Cold Open And Welcome

SPEAKER_05 0:34

Oh, yes, you ready? Five years. Five seconds.

SPEAKER_01 0:44

I mean, how long does it take his wife's back? That is wife's back. I was afraid to misunderstand.

SPEAKER_06 0:59

What's the misunderstand? A man's wife spends five years on an island with a strange man.

SPEAKER_01 1:04

Would you like it any better if I knew it?

SPEAKER_06 1:06

And it slips her mind.

SPEAKER_01 1:07

Well, I was going to tell you, but I know how upset you get about little things.

Brad Shreve 1:16

Hello, I'm film historian Tony Maeta. And I'm Brad Shreve, who's just the guy who likes movies. We discuss movies and television from Hollywood's golden age. We go behind the scenes and share our opinions too. And of course, being the average guy, my opinions are the ones that matter. As does your self-delusion. Welcome to Going Hollywood. Brad, right at the start, I have to offer an apology. Oh? Not to you. Not to you. No. I'm not apologizing to you. To our listener, Robert in Virginia. Because, as you know, last week we discussed Guess Who's Coming to Dinner, which was a suggestion request by Robert in Virginia. And I called him Richard. Oh, did you? You didn't notice it either, did you? I didn't even catch that. I caught it when I I will re-occasionally re-listen to our episodes. And I caught it and I was like, oh, oh, I can't believe it. You know, I you get in front of this microphone and everything goes out of your head. Everything just, you know, it just flies out of your head. It's so funny. So I know I hate it when people call me Tommy. So, Robert, I truly apologize to you for calling you Richard. Um, I hope that doesn't put you off from the podcast or anybody else from making suggestions because we love it. And I promise I'll get everybody else's name right. But look at all the airplay you got, Robert, from that mistake. So there you go. You've been on like a couple episodes now. And maybe Robert Richard didn't rec realize that happened. We could have called him Robert Richard. So anyway, I wanted to get that out of the way before we started because I want this to be a happy podcast. A happy podcast, if I can, as opposed to the the slog it usually is. Um just kidding. Um, because we're celebrating something today. We are celebrating somebody's birthday, somebody's 100th birthday, which was actually June 1st. So we're a couple days late, but she's 100 years old, if she were still with us. And her name is Norma Jean Baker, also known as Norma Jean Mortenson, also known as Ms. Marilyn Monroe. Yes, 100 years celebration for Marilyn. Isn't that cool? Maybe. That is very cool. And um, you know, I it kind of made me sad because something came up that I didn't realize.

SPEAKER_03 3:55

What?

Brad Shreve 3:56

I'm the youngest of seven kids, so my mom was older when I was born. So it wasn't until I watched this film and looked up her bio that I realized my mom was born the same month and year as Marilyn Monroe. Oh yeah? My father would be as old as Marilyn Monroe. Isn't that interesting? Yeah, I was surprised that Marilyn, it was her hundredth birthday because the fact that she was she died before I was born, yet her and my mom were the same age. I just kind of saw her as being a much she would have been a much, much older woman at this time. Oh, so you thought she was a hundred years young. I mean, you didn't you did you thought she was older than a hundred? Oh, yes. Oh wow. Oh wow. See, in my mind, and I think in everybody's mind, I think she's frozen at 36. I mean, that's the amazing thing about these people who die young, you know. That is true. She'll never be older than 36. You know, Judy will never be older than 47, even though she looked 67 when she died. But and you know, James Dean, Jesus, talk about young. So that's that's one thing about Marilyn. I think that also feeds the Maryland myth. But I I don't want to talk about the death. I mean, we're we'll we'll touch on it. I mean, you can't help but touch on her death. But, you know, there are so many theories and hypothesis about exactly what happened the evening of August 4th, 1962. And hey, maybe maybe we'll do uh last days of Marilyn Monroe sometime, Brad. Maybe we can do that or the last days of Natalie Wood, everybody's last days. Um, you know, but there's there's so many questions, nobody really knows. I mean, was the mob involved? Were the Kennedys involved? Were the mob and the Kennedys involved? I mean, was it accidental? Wasn't it? So there's lots of books and documentaries and wonderful material out there which discuss that aspect of Marilyn Monroe. We're not going to talk about that today. Yeah, and you know, there people have a natural curiosity about death. I mean, if you look at Wikipedia on every celebrity that is dead, there's a whole section that just says death and it tells about how they died. So people have a natural curiosity, but at the same time, it drives me crazy when you see like today in history, and they today in history, well, Wally Cox comes to mind because we just watched him. Yes. You know, today in history, Wally Cox died, and um, it's like, well, I'd rather hear when he lived, you know, and I think there's always way too much focus on that. You know, it's been 40 years since so and so died. So I agree with you. Focus on when they were born and when they lived. And yes, of course, you always want to talk about how they died, especially when it's an extremely interesting circumstance or whatever, as in Marilyn's case, but I don't want to make that the focus here either. Right. I mean, I think that's part of the legend that feeds the legend. One of the reasons why we're fascinated with Marilyn is because of her death, and that's why there are so many books, articles, websites, documentaries out there about Marilyn. And if there aren't already enough conspiracy theories around John F. Kennedy, we had to get another one. Yeah, right.

