The Reality Is, As a Twenty-Six Foot Statue in Palm Springs Or Not, Marilyn Was Still A Sex Symbol

She said it herself: “If I’m going to be a symbol of something, I’d rather have it sex than some other things we’ve got symbols of.” “Self-objectifying” herself perhaps as a means to prove she was “in on the joke,” it doesn’t change that Marilyn Monroe aided and abetted the image that the studio upsold to make as much money as possible at the box office. And in the 1950s, since the closest thing to sex in mass media was Marilyn Monroe or Playboy (the cover of which Marilyn famously graced for its inaugural issue), there was a particular reason she drove men so crazy. In short, she was just about the only woman showing any skin in that decade, let alone a modicum of sensuality. A decade in which the likes of John Seward Johnson II turned twenty-five the same year Marilyn’s infamous still from The Seven Year Itch was emblazoned upon Planet Earth’s consciousness. And it clearly got etched upon his. For one thing even rich boys can’t buy (lest you forget that Johnson II was born into the Johnson & Johnson empire) is the affections of women who prefer men with brains (as Joan in The Damned Don’t Cry would say).

While Johnson II might only have been given a leg up in the “art industry” because of his name—as it certainly wasn’t because of his originality—he managed to create public works that have left an indelible impression. Not only “Double Check” (largely because of how ironic it was that only a bronze depiction of a businessman should survive among the rubble of 9/11 in the area it was placed) but also more derivative sculptures like the cringingly named “Unconditional Surrender.” Like the Marilyn form, the subject matter of this one also instantly demarcates what generation Johnson II hailed from, as it re-creates the famous photo known as “V-J Day in Times Square.” While the photo was once highly romanticized, it has since become yet another emblem of sexual assault as the soldier in question simply grabbed the girl nearest to him and kissed her. The outrage is emblematic of the present, as people would prefer to pretend there wasn’t a time when women did lust after the carnal attention of men, especially since they themselves were not allowed to express it in any way, lest they be deemed sluts, whores, etc. Kind of the way Marilyn was (or would have been more regularly if she didn’t make it a point to be married for most of her career). So yes, Johnson had an admitted flavor for immortalizing the moments best beloved by a patriarchal society in the era during which baby boomers came of age, never questioning the system until the upheaval of the 60s, and even then, the rebellion was sidetracked more than occasionally by the distraction of “free love”—also not something that would be deemed “feminist” by today’s staunch standards, for the practice likely gave too much pleasure to men while still causing women to be ostracized for railing against so-called convention.

As Marilyn’s statue is slated for a return to Palm Springs with her exposed backside to face against the Palm Springs Museum (as Midcentury Modern as Marilyn herself), a new outrage has been stoked, with an entire article in the Los Angeles Times billing the sculpture as #MeToo Marilyn. Among the damning accusations of all the ills this likeness represents is how “tone deaf doesn’t begin to describe it. You would think that the national movement against sexual violence, which exploded as the crimes committed against actors by a powerful Hollywood mogul, Harvey Weinstein, were revealed three years ago, had never happened. ‘Forever Marilyn,’ as the awful sculpture is named, would be better called #MeToo Marilyn.” Lumping in an Old Hollywood star (who was actually quite familiar with the score of how the industry worked and knew how to capitalize on it to get what she wanted in the end) to suit the narrative of this movement does not ring true. And it also further paints Marilyn as a victim when she was, indeed, a very strong woman who didn’t crumble as easily under pressure as she’s been portrayed to. To perpetuate this stereotype about her is only a disservice. To give her the #MeToo treatment is also endlessly reductive. And sure, hate the sculpture all you want, but it can’t be denied that it does actually depict a carefree, liberated woman.

