Miss Artichoke of 1948

February 10, 2006 4:53 PM

Marilyn Monroe, The Exhibit is a near-complete hoax, if Mark Bellinghaus — a man who appears to put the "fan" into "fanatical" — is to be believed. [wikipedia]
posted by five fresh fish (11 comments total)

Damn, she was a sexy woman.

And, damn, she died young. Mid-thirties. What a shame.

According to the 'pedia, there's little debate over the shadiness of her death: it's pretty obvious the investigation was a complete botch. Surprisingly, though, there's little in the way of explanations, save some unlikely rumours regarding JFK.
posted by five fresh fish at 4:56 PM on February 10, 2006

Photos in that article I've never seen. A charmer, she was. And how devoted Joltin' Joe was to her, especially in death.

The Misfits is a terrific film. I didn't know what to expect when I saw it the first time, and despite obvious flaws, it exceeded my expectations. Given modern nostalgia for the fifties it's hard to imagine people having this visceral and vicious a reaction to it, but Miller really ripped into the supposed zeitgeist.
posted by dhartung at 5:57 PM on February 10, 2006

Scroll down through the comments, and you'll see admiring praise for the debunking from Michael Shermer, Mr. Skeptic himself.
posted by Creosote at 6:09 PM on February 10, 2006

I love that picture of her in the black turtleneck and the checkered pants.
posted by Eekacat at 6:58 PM on February 10, 2006

And how devoted Joltin' Joe was to her, especially in death.
Funny thing, I just read an issue of 100 Bullets that suggested DiMaggio avenged MM's politically motivated 'murder' by being the man on the grassy knoll.
posted by Alvy Ampersand at 10:01 PM on February 10, 2006

That's one long soap opera of a thread - the flame-out with Jill, a Marilyn Monroe webmaster, was spectacular. I actually believe Bellinghaus but boy does he come off as some kind of crank, with all the typos, caps lock and exclamation marks.

Someone replied to his blog:
Your emotions are really creating a joke out of your own investigation. And no journalists will want to be associated with you if you keep it up...or is it already too late?

And Bellinghaus answered:
You are ABSOLUTELY RIGHT! I am really "burned out" !!! So who wants to take over?

This could be a useful example in current blog power. At the beginning there is no interest in his story, then amateurs begin linking his blog and at the moment the biggest breakthrough is at MSNBC [though not as news].

It will be interesting to see if this one blog can break the story right into the mainstream. It has all the right ingredients - Marilyn Monroe, fraud and one fanatical fan trying to break the case. If I was a producer of 20/20 I'd be jumping on this story.
posted by meech at 10:38 PM on February 10, 2006

Er, for what it's worth, "fan" has never been out of "fanatical" -- "fan" was originally a contraction of the latter word.
posted by QuietDesperation at 11:46 PM on February 10, 2006

MM as she might look today (-5 years.)
posted by cenoxo at 12:28 AM on February 11, 2006

That's a rather regal look, I must say.
posted by Pontius Pilate at 3:31 AM on February 11, 2006

Problem is, any forensic aging reconstruction of a Hollywood star should correct for the effects of years of cosmetic surgery...
posted by Creosote at 6:25 AM on February 11, 2006

What a shame Bellinghaus showed himself to be a complete crank in the comment thread - his original piece seemed a decent debunking.
posted by jack_mo at 6:30 AM on February 11, 2006