Why This Unfinished Film Matters

Brad Shreve 7:10

So here's how we're gonna do this: we're gonna talk a little bit about Marilyn, and then we are going to focus on her final unfinished film from 1962 called Something's Gotta Give. It was in production for about 30 days of filming. Marilyn was fired from it, and it was never completed, and we'll talk all about that. It was actually remade later as Move Over Darling, starring Doris Day and James Gardner. So if you want an idea what Something's Gotta Give was like, then you can watch Move Over Darling, and it's this it's pretty much the same. It's but it's Doris Day, not Marilyn. So it's the difference between Doris Day and Marilyn Monroe is the difference between Move Over Darling and and uh Something's Gotta Give. Yeah, I'm picturing this as not uh the same film. So I gave Brad some assignments uh in in preparing for this kind of change of pace episode we're doing. And I sent him a documentary, and I sent him uh the 30 minutes of existing footage from Something's Gotta Give. So he should be prepped for this, right, Brad? What did you think of that documentary I sent you? Well, I am totally prepped to hear the film historian teach us a lesson they and uh you know I I watched the documentary and you told me that you were sending it over. What I wasn't expecting is when it started, this voice came over over before before the camera came on. It was and Mike, I recognize that voice. You did not tell me it was a documentary that you did. Then I'm then I am featured in, yeah. You were you were narrow, yes. Do you think I'll send a documentary of somebody else? What do you tell you? No, no, no. I'm not I you know what I actually went and looked at the at uh the production company's website, and I knew you did quite a few documentaries. I didn't really know how many you did, so it should not have surprised me. And well done. It was good, it was very good. Oh, thank you. Thank you. I think it's a great documentary. I'm not the only person in it. There's some wonderful people in it. But you were the best. Oh, that's sweet. Thank you. You'll get your payment, don't worry about it. Um it just aired on French television on June 1st, so hopefully it finds its way to the US. But um, because you know, I that's big, I'm big in France, I'm big in Germany. Uh not so much in Peoria. So tell me about your thoughts about just your overall general feeling about seeing the film. Did it make sense to you the on you the 30 minutes or so of footage that uh were shot? Of something's gotta give? Yeah. Um, well, it was rather uh difficult because it was so disjointed. You know, you know, I'm sitting there when it cuts from one scene to the next, I'm trying to piece together what happened in that gap because it it wasn't filmed, obviously. Right. Um, but it certainly had my interest. I'm like, wow, this would have been a really good film. And I really enjoyed her because it was a comedy, but she didn't play, she was more sophisticated than I'm used to seeing her. Exactly. That I think is and I enjoyed that. I think that is the most tragic thing about the fact that this film was not finished because it was really a new Marilyn. You know, she was 36 years old, 35 years old. Sorry, she was 35 years old. She looked amazing. All the all the baby thought was gone. She had uh had her appendix and her gallbladder removed, and she lost about 15 pounds. So she looked fantastic, and there's a maturity in this marijuana. There's a there's a wonderful, sophisticated quality that we don't get in gentlemen prefer blondes, and we don't get in the seven-year-itch. And that's what's so sad. She would have been such a wonderful light comedian, and we lost that on August 4th, 1962. It's very, very sad, but I'm glad you mentioned that. Yeah, because it actually caught me off guard because I was expecting the Marilyn that we all know from other movies, and or not that not that we all know, that we remember most, I should say. That we remember most from other movies, and that's what I expected, and it's not what I got. I'm like, I like this. Yeah, I like this. So it was very sad in that sense. It's probably the character that is closest to who she really was in real life. You know, she was witty. I believe that she was witty, she was smart, she had an incredible sense of humor. The kid she loved kids. Um I we should probably tell people that you can find the footage that we're talking about on YouTube. So you just put in something's gotta give Marilyn Monroe, because it was reconstructed in the 90s and put together for various DVDs and documentaries. So I want people to watch that, not just listen to us and not know what we're talking about, even though we're gonna talk about Marilyn too. We'll put in the show notes. Yes, the link will be in the show notes. The link will be in the show notes. So had Marilyn completed this film, it would have been her 30th film. And the whole legend is about we're gonna bust a myth. Here we go. Um, but this was actually not busted by me. This has been but this was busted by many people. There's a wonderful book called Marilyn The Last Take by Peter Harry Brown and Patty B. Barham, which discusses something's got to give in detail. I mean, day by day by day. So I'm not doing this, but this is there was the legend for many years that Marilyn was too much of a mess to complete this film, and that's why it was canceled. They said she was unfocused, she was distracted, it was like she was acting underwater. You know, her mental illness was blamed for the cancellation of this film. But in the late 90s, when the footage was located in the in a vault at 20th Century Fox, and people saw this, they're like, she's not like that at all. This film does not lie. I mean, this is not you tell me, this is not a woman who looks like she's acting underwater, is it? No, no, not at all. You know, I'd have to go back and share all of her films, but she was at the top of her game, I felt. She really was. That's what's so sad about the legend of this. You know, she's alert, she's vigorous, she's charming as hell. Uh, she's just a really winning comedian uh in this film. So that's that's unfortunate, but that is not true.

