The Story of Eve Arnold and Marilyn Monroe
“It is not surprising that Marilyn, with her extraordinary gift for conveying emotional colours, would seek the mirror that Eve Amold’s camera provided.”
Marilyn Monroe on the set of 'The Misfits', Reno, Nevada, 1960
These words, from Anjelica Huston, feature in the foreword to the recent re-release of Eve Arnold’s acclaimed 1987 book Marilyn Monroe: An Appreciation. It was at a party for Anjelica’s father John Huston, in 1950, that Marilyn Monroe first introduced herself to Eve Arnold, and asked the photographer to capture her on film.
In the prologue of the same book, Arnold recounts how what was initially a quid pro quo professional arrangement developed into a complicated friendship. She describes Marilyn in front of the camera as gifted, prodigal, a joy to photograph, but notes how the real woman behind this performance seemed always “to withhold something of herself, as though by giving too much away she might be misunderstood.”
History shows Monroe’s circumspection to be justified. Throughout the 1950s, a decade which saw Arnold photograph her on six occasions, Monroe would be typecast, objectified, dragged publicly through two difficult marriages, and hounded by the press into isolation and substance abuse.
Through this turbulent decade, Monroe and Arnold maintained a bond of trust, with Monroe remaining uniquely vulnerable with Arnold — and not just in front of the camera. When they came together on the set of 1960’s The Misfits, a famously chaotic and emotionally gruelling production for all involved, Arnold was struck by how “distressed, troubled and radiant” Monroe looked.
“She looked into my eyes for a long moment to make sure she could still trust me,” Arnold recalled. “Then she drew her breath, sighed and said, 'I’m thirty-four years old. I’ve been dancing for six months [on Let’s Make Love]. I’ve had no rest, I’m exhausted. Where do I go from here?' She was not asking me – she was asking herself.”
Monroe was right to trust Arnold. When the star died suddenly less than two years later at the age of 36, Arnold embargoed thousands of the photographs she’d taken of Monroe to prevent her image from being exploited. The thoughtfully curated selection that Arnold has given us, as well as newly discovered and restored images, fill the pages of the re-released book, reproduced in the highest modern quality. Like no other photographer, Arnold reveals Monroe’s complex vulnerability, and the consciousness that first hid and then was trapped behind the mask of fame.