Like Madonna when she first showed sexual agency in the “Lucky Star” video with the writhing exposure of her belly button, part of what made this scene so iconic was that Marilyn is delighting in her own feminine sexuality. It was during a hot summer night in NY that she decided to let the subway wind blow up her dress (at a time when subway wind was presumably purer). The operative words being she decided. Sure, we can say it was written from the perspective of some puerile male fantasy (George Axelrod and Billy Wilder’s), but Marilyn made it her own. Conveyed the scene as a woman in control of her desires and what she wanted to do with them. What’s more, when Marilyn couldn’t ignore that she was no longer happy with 20th Century Fox, she fled from Hollywood to New York to create Marilyn Monroe Productions, after which she still appeared in “oversexed” roles, including the first movie she made under the MMP brand, Bus Stop. After all, this was a woman who once declared, “We are all born sexual creatures, thank God, but it’s a pity so many people despise and crush this natural gift. Art, real art, comes from it—everything.” It is a shame people still forget that and how, especially in this new Victorian moment, every aspect of sex is tinged with the taint of being “dirty” or nonconsensual. If Marilyn was sex positive, the media is now most assuredly sex negative, coloring everything old and new with the slant of how women are being objectified and taken advantage of (because, to borrow a phrase from Kathryn Merteuil, “God forbid, [a girl] exude(s) confidence and enjoy(s) sex”–especially in front of others of her gender). While this is, for the most part, undeniable, what isn’t remains the fact that Marilyn was a self-made sex symbol. She embraced the part for many reasons, but mainly because it meant she could be a star–which equated to her with the unconditional love she never got from any family member.

Another additional concern about the behemoth gracing Palm Springs again is that not only does it send a “wrong message” about objectifying women, but also that “the children” shouldn’t be exposed to such things. Yet it’s fine for Cardi B and Megan Thee Stallion to play the stripper roles for “WAP” on network television because they’re ticking the correct boxes of “how to be acceptably political” in the current landscape. However, Marilyn is arguably the pioneer of being political when it comes to sexuality. And in the 50s, her very existence caused more of an uproar than “WAP.” She was a sex bomb, there’s no getting around that—one of the first of her kind (though let’s not forget Jean Harlow and Mae West) before a barrage of carbon copies started being “called for” by the studios. She fulfilled some need within a misogynistic society, yet she also owned and delighted in her image in a way that no woman—let alone a female celebrity—ever had before.

Like Helen of Troy, Marilyn was the face (and body) that launched a thousand ships. On a side note, is Helen of Troy going to get the #MeToo treatment pretty soon as well? Sure, she’s only a “myth,” but the extent of offense people feel entitled to is extending to every facet. This might even include literature, where Helen resides (though so far, the medium has been largely spared as there are not that many enthusiasts of it—try as people might to come across as literary by having a tote bag with the John Waters quote, “If you go home with somebody, and they don’t have books, don’t fuck ‘em!”).

Surprisingly, it seems to be male culture writers who are the most offended by the presence of Marilyn’s derrière mooning an entire crowd of people as they flood out of a museum (or whatever will amount to a crowd post-COVID). This seems to highlight the continued lack of “comfortableness” men actually have with female sexuality. Not quite knowing what to do with it more than ever in such a politically charged environment. So if a man can’t salivate openly over a woman’s body, he would perhaps prefer to condemn it being paraded in any way beyond the chaste. Would prefer to be marked as with the crowd of pitchforks and torches decrying male concupiscence rather than against it.

Some, of course, will continue to suggest that Marilyn’s effigy being forced to be photographed with people looking up her skirt ad infinitum is almost tantamount to that Black Mirror episode where convict Clayton Leigh (Babs Olusanmokun) is put into a museum as a sentient hologram, and all so that a visitor can pull the lever and watch him be electrocuted in the chair, the moving image of which is rendered onto a keychain. But Marilyn is not conscious, and she was also well-versed in the tradeoff of fame (and at least it was fame in an incarnation long before paparazzi and TMZ, as Britney Spears was forced to endure). That it meant your image was no longer really “yours” once you hit the big time. She was willing to make that trade for the presumed benefit of securing what she was always looking for: love. Even though it’s debatable if she ever truly found it. Maybe, however, love in the twenty-first century is people wanting to take their selfie with you and post it to social media. Regardless of whether your sexual nature remains a continued topic of debate, controversy and scandalization.