The Story Behind The Story

Brad Shreve 13:32

So this film um was actually a remake of another film called called My Favorite Wife, starring Cary Grant and Irene Dunn, which itself is based on a tragic 1864 narrative poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson called The Legend of Enoch Arden. How about that? Did you know that? Have you ever heard of the legend of Enoch Arden? No, yeah, you know, it's not high on my reading list. Um, so no, I you don't have a lot of Alfred Lord Tennyson on the book. No, I don't. Uh you know, I thought I was well read, but maybe I'm wrong. This film is actually the sixth retelling of this story. It's an old legend. The poem tells the story of a sailor who is marooned on a desert island and returns home after a decade to discover his wife is remarried to his best friend. And so to preserve her happiness, he never discloses who he is to her, only to a tavern owner, after which he dies. We presume of a broken heart. Now, this film is not that tragic. I was gonna say, I didn't I didn't see all this. No, no, no. So, but it's interesting because uh Marilyn, the character that Marilyn plays, her name is Ellen Arden, and you get that directly from Enoch Arden, and also in Move Over Darling, the character's name is Ellen Arden. So that yeah, something's gotta give is not nearly as heavy as that. But this film was also the basis for a legal statute, and that is the Enoch Arden doctrine or the or address that states a spouse can remarry after seven years of unexplained absence of the other spouse. So, Brad, if Maurice disappears, you gotta wait it for seven years before you can get wait, but you're in Spain, it might be different. It might be different in Spain. It's probably stricter in Spain. Well, yeah, Catholic. Yeah. But here in America, here in America, it's seven years before you can remarry. So that's I think I think that's really interesting. I I I that this this comedy, you know, based on something very tragic, and yet a lot of films. This was, as I said, this film, this was the sixth retelling. D.W. Griffith made a film of this in 1911. So this is one of those stories that has gone down through history, through the time. Well, uh, somehow I don't think D.W. Griffith made this particular film. No, he didn't. He actually made the legend of Enoch Arden. Oh, that makes more sense. So, anyway, um, so in the documentaries you watched, what what were your impressions of

Marilyn’s Intelligence And Resilience

Brad Shreve 16:18

Marilyn? You know, we talked about Marilyn last year when we talked about the seven-year itch, um, and you gave some ideas about the film, but what what were some of the impressions you had of the actress, the woman, Marilyn Monroe? You know, I was I was fascinated by her career in general. It was really, really interesting. And but what stuck with me the most, I was actually sad, sadder than I expected to be. And the reason I'm with sad is to to just watch her interviews and listen to you and the other narrators talking about her or presenters talking about her, uh, and realizing how sharp this woman was. How do I explain this? It made her death more tragic, and not because of that, because she was sharp. It's not an issue of you know, a person that's smarter has a right better right to live than somebody that's not. It made me feel like she was more aware of the tragedy in her life. Does that make sense? Yes, absolutely. That she she had more focus as to what uh was going on in her life and how sad aspects of it were. And you know, the fact that uh her mother and my mother were pretty or no, the fact that she and my mother were the same age, her mother had mental illness problems, mine had had as well, she did, I do. So a lot of that really came to home. So I may had a different perspective than other people would have. So that made her tragic ending, and knowing that she was probably more self-aware of uh not per se her death, but but how difficult her life had been um than I had thought about before, not necessarily known, but just never thought about, made it more difficult for me. Yeah, it's so sad. I think I think everybody pretty much knows the shorthand of the history, the bio of Marilyn Monroe, you know, born her father uh never acknowledged in her lifetime, her mother was in and out of mental hospitals, Marilyn was in and out of orphanages and foster homes from a very early age. She was physically abused, she was sexually abused, you know, she was married very young, uh, and she was working in a munitions factory where a photographer came, and the rest you can find out in any book or any documentary, but that was basically the beginning. But what's most let me let me continue with what I was gonna say because I I mean it sounded like this was just all sadness, but actually I was absolutely impressed and almost astonished that given her background and the fact that she dealt with lifelong depression, her resilience and her good business uh acumen and her brilliance as an actress uh made it all the more impressive. Yeah, I mean she formed her own production company. She was in nine in 1955, Marilyn Munro Productions, which would have which was a producer on this film. You know, so she was way ahead of the game, you know. There was Mary Pickford, and of course there was Lucy. But Marilyn was really ahead of her time in the in the vanguard of setting up her own production company because she wanted to control her career. But I think the most, the saddest thing about it is, you know, dealing with mental illness, she was basically undiagnosed bipolar. You know, and that what the problem is is that she got such a bad reputation. Oh, she's always late. Oh, she's you know, she comes to the studio, she doesn't know her lines, oh she's she was dealing with mental illness, undiagnosed mental illness, and she was self-medicating with pills. People say, Oh, she was an addict. Same thing with Judy, by the way. Oh, she was an addict, oh, this, that. Well, they're dealing, they're what they're doing is they're self-medicating because they're not getting any help from anywhere else, you know. And that's what's so sad about Marilyn. She gets the bum rap as this irresponsible, you know, terrible nightmare of a person. And maybe, yeah, she had definitely had issues, but it's because she was undiagnosed in dealing with her mental issues. And that's so sad to me. That's the way it was back then, though, right? Well, it's not that there are not that it's not that there are more people with mental illness today. It's just we diagnose it now, we have medications for it now. Back then it was you were depressed, and that was probably 99% of what people were diagnosed with, regardless of what they had. And they were either given a bunch, they were they were given a bunch of drugs that were not well controlled, if they were given anything, and people not self-medicated because it just a lot of ECT too, a lot of shock therapy? Uh, there was a whole lot of shock therapy back then, yes. Yeah, it was one of the few ways of of dealing with mental illness. And yes, um well, shock therapy is very popular today and well respected because they've learned they have learned to target no, well, I just want to say because they've learned to target it. Back then they just fried your brain. Right, exactly, exactly. Not good. No, so this woman was dealing with a lot, a lot, plus being a female in Hollywood, a sex symbol female in Hollywood in the 1950s, probably the most lascivious decade there ever was until the 70s. You know, so she was dealing with a whole lot, and she was a very smart, career driven woman. So she was dealing with a lot. And I want to point that out as we celebrate her 100th birthday. And we have a lot of people who are in her shadow, a lot of people that exist because Marilyn Monroe existed. You know, because Marilyn Monroe walked, so many other actresses could run. And I just think that's important to point out before we start talking about this film because those those mental illness issues we've been talking about play a big part in what happened to this film and why this film wasn't made. It wasn't that she was being a brat, it wasn't that she was being difficult. It's that she was dealing, she was dealing with very, very severe mental illness. And that's really important to point out. And that's one thing the documentary really made clear, and I know very specifically you made clear, and I'm paraphrasing here because these were not your words, but for the most part, you said Look at him quoting me. Look at you quoting me. No, I'm not quoting you. I should have wrote it down so I could. That's why I'm emphasizing. I'm paraphrasing, but for the most part, you said Look at you paraphrasing me. Was she sexualized in this movie? Yes, it was an era where women were sexualized. Duh. I mean, that's basically what you said. I mean, you put things in perspective. Yeah, exactly. It's true, it's absolutely true. It's absolutely true. Not that they aren't today, of course. So in speaking of some, yeah, exactly.

