The Last Days of Marilyn Monroe (33 page)

M
arilyn once remarked that she had appeared on calendars “but never on
Time
,” In May 1956, however, she made the cover of
Time
magazine. A lengthy cover story by Ezra Goodman hinted at her romance with Arthur Miller.

With
Bus Stop
completed, she returned to her Sutton Place South apartment in New York, where she was besieged by reporters seeking confirmation of the romance rumors. Marilyn declined to comment. Miller's divorce was granted on June 11, and the next day he returned to the East Coast, where he found the press camping on Marilyn's doorstep—along with a representative of the House Un-American Activities Committee, who handed him a subpoena. He was to appear before the committee in Washington on June 21.

Miller wasn't surprised at being called before HUAC. So many of his friends and associates had already been subpoenaed—Elia Kazan, Lee J. Cobb, Clifford Odets, Lillian Hellman, Dashiell Hammett, Hannah Weinstein. But the timing was bad. Arthur and Marilyn were planning on going to London for the production of
The Prince and the Showgirl
, and he needed a passport.

The evening before Miller was to leave for Washington for the HUAC hearing, Spyros Skouras, the Greek immigrant who had become president of 20th Century-Fox, paid a surprise visit to Arthur and Marilyn in an attempt to encourage Miller to cooperate with the committee as Kazan, Odets, and Lee J. Cobb had done. If the rumors that Fox's top star was going to marry a “pro-lefto” were true, Skouras's concern was that patriotic organizations would boycott Marilyn Monroe movies. Miller described the meeting:

In the subtext of the times, Skouras meant that in exchange for “clearing” himself by naming names and cooperating with the committee, Miller would be questioned
in camera
instead of in open hearings, which would be widely reported by the press. Miller was tempted, but the com
mittee members didn't want to hear him
in camera
. They wanted to question him in open hearings.

When Miller was called he was represented by attorney Joseph Rauh, who had also represented Lillian Hellman. Miller's appearance before the committee was on June 21, 1956, in the Caucus Room of the Old House Office Building. Miller's clash with the committee came when he refused time and again to name others he had met at communist gatherings. “I could not use the name of another person and bring trouble on him,” he stated to his interrogators. “These are writers, poets, as far as I could see, and the life of a writer, despite what it sometimes seems, is pretty tough. I wouldn't make it any tougher on anybody. I ask you not to ask me that question.”

Miller's words had an effect on all who listened. Even the committee was taken aback by the sense of honor revealed; however, according to one source, the words were Marilyn's. In 1961, Marilyn related to Danny Greenson, the son of psychiatrist Ralph Greenson, that Arthur Miller had been afraid. He had seen the careers of many writers destroyed by the committee. Miller had been very tempted to name names. It was Marilyn who told him he mustn't make any writer's or poet's life tougher than it already was. Marilyn revealed to Danny that she had told Miller, “You can't let those bastards push you around. You've got to stand up to them.” When she related this in 1961 it was of great interest to Danny, because at the time he was a student at the University of California at Berkeley, and as a political leftist and a member of SLATE
^*
he had been demonstrating against the Un-American Activities Committee. Danny Greenson later commented, “She really was unsophisticated politically, but her instincts were always with the underdog and—to me—on the side of right. There was more to Marilyn than met the eye.”

Marilyn was suspicious of any doctrinaire political theories, and her sentiments, which were drawn from her own experience, were with the downtrodden and people in emotional and material need. Though she disagreed with Stalinism or any form of tyranny, she respected the individual's right to embrace what he or she believed in.

At the hearings, Marilyn stood by the man she loved, and in doing so played one of her better roles. She wisely played the role of the loving
ingenue waif and engendered sympathy for Miller. When asked by reporters about Miller's testimony, she smiled sweetly and replied, “I don't know much about politics. I'll have to have a good talk with him, and I think he's very tired.” However, Marilyn's New York maid Lena Pepitone later revealed that when Marilyn was mad at Arthur, she would refer to him as “that damned communist!”

While Arthur Miller was before the committee being interrogated about his leftist leanings, he made a rather left-handed proposal of marriage. Asked by an interrogator why he wanted a passport to go to England, Miller replied, “The objective is double. I have a production which is in the talking stage in England, and I will be there with the woman who will then be my wife.” Besieged by reporters as he left the hearing, he announced that he would marry Marilyn Monroe “very shortly.” Soon afterward, Norman Rosten received a hysterical call from Marilyn, “Have you heard?” she gasped. “He told the whole world he was marrying Marilyn Monroe—me! Can you believe it? You know he never really asked me! I mean
really
asked
me
to marry
him
! We talked about it, but it was all very vague.”

The committee voted to give Miller ten days to present it with names of communists he had known within the front organizations he had joined. On June 25, 1956, he was cited for contempt for noncompliance. A contempt conviction meant a thousand-dollar fine and one year in jail. Almost all the similarly cited witnesses—such as Dashiell Hammett, Ring Lardner, Jr., and Howard Fast—had been convicted and went to prison. Miller's attorney, Joseph Rauh, filed an appeal, however, and not only was Miller not jailed, but he was quickly granted a passport, while the passports for Paul Robeson and other witnesses were denied. The leniency Miller received was unprecedented.

