Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe was born under the name of Norma Jeane in Los Angeles in 1926, Her childhood was quite unhappy because her parents got divorced even before her birth and her mother left her with foster parents. Later on, she spent some time in an orphans’ home.

Marilyn married her first husband, James Dhougherty when she was only 16 years old. He was a merchant marine and he was sent to World War II shortly after their marriage. Marilyn started to work in a factory making parachutes in 1944.

While she was still working in that factory she was discovered by a photographer, David Conover and signed  by a modeling agency. In the following years she became a very successful model and appeared on the cover of lots of magazines. The first film in which she acted was in Scudda Hoo! Scudda Hay! (1947) but her role was very small, she only spoke two words!

During the late 1940’s She obtained other minor roles in films. The most important of those films were All About Eve and The Asphalt Jungle.

She finally got a starring role in 1952 with Don't Bother to Knock, in which she portrayed a deranged babysitter who attacks the little girl in her care. That was the beginning of her raise to stardom.

Her next films  were Niagara, Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, where she sang  "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend"   and How to Marry a Millionaire. These films were very successful and by the beginning of 1954, when she married  the famous baseball player Joe Dimaggio,  she had already become one of the world's biggest movie stars.

The Seven Year Itch (1955) directed by Billy Wilder, contains one of the most famous scenes  of her career in which Marilyn Monroe’s dress  is blown up by a passing train underneath a subway grate she is standing on.