I was referred to
as "The girl!"

"Put the light on the girl!
Move the girl to the left!"

It's only when I look back on it
now that I see that perhaps

I was thought of as a commodity.

I'd never heard a women's brain
praised in that period.

That was not considered
a feminine virtue.

It took a while for women to be
appreciated as thinking beings.

To Darryl Zanuck,
Marilyn is nothing special.

Darryl Zanuck, basically,
he didn't like Marilyn.

He called her "Straw-head".

He never got her message.

And if a studio head
doesn't like you,

you got problems, honey.

To begin with,
Zanuck sees Marilyn as...

I believe he said that
her talent was all

below her navel
and above her waist.

Basically, that she was tits
and ass, and that was it.

If Marilyn wants
to keep her contract,

she will have to fight for it.

She kind of had a, sort of,
"Whatever means necessary,

"I will find my way to this."

That meant doing the right photo
shoots or taking acting classes.

She wasn't just sitting idly by,

waiting for the studio
to tell her what to do.

She was going to Fox
every single day.

I said, "Why do you work so hard?

"The other kids that are
under contract,

"I call sometimes at 11.00, 12.00,

"they're still sleeping from
being out the night before."

She said, "Well, Mr Lyon,"

she said, "I work hard
because one day,

"maybe opportunity will knock,
and I want to be prepared."

And the knock comes in May 1947.

Marilyn lands a speaking role
as Evie,

a waitress with a sharp tongue.

Hi, Evie. Hi, Small Change.

Hey, wait, I got money tonight.

Am I going to see your later?

If I'm not too tired.

But, Evie, I thought we had a date.

Look, this tray weighs a ton.

She has this confidence
that is starting to emerge.

She commands the screen
when she's on it.

So, Miss...?

She certainly has poise.

You can see the beginnings
of a bombshell,

but nothing like the bubbliness
that you would see later on.

Two double Cokes. Who's paying?

I told you I got money.

And now, you're blowing it
on two Cokes.

Double. My, my.

It's now up to
Darryl Zanuck to decide

whether to keep Marilyn
under contract.

There's a lot of beautiful girls
in the world,

and Marilyn is still
just a bit player.

He's not that interested in her.

He thought she was just another
pretty face and a dime a dozen,

and he had literally
hundreds of girls he thought

were just as pretty.

Darryl Zanuck, a great spotter
of stars, said no.

And he dropped her.

When Marilyn was dropped by Fox,
she was devastated,

but she was tenacious and vowed
that she would work even harder.

Released by 20th Century Fox,

21-year-old Marilyn Monroe
decides to pursue

another one of Hollywood's
biggest players.

Joe Schenck had a huge estate,

and he would just hold
Saturday night parties,

and a lot of people from
Hollywood would be there.

And Marilyn is invited
to his parties.

A lot of contract girls are.

It was understood tacitly among
the studio heads that these girls

were there for the men
at the studios to date.

And then, once their contract
was up, they'd be discarded,

and in would come a fresh new crop.

As a pretty young girl,

you learn that there's a lot of
predatory men out there.

Bottoms were patted.

We were - "Oh, sweet little thing,
cute little thing."

Passes were made.

This was completely normal
in Hollywood.

It was something that happened
all the time.

It happened openly.

I think Marilyn accepted that
she was going to have to date people

in order to get what she wanted.

And I don't think she ever
should have had to choose that.

But at least there was
a decision in it on her part.

Marilyn knew that this party
put on by Joseph Schenck

could be an opportunity
to get ahead in her career.

Joseph Schenck was a very,
very prominent,

powerful man in Hollywood.

And he understood how to make
a female movie star.

Schenck loved Marilyn,
thought she was amazing.

And she became his favourite girl.

Marilyn knew that this was
a very powerful connection to make.

And the two ended up forming
a sort of intimate relationship.

She understood that you either said,
"I don't like these rules,

"and therefore
I'm not playing your game,"

and therefore you give up
your dreams of a career,

or you recognised that those
are the rules of the game,

and you decide how you're going
to deal with it.

Schenck is on the board
at 20th Century Fox,

but, instead of pulling strings
with Darryl Zanuck

to get Marilyn her job back,

he puts in a word
with another pal...

..the boss of a rival studio.

Harry Cohn, who was the head
of Columbia Pictures,

introduced, understood,
and manipulated

the star-making process.

Cohn offers Marilyn
a six-month contract,

but he insists on big changes

before he'll cast her in a movie.

I think the platinum blonde
was inspired by Jean Harlow.

It was the ultimate Hollywood look,
the ultimate star image.

It's almost unearthly.

It's almost like an angel
with, like, glowing hair.

Blondeness is hugely valued
in American movies

and culture of the time.

Often associated
to purity and innocence,

but also associated to sexiness,

and sometimes even pornography.

For Marilyn, the platinum was
the step into a different

stratosphere of, like, "I am now
this kind of created persona."

Cohn's same formula had transformed
Spanish dancer Margarita Cansino

into Hollywood star
Rita Hayworth in the 1930s.