Fox’s Crisis During Cleopatra

Brad Shreve 23:06

So in speaking about something's gotta give, um, you really can't talk about something's gotta give without talking about another film happening at the same time called Cleopatra. Because Cleopatra was filming in Rome with all of those Liz and Dick shenanigans and being condemned by the Vatican and cheating on Eddie Fisher and all that stuff, and delays and delays and costs, and having meals flown in from Chasen's in West Hollywood to Rome because Liz liked their chili. And Cleopatra was slowly bleeding 20th century fox dry. The studio was basically shut down. This is what is really fascinating to me. I mean, I'm I'm talking about everything, all the departments, you know, makeup, hair, the cafeteria was closed. There was no one there. It was a ghost town. And the executives decided they had to do something to get some money into their coffers. And wouldn't you know? It just so happened that the biggest box office star of the previous decade owed them one more film on her contract. And guess who that woman was, Brad? Was it Marilyn Monroe? It was Marilyn Monroe, yes. She hadn't made a film for Fox in two years, and they needed her box office magic badly. Now, the background of something's got to give and what happened with Marilyn is very convoluted, and I'm not gonna go too much into the revolving door of all the production executives and the creatives who came and went in this short period of time. There were two different producers, seven different screenwriters, two different directors, two studio chiefs. Uh I mean, it was it was nuts at Fox Right at this time. And Marilyn had just, she was at a crossroads in her life when they came to her for this. She didn't really want to work. You know, she had had a terrible year before this. She her marriage to Arthur Miller ended. She had, this is really crazy. She had admitted herself to the Payne Whitney Clinic to help treat some of her undiagnosed bipolar issues and also her depression. And she was erroneously placed in a psych ward. So she was locked in a padded cell and basically held prisoner for days. Can you believe this? This is 1962, 1961. And she it was only when she was able to get a hold of her ex-husband, Joe DiMaggio, who got her out. I mean, this is real nightmare stuff. You said you could believe that happened? Oh, yeah. Yeah. I've well, I've uh heard enough stories from back then, and uh have done a lot of study on it. Um I did a blog when I was first diagnosed with bipolar, and so I did a lot of stuff on studies, and yeah, it was there was so little control back then. So little control. Yeah, that's it's that's astounding to me. You know, she was basically trapped. Yeah, it's it's the snake pit. I mean, just thank God for Joe DiMaggio, he could get her out of there. Um, so she really didn't want to make a movie right now, but she knew that this was the last film in her Fox contract, and maybe they could do something. So ironically, someone else who also owed the film the studio one more film was director George Q-Cor. And George Cucor had directed Marilyn very unhappily in Let's Make Love a few years before. It was a nightmare production. She was at her lowest, lowest ebb when she was making that. So he wasn't really crazy about going back into the arena with Marilyn. But like Billy Wilder, he knew that when Marilyn was on point, when Marilyn was good, there was nobody better. So he crossed his fingers and hoped this would be a time when Marilyn was really, really good. So they put a team together, as I said, seven different screenwriters on this thing. They got basically they got the two screenwriters who are credited with this are Walter Bernstein and Nutley Johnson. And they what they did was they took the bones of my favorite wife and Marilynized it. God, that was hard to say, to suit the talents of their star. So James Gardner was uh the original choice to play opposite Marilyn, but James Gardner was about he was committed to the great escape. And it was going to start filming in a couple months, and they were afraid, with Monroe's reputation, that he wouldn't be finished in time. So ironically, he would do the remake, move over Darling, opposite Doris Day. So you got on the part. Uh, they also thought about Rock Hudson, Jack Lemon, John Gavin, and finally, who who was offered the part, Brad? Who was in the move? Who was in the film with her? Dean Martin. Dino! We got Dino. Dino said yes, because Dino loved Marilyn. Marilyn was close with the whole rat pack. Marilyn was close with Frank Sinatra, she was close with Peter Lawford, she was close with Dino, and he stepped in and said, you know what? I'm gonna help you out, Blondie. Let's do this film. And what did you think? Watching the footage that we watched, what did you think of their chemistry, Brad? You know, it was pretty good. I there wasn't a lot of scenes with them together, but what did you think of their chemistry? I actually I'm not a fan of Dean Martin at all. And uh I actually thought they were pretty good together. They were um connected much better than I expected. Simple fact, he didn't drive me crazy. Well, there's some praise for you right there. Do you um do you know who else? Can you give the people an idea of who else was in this in this film with her? Okay, I'm gonna start with one that uh most people probably wouldn't start with because he's one of my favorite character actors of all time, which is John Macyver. I know. I'm one when I the minute I was like, Brad, we love John MacGyver. Love it. As I say every time he plays the exact same damn character, and I still love him every time. He plays a judge, he plays a judge at the very beginning, and he is so damn funny. He's hysterical, funny, and then he's like John MacGyver always is. He's irascible, irritated by everything, and everyone. We had Sid Sharice. I really enjoyed her character because I thought, okay, she's gonna be the new woman, and we're supposed to hate her guts instantly, and that wasn't the case. Um, Phil Silvers, totally different character. I'm used to Phil Silvers being this nasty, money-grubbing guy, and he was a goofball. He was a goofball, he's just a total goofball. Uh Wally Cox, and then Tom Tryon. Is it Tryon? Is that how you pronounce his name? I feel like I should know him. He's a very handsome man, uh, as he was supposed to be. Um, but I'm not that familiar with him. Am I supposed to know him better than I am? Yeah, he's a he was a journeyman, he was a young actor making his way. He's he did some films, but it's not he's not like Tab Hunter. I mean, there's no reason why you would go, oh but very good-looking guy, very good actor, you know. Okay, that I kind of felt like I'm 99% of the reason he got the role was because uh his looks, but yeah, because that was the character. But uh uh beyond that, I I because I didn't I wasn't familiar with him at all. Yeah, but a great cast, a great cast. Yes, it is it's a great cast, all designed, kind of handpicked, because they're all friends of Marilyn's, except maybe Sid Sharice. But I mean, how are you gonna say no to Sid Sharice? I love that Sid Sharice is in this. You know, we think of Sid Sharice from the bandwagon and from Brigadier. I mean, she was a one of MJM's biggest musical dancing stars, and the fact that she was now transitioning into like comedy is wonderful. And she's gorgeous. She was gorgeous until the day she died. Gorgeous until the day she died. Gorgeous in this. Um, yeah, I was so happy. I'm so happy to see