Many believed that the benevolence on the part of the Passport Office could be attributed to concern over the bad press it would receive as a naysayer to Miller's romance with America's favorite ingenue waif. However, the Passport Office had indeed decided to deny Miller's passport. Someone within the State Department subsequently ordered its issuance. It was rumored in Washington that Senator John Kennedy and Kennedy family friend Averell Harriman had intervened.

 

When Arthur introduced Marilyn to his parents in their Flatbush apartment, he stated, “This is the girl I want to marry.” Marilyn embraced her
new surrogate parents, Isadore and Augusta Miller, and they all wept with happiness. Mrs. Miller said, “She opened her whole heart to me and Marilyn was like my own daughter.” Marilyn felt a particular fondness toward Arthur's father, Isadore, a retiring man of gentle disposition. She knew he had lost everything during the Great Depression and had never recovered emotionally or economically. Marilyn was to remain close to and supportive of Isadore Miller for the remainder of her life.

Marilyn asked Arthur's mother, Augusta, to teach her how to cook the Jewish dishes that Arthur enjoyed. Perhaps knowing that Augusta Miller had been unhappy because Arthur's first wife was not Jewish, Marilyn announced that she was going to enter the Jewish faith, and she studied with Rabbi Robert Goldberg, who later performed the wedding ceremony. Her conversion to Judaism took Arthur by surprise. He had long ago abandoned the tenets of Judaism when he embraced Marxism. When Susan Strasberg asked Marilyn why she wanted to become Jewish, Marilyn replied, “I believe in everything a little, and if I have kids, I think they should be Jewish. Anyway, I can identify with the Jews. Everybody's always out to get them, no matter what they do.”

Susan Strasberg recalled that Marilyn began injecting Jewish expressions in her conversations: “Hi, bubuleh! Oy vay! Wotta shlep!—It's all bashert!” And she was constantly making chicken soup with matzo balls (an apocryphal joke at the time had her asking Arthur what they did with the rest of the poor matzo).

Public interest in the couple and their betrothal received more press coverage than anything since King Edward VIII abdicated to marry Wallis Simpson. As stalwart reporters stood vigil outside Marilyn's Sutton Place South apartment waiting for confirmation of the wedding plans, the door opened and the announcement came from an unexpected source: An air-conditioner repairman had overheard Marilyn talking about the wedding on the telephone. Emerging from the apartment he announced to the anxious crowd, “I heard her say she was going to marry Miller!” To escape the growing camp of reporters on their doorstep, Miller and his betrothed fled to his Connecticut farm. The press followed en masse, and Marilyn's enraged fiancé promised to hold a press conference on June 29 if the reporters would leave them in peace until then.

On Friday, June 29, scores of automobiles lined the roads leading to the intersection of Old Tophet and Goldmine Road, where the Miller farm was located. More than four hundred reporters and photographers from all over the world wandered about the property, looking through
windows, knocking on doors, hoping that Monroe and Miller would appear. There was no food, no coffee, no sanitary facilities. There were rumors and gossip:
They're already married…No, they're in the house…They're getting married in London…They're in New York—the wedding's off…No, it's tomorrow…

Suddenly a green Oldsmobile sped into the driveway to the farm and stopped on the hill. Arthur Miller and Marilyn jumped out from the backseat and ran for the house. The man at the wheel, Miller's cousin Morton, cried hysterically, “There's been an accident! It's bad! This car was following us, there's a turn in the road. We heard a crash behind us. Oh, God, there was a photographer and a woman—their car hit a tree. She was thrown through the windshield. She's bleeding—all cut up! We tried to do what we could. Marilyn's all upset. Arthur's calling the hospital now!”

Correspondent Myra Sherbatoff of
Paris-Match
died before she got to the hospital. Marilyn was horrified and had to be reassured by Lee and Paula Strasberg that it hadn't been her fault. But privately Paula said to Lee and Susan, “This is an ill omen. It's all bashert!”

While she was trying to comfort the dying woman, Marilyn's sweater had become stained with blood. As she changed and tried to recover from the catastrophe, the reporters swarmed to the scene of the accident, took their grisly photos, and returned to the farm—waiting, smoking, gossiping. The heat was relentless. A photographer fell from a tree.

Marilyn and Miller emerged from the house with his parents and Milton Greene. Greene took command—twenty minutes for newsreels, twenty minutes for stills, thirty minutes for interviews. Miller looked like a man in shock. Marilyn tried to appear serene.

“Stand a little closer!…
click
…Please smile, Mr. Miller!…
click
…Would you put your arm around him, please?…
click
…Smile, Mr. Miller!…Look this way…
click
…Please smile, Mr. Miller—
big
smile now…
click
……This way now!
…click, click, click…

That night there was a double-ring civil ceremony in White Plains, conducted by a municipal judge. Arthur gave Marilyn a ring engraved with the ambiguous sentiment “Today Is Forever.”

On Sunday, July 1, the nuptials were to be performed by Rabbi Goldberg at the nearby home of Arthur's literary agent, Kay Brown, in Katonah, New York. Away from the press, twenty-five friends and relatives gathered for the traditional Jewish wedding ceremony. But while the jubilant guests arrived downstairs, Marilyn was in the upstairs guest room having second thoughts.

According to Amy Greene, Marilyn decided she had made a mistake and didn't want to go through with the ceremony. “Marilyn was in a terrible state,” Amy Greene recalled, and she and Milton tried to comfort her.