She was what they would've called
"ethnic" in those days,

meaning she was Latina,

and they dyed her hair.

She underwent electrolysis
to raise her hairline,

so she looked more Waspy.

And it turned her into
a huge box office star.

Hollywood studios are pressuring
people to meet an ideal.

In some cases,
it's about enhancing beauty.

In other cases, it's about
wiping away ethnic traces.

For Marilyn, going blonde,

it was like the Hollywood
star-building machine,

and she saw
what it could do for her.

It gave Marilyn an extra
charge in her looks.

It took her to another level.

Now that she looks the part,

Marilyn will make sure
that she can play it.

Most of the stories that are told
about Marilyn's career,

particularly in the early years,

are about the role that powerful
men played in her story.

But there were a couple of important
women in her life, as well.

She was introduced
to Natasha Lytess,

the head of drama
at Columbia Pictures,

and they just instantly hit it off.

I think Natasha, bringing with her
a wealth of knowledge about theatre,

was very enticing to Marilyn.

She wanted to get this kind of
serious education about acting,

about theatre, and Natasha
was able to do that for her.

She really saw something special
in her as an actress.

She just thought that Marilyn
had what it takes.

She had been in the gate,
and she was ready to run.

Within a month of signing
with Columbia Pictures,

21-year-old Marilyn Monroe
lands her first starring role

as a burlesque dancer
in a low-budget musical.

This was the most demanding
role that she'd had yet,

and it required her both
to sing and dance.

Marilyn just loved getting
into the trenches there

and working on her skills.

During a musical number,
I tried to be more outgoing

because that's what
I have to express.

It was the first time
Marilyn sung on screen,

and she is quite remarkable.

Marilyn plays chorus girl
Peggy Martin,

who's courted by a lovestruck fan.

You'll be sure to send this
right away, won't you?

Wouldn't you rather deliver it
in person? No, thanks, I...

Ms Martin. Yes.

It's a very sweet role...

Well, aren't you going
to give me the orchid?

The orchid?
Oh, yes, yes, the orchid.

..in spite of the fact that
she's a sexy striptease artist.

One of Marilyn's biggest numbers
in "Ladies of the Chorus"

is somewhat of a creepy song.

She's being positioned
as a gold digger.

So, the idea is that every woman
needs a man support her.

What's interesting about wanting
a daddy is it's twofold.

It's, "I'm brazenly sexual,

"but I'm really just a little girl."

She manages to be
sexually attractive,

and the object of the male gaze
in all of the ways that

she needs to be, but she's
also making fun of it.

And that is the moment
at which Marilyn discovered

how this performance was going
to work for her.

APPLAUSE

Shortly after finishing
"Ladies of the Chorus,"

Marilyn is summoned to a meeting

with the head of Columbia Pictures,
Harry Cohn.

Although it was just a B-movie,
it was a movie,

and she had the main role.

And so, I think she probably
thought that it was going

to be her big break.

But renewal of her contract
comes at a price.

Harry Cohn invited her
onto his yacht.

And that is not a code
that anybody even today

requires any help deciphering.

Cohn was a major womaniser.

Oh, my goodness, par excellence.

He often exploited young women,

and if they didn't return
his affections,

then he would make their lives hell.

She knew that if she said no to him,

that she would be thrown out,

but she had integrity.

She just asked him,
"Will your wife join us?"

It was very pointed,
and he was furious,

and he threw her out of the office.

And I think that's why
he didn't renew her contract

at the end of the six months.

"This is the patriarchy.
This is how we do things.

"Well, girl, you want to be famous?

"You know, play with me."

It is not the case that
she was simply sleeping with

any powerful man
that she encountered in order to get

where she wanted to go,

because she turned down Harry Cohn,

who was one of the most
powerful men in Hollywood.

It's not until four years later...

..that Marilyn will find
the courage to speak out.

In 1952, she co-authors an article
with journalist Florabel Muir

called "Wolves I Have Known."

It's a great title,
and that'll show you,

a woman that came up with
that title? That's a poet.

"The first real wolf I encountered
should have been ashamed of himself

"because he was trying to
take advantage of a mere kid."

SINISTER CHUCKLE
Kiss me.

Wolves are sexual predatory men,
and the drawing of a wolf,

it's often, like, the tongue
hanging out, the eyeballs bulgy,

very open about the sexual desire.

HOWLING

She already understands
the idea of being hunted.

I don't think that
sexual harassment was a term

in anyone's vocabulary in the 1950s.

It was just something
that you put up with.

WHISTLING
Bring on the women!

There's something very accurate

about the feeling of being

pursued by a wolf.

How dangerous that...that feels.

"He gave me a script to read
and told me how to pose

"while reading it.

"All the poses had to be reclining."

"Although the words
I was reading didn't seem

"to call for that position."

She really could have faced
a serious backlash because,

of course, the powerful men
didn't want to be called wolves,

and they didn't want
their behaviour to get called out.