Cast, Plot, And Missing Footage

Brad Shreve 31:07

her in this. Tom Tryon plays Stephen Burkett, who do you remember what their we find out that they were shipwrecked when Marilyn comes back? We find out that she was shipwrecked for five years on this island with Tom Tryon, with Stephen Burkett. And do you remember what their nicknames for each other were, Brad? Well, of course. Tom was Adam and she was Eve. Right. So that gives you an idea of what kind of character Stephen is. And here's a quick little aside. So in the uh the film that this was remade from, My Favorite Wife, with Cary Grant and Irene Dunn, the part of Adam was played by none other than Randolph Scott. And there's a very, very funny moment when Cary Grant first sees Randolph Scott on a diving board in a bathing suit, and he does a little bit of love of flutter. Like got the vapors. It's so funny. That's why I'm like, people in Hollywood weren't stupid. They knew people were saying these things about them and they were laughing about them behind their back. So that's a fun little meta moment in my favorite wife. But anyway, back to this. So Phil Silvers plays an insurance salesman who is the person who cues Dino in on the fact that Marilyn was not alone on that desert island. And uh we also have um Steve Allen as Sid Charis's psychiatrist. One scene, he's in one scene, but he's very funny. He's obviously deeply in love with this character, Bianca, that Sid Charice is playing, and really doesn't listen to a word she says. It's very funny. And that's where it was really hard to follow because the majority of this film was missing, and I would never have guessed that was a single scene role. I thought there was I was really trying to figure out what their chemistry was and what their story was, and I expected there probably was going to be a lot more. Yeah, listeners, when you watch this film on YouTube, um, or if you have a DVD of it, here's the warning is that you really have to fill in the blanks. Because what happened was was that, and I'll go through, I'll just briefly touch on the production history of the as this was being made. Marilyn basically called off, I think she showed up for two days in two weeks. The first two weeks of she was sick, and she was there for two days, and she only filmed one day in the first two weeks. So George Kukor had no choice but to film as many scenes as he could without her. That's why the majority of the film are these scenes without her, and they're not connected because she would be in the scenes that connected them. So you kind of have to go, hmm, okay, I'm kind of gonna assume here. And the reconstructed film starts with um this wonderful scene with John MacGyver and Dean Martin and Sid Charis in the judge's chambers. And as we said, John MacGyver plays this irascible, irritated judge who is declaring Ellen legally dead. And after he does that, and then he is going to marry Dean Martin and Sid Charis, their characters. And it's so funny because he's so irascible in that scene, and he's just fighting with Dean Martin and being sarcastic and nasty to Dean Martin. So he declares Ellen dead. He goes, What's next? We're gonna marry someone who these two, and he goes, that was awfully fast, wasn't it? And he goes, five years, Your Honor. And he goes, five seconds in the eyes of the law, young man. It was a great scene. It's such a cute scene. But right after that is a scene of Dean Martin, they get married, and right after that is a scene of Dean Martin and Sicherise on an airplane coming back from their honeymoon. And there's clearly some problems here. Uh, and you get the idea that they haven't had sex and they're on their honeymoon. Well, the scene that's missing is of course, there's a couple scenes missing. The scenes that are missing is Marilyn coming back from the island and then going to uh I think they went to Hawaii on their honeymoon, and then going to Hawaii and Dean Martin seeing her and finding out she's still alive. So that's why when they're coming back, she's like, you know, you can't sleep with her, otherwise um you can't get in the moment. I'm still alive. Hi, I'm still alive. First wife's still here. So that's missing. And you have to kind of just know that when you're watching the movie, that there's going to be scenes that are missing, and you just have to kind of like use your imagination as to what happened. And it is confusing, but still it's well worth watching because it's actually kind of fun to fill in those blanks. And the rest is so interesting. So definitely watch it. Yeah, absolutely. So the production began on April 23rd, 1962, and Marilyn called in sick. She actually, it it was in good intentions, though. She went to New York the week before to consult with Lee Strasberg, her mentor at the actor studio, about this character, about how to play this character, and she caught his cold. So, okay, it's like everything was against this woman. So she came back to LA to start this film, and she came down with a very bad case of sinusitis. And she was too ill, as I said, she was too ill to work for the majority of the first two weeks of filming. But she did come in for two days. And the first day she came back was the scene where her character returns home for the first time and sees her children. She has two children. She and Dean Martin, Ellen and Nick, have two children, a boy and a girl. And this is what I think is so wonderful about Marilyn, Marilyn Monroe. It's mostly all silent when she comes in and sees them. What did you think of that scene, Brad? Well, I was gonna ask you, is this the only time we've ever seen Marilyn play a parent? Yes, it is because that really jumped out at me. And I I savored it for that moment for that very reason. Uh that was tremendous. I um I was heart heartbroken for her uh seeing her children after uh for the first time in five years, and them not having a clue as to who she was, and knowing that they only know her from going to her grave site. And it was heart-wrenching because she played it so well. You could see the love and the pain that she had for these children simultaneously. Yeah, it's so amazing. So she was sick, she came and filmed this scene, so it was it's wordless. And we talked about Joan Crawford and Joan Crawford being trained in silent film and how every thought you could see on Joan Crawford's face. Marilyn is stunning in this. She takes her time and you see every single emotion, you see the happiness, you see the love, you see the sadness, you see the sorrow, you see the excitement. These all go across her face without her saying a word. Oh, I thought you were. I'm sorry, you were talking about before there was even the scene with the children. Well, but it's the same scene, it just continues with the children. Yeah, but you know, I agree. The emotions on her face. When she first walked out, yeah, I agree with you. And she sees her children that she hasn't seen for five years. Her daughter was a baby when she when she got shipwrecked on this uh on this island. And the nice touch was the dog recognized her, but the kids had no idea who she was. I'm like, yes, that was tippy. Yes, and that was so well done, because that would be true. Yes, the dog recognized her, and and the kids say, you know, he why is he being so nice to you? He always bites strangers. He always and she goes, Oh, I used to know your mother. And so she's she's kind of tiptoeing her way around. But she, the other thing about that scene, besides her incredible emotional behavior when she sees her children and how brilliant Monroe is at it, is it's so touching to see her with children because we I don't know if you know, but you know, one of the legends, one of the things about Marilyn was she could not have children. She had miscarriage after miscarriage after miscarriage, and she wanted children so badly. She wanted them so badly with every single husband. She wanted kids, and she couldn't have them. So to see her interacting so beautifully with these kids, it's heartbreaking. It's heartbreaking. Yeah. It's a beautiful scene. It really was. It really was. That's that's that is why this is worth watching. This 30 minutes of all that's left of a film is to see her. It's totally to see her. And to see that the few, there are, and there are a few standout scenes. Um, I think that's one of the standout scenes. Um, but you know, so by the end of the second week, she started showing

Paula Strasberg, JFK, And Tension

Brad Shreve 39:31

up. And when Marilyn showed up, so did Paula Strasberg, who was Lee Strasberg's wife. Every single film after Marilyn went to the actor studio and became a method actress, air quotes, Paula was on every set, and everybody to a man hated that, particularly her directors. Because when you're directing a film and you yell, cut, you expect your actress to look at you to see how she did. Well, Marilyn would not look at the director, she would look immediately to Paula. How did I do? How did I do? This pissed off Billy Wilder, this pissed off George Cucor, this pissed off John Houston. I mean, people did not like this, but that was her process. That was what happened. With Marilyn came Paula, and people called Paula like the black witch because she always wore big, long, flowing robes. You know, she was a she was a big woman. Um, and it just drove everybody crazy. So that was another thing. Another irritant on the set was the fact that Paula Strasberg was there usurping George Cucor at every turn. That's almost like having a book's author on the set. It's exactly it. It's an unwanted voice. You're the director, you're the boss. I'm a de boss. You know, you're directing this. You don't need somebody, you don't need your leading lady looking to somebody else and saying, I want to do it again, or that wasn't good enough. That was fine, let's move on. No, you're the director, you're the boss. So that was a problem. And then there were the Kennedys. Now we're not going to go too much into this, which Kennedy Marilyn was having the affair with, which she wasn't, whatever. The facts are that she knew John Kennedy through Peter Lawford. Peter Lawford was John Kennedy's brother-in-law through his sister Pat. Marilyn was very close to Jack Kennedy. Jack Kennedy would come to Peter Lawford's house in Santa Monica. It was called the Western White House. And everybody knew, everybody in Hollywood who was a big star, knew Jack Kennedy. It's just that they were celebrities, Jackie and uh Jack. However, so she's finally in the filming, in the movement of the filming. It's moving forward, it's moving forward. And President Kennedy's birthday comes along. The famous birthday at Madison Square Garden. Do you know where I'm going with this, Brad? I believe it's a certain song. What song is that? Uh, would it be the happy birthday song? You're not gonna sing it. Oh.

SPEAKER_03 42:02

Happy birthday, Mr. President.

Brad Shreve 42:08

Yes, it's that exactly. So Marilyn had accepted an invitation to appear at President John F. Kennedy's birthday celebration in Madison Square Garden. She got approval for this long before they started production on the film. However, they didn't expect her to miss so much filming, to be only present for the first, you know, for two days out of two three weeks. So the the president of Fox was furious that she was actually going to keep this engagement. But she's not gonna. She's Marilyn Monroe. She grew up in orphanages. She's being asked to sing to the president of the United States. Of course, she's gonna go. Plus, she might be screwing him, too. So there you go. I mean, how are you gonna say no to that? If Fox had been smart, they would have gone, wow, this is an incredible publicity opportunity for the film we're making. Let her go and let her get publicity. But you know, Fox was stupid. They weren't they weren't thinking along that way. So she left. She had only filmed a few days, and she's like, bye. I'm off to Manhattan to go see JFK and sing happy birthday to him. Which, you know, and they were pissed off. But thank God she did that because we have one of the most iconic moments in history is Marilyn in that flesh-colored uh Jean-Louis Gown singing, Happy Birthday to you. So, I mean, how can you deny that? How can you deny that? So she came back and people were pissed off, but they continued and they started to get excited because what was up next was worth all the problems. It was the pool scene. What did you think about Marilyn Monroe's pool scene, Brad? Uh wow. I actually was surprised by today's standards that passed on YouTube. Yeah. Um, there was uh uh Uh quite a bit of breast from the sides shown and uh uh a butt and her body looked spectacular. Yeah. And um I uh I was somewhat taken aback. I'm like, wow, would this have made it to the film? I know it would have, but uh well, there's stories. There was something. There's stories about that. So obviously, had something's gotta give been completed and released as planned, Monroe would have been the first mainstream Hollywood star to appear topless in a film. So that's true. But you're like, wait a minute, it's 1962, the production code administration. Okay, so here's how they got around that. Marilyn was very excited because