She exposed fissures in the cracks
of society like nobody else.

And that, to me,
is a trailblazing accomplishment.

She said, "Watch out for the wolves
in Hollywood, honey.

"If they don't get what they want,
they'll cancel your contract."

I drove down to headquarters.

That's the way a lot of us
think about Schwab's drugstore.

Kind of a combination office,
coffee klatch, and waiting room.

Immortalised in Billy Wilder's
Sunset Boulevard,

Schwab's drugstore is a Hollywood
hang-out every actor knows well.

It was a place where people
who wanted to break into movies

could hang around,
interact, exchange gossip.

They would handle mail for people.

People could leave messages
for each other.

We were young and struggling.

We used to sit in Schwab's drugstore
and fantasise about the future,

having glorious careers and Oscars.

Marilyn was at Schwab's one day,

you know, kind of waiting
for a break.

And somebody told her
that Groucho Marx

was casting for a new movie.

She ran to the phone booth
and got on the phone,

found the producer, and said,
"I hear you're casting.

"I want to get a chance
at this part."

Groucho Marx said that
he wanted an actress who could

"make my elderly libido rise".

LOUD KNOCKING

He tested three different
actresses...

Come in.

..and Marilyn fit the bill.

STEAM WHISTLES

She entered the room with so much
awareness of her sexuality

and willingness
to have it out there.

Her role is 40 seconds,

and her job is to make
everyone's jaw drop.

Is there anything I can do for you?

What a ridiculous statement.

Mr Grunion, I want you to help me.

I have a little sand left.
What seems to be the trouble?

Some men are following me.

Really? I can't understand why.

She was a product of the times.

You couldn't show sex in any
of its, sort of, natural form.

I advise you to leave.

I'll take you down
to the bus station.

Oh, if I'm not back tonight,
go ahead without me.

So, you got it in this
exaggerated, unnatural form.

That's been the history
of all my romances.

She was letting the world know
she carried this aura of sexuality,

and everybody got it and went,
"Wow! Who's that?"

Eager to capitalise on Marilyn's
scene-stealing potential,

the producers send her on a
publicity tour to promote the film.

This was to happen during
the summer on the East Coast,

but Marilyn wasn't aware
that during the summer,

it does get very, very hot
on that side of America.

She believed that it would be
snow on the ground.

Marilyn arrives to
the sweltering heat of New York

wearing a thick, wool suit.

Marilyn and the publicity agent

decided to make the most
of her faux pas.

Gave her some ice creams
to hold and a fan,

and photographers captured her
peeking out of the train.

On the tour, she knows exactly
how to present herself

and when to be funny.

She's extraordinary.

She's very, very smart about
publicity and very funny.

Marilyn always seemed to know
what publicists wanted,

what photographers wanted.

So, whenever she was presented
with an opportunity,

she made the most of it.

She's just slowly walking up
the ladder of success.

Before leaving New York,

Marilyn finds time to meet
with an old friend,

photographer Andre de Dienes.

Marilyn and Andre happened to be in
the same place at the same time,

so they went to the beach,
and they just

took photographs in the surf.

Since their road trip
four years earlier,

Marilyn has transformed.

She's no longer a naive young model.

She is a rising star.

I see pure joy.

You can just sort of see the comet,

little light up there in the sky,
is starting to twinkle.

There's something unique,

something in the way she and
the camera related to each other.

The camera was her lover, truly.

People talk about these pictures
as the moment

when she was becoming Marilyn.

"Creating Marilyn" might be
a more active way of putting it.

She was finding her power.

She was finding her talent.

She was learning
how to own her career.

Becoming Marilyn means that
she's about to get

everything that she had ever wanted.

Becoming Marilyn is not a tragedy.

It's a triumph.

Next on Reframed:
Marilyn Monroe...

Her performances
are like watching magic.

She became the biggest
actress in the world,

and the biggest star in the world.

She was just so comedically gifted.

She began to understand that comedy
could be one of her powers,

if she could fuse it with sex.

I said, "Are you sure
they won't recognise me?"

It could've ended her career.

She ended up being the first
centrefold of Playboy.

Those nude shots actually titillated
the audience into wanting

to know more about her.

100,000 screaming fans.

It's J-Lo before there was J-Lo.

Romance that thrills the world -
the marriage of Marilyn Monroe

and Joe DiMaggio.

Joe DiMaggio felt that once
they were married,

her sexual appeal belonged to him,

and it didn't belong to other men.

Her third husband was
playwright Arthur Miller,

and they, too, separated.

Marilyn takes off to New York.

She had a date with the president.

And it's just like, "Oh, my God."

She was to sing happy birthday.

I think she was playing with him.

She stood up to
the old Hollywood guard.

Women didn't make their own movies.

Are you crazy?!

I have director approval,
and that is true.

She got everything she wanted,

which was unheard of at the time.

She was at the height
of her success,

and all of a sudden,
the curtain came down.

It's like, "Wait a minute.
The movie's not over."