there's one thing Marilyn liked to do was pose for photos and pose for photos naked. She was very, very she was an exhibitionist, obviously. She loved showing off, and she looked fantastic. You're absolutely right. Fantastic. She hadn't looked that good since bus stop. She looked fantastic. So they closed the set to all unnecessary personnel. I'm talking about grips, I'm talking about best boys, I'm talking about ADs, I'm talking about everybody was gone except the director, the cameraman, Marilyn, and two photographers. Because they were like, we're not letting this opportunity go by. Two of Marilyn's favorite photographers. Because in the original script, she was supposed to be wearing a flesh-colored bikini. But the cinematographer William Daniels told QCOR that her straps were showing. So Marilyn said, okay. She obliged, she just took it off. So she is actually swimming naked in that pool. And the what's going on in the scene is that she's trying to entice Dean Martin from his bedroom away from Sid Sharice to go and cavort in the pool with her because they have come home. Uh, Nick and Bianca have come home. Marilyn is masquerading as the nurse, Ms. Tick, Swedish. Yeah, Swedish, yeah. Uh, pretending to be this nurse. And Sid Charice is getting more and more frustrated because Dean Martin won't sleep with her. And so it's later that night, and Marilyn is cavorting naked to lure Dean Martin down away from Sit Charice so this charade can be over because he still hasn't told Sid that Marilyn is alive and back. So Marilyn told the photographers, you can take as many pictures as you want. You just have to promise me these photos will knock Elizabeth Taylor off the cover of every magazine in the world. Because Liz was all over the place with Cleopatra, and there was a rivalry between these two women. And uh, and they're like, Yeah, you got you believe it. So had the film been finished, we would not have seen everything that you see in that unfinished footage. The PCA would have been would have been very strict about that. That's very true. Okay, but that didn't mean that the photographs wouldn't be seen. So in the finished film, had the film been finished, uh, it would have been cut, you would have seen very tasteful, maybe you would have seen a side boob. I guarantee you wouldn't see her little butt when Dean Martin throws the robe down to her and she grabs the robe and you see her little butt. Uh you wouldn't have seen that. That not what that would not have made the film, but it did make all the magazines and all the newspapers. And mission accomplished, Liz Taylor, bye-bye. Everybody was talking about Marilyn and this nude scene. So it's a fantastic. Smart. Again, what a smart woman. People don't think she wasn't a dumb blonde. She knew this would happen. Yeah. She achieved her goals. And the the butt was the one that surprised me the most. I mean, Star Trek was a few years later, but anybody that watched Star Trek would know that they reached a point where you could pretty much show as much boob as you could without as long as you didn't show the nipple. So that I was surprised, but when they when the towel fell and she and you saw her butt, or before she pulled it up, I was like, wow. Yeah, it's pretty amazing. It's a wonderful scene. It's such a she is so charming and playful and alluring. I mean, you're like Dean Martin would jump out that window and dive in that pool, you know. I mean, it's funny. And that's when Phil Silvers comes in. He sees her and he's like, What's up? Who's the naked blonde in your pool? And that's where this, that's where this clip is so worth watching, or or the parts of this film, is you see so much of Marilyn. Well, I don't mean physically, but yes, you do. Yeah, you see her seductiveness, you see her be much more of a for lack of better word, this could be terrible. A serious actress. You see her be a comedian. She runs the gamut in the short amount of time that she is in this 30-minute film clip. Yeah, she does. She hits every note. She's playful, she's sophisticated, she's serious, she's winsome, she's charming, she's loving with those kids. It it really is. It's like a complete performance in 30 minutes. Yes. It's it's astounding. Can you imagine had the film, had the film, what if the film had been made, supposition time, uh, and been released, her career would have gone in a well, there's a slew of movies she was going to make that were made by other people, which is an episode for another time. Well, and I was looking at 1963, and I'm wondering where this would have fit because you had looking at the list, you had Cleopatra, How the West was one. And the it's a madman mad world. Those are big productions, but then you had Tom Jones, uh, Lilies of the Field. Am I drawing Sydney Point? Yeah, Lilies in the Field.

SPEAKER_04 49:34

Yeah.

Brad Shreve 49:34

So there were some other great films or big box office films. Where would this be? We it's impossible to know where this would have fell. But the budget was so low. I think I want to say too the set, the house set, there was one set. It was the house. I mean, there were little smaller sets, but that house set was a replica of George Kukor's house in the Hollywood Hills. Oh did you did you did you know that? Yeah, I love that house. That is only the house. It's the cute, it's the most beautiful house. And they reused it for Move Over Darling. So if you watch Move Over Darling, that's George Kor's house, and that was the set of something's gotta give. So the budget was incredibly low. So one of the reasons why they kept putting up with her absences and saying, give her another chance after New York, giving her another chance, because the budget was so low, they thought they could squeak by and it would still make a ton of money because it had the first nude scene, but with uh a major American star. So you have publicity right there. Well, that's true, yes.

Fired, Rehired, And A Tragic End

Brad Shreve 50:34

So there's an interesting kind of symmetry with Marilyn in this film because on Friday, June 1st, 1962, her birthday also ended up being her final day on a film set, which is very sad. But I just think it's kind of interesting that it happened on her birthday. Her birthday was the last day she shot on any film, it was the last day for her. She was 36, as I said, they were planning to celebrate her birthday with a party on the set. But QCOR said, I'm gonna get a full day's work out of her, and then we're going to celebrate. So, over in Rome, there was a huge celebration for Elizabeth Taylor's 30th birthday in Rome. I mean, it was crazy. Here in Westwood on the 20th century Fox lot at six o'clock, they brought out a $7 sheet cake, and a crew of people sang happy birthday to her. And that was it. That was the end. She's everybody left after a half hour. It's so sad when you when you juxtapose those two scenes of Elizabeth Taylor's birthday. As I said, Cleopatra is so much a part of something's gotta give. When you juxtapose those two incidents, it's really kind of it's very sad and tragic. No wonder Marilyn felt unloved. I mean, come on. That last day uh of filming was the scene with Wally Cox, and I think it's probably one of Marilyn's best because she goes to Wally Cox. So Dean Martin has found out that Marilyn was not alone on the island, that she had a male was with her, and his nickname for her was Eve, and her nickname for him was Adam. Now, Nick, Dean Martin, has gone and seen Stephen Burkat, the Adam, so he knows what he looks like. But Marilyn says, I'll bring him over so you can meet him. So Marilyn goes shoe shopping and she finds the meekest little guy in the world. And who is that guy? Well, I will say he doesn't look anything like uh Tom Tryon. It was Wally Cox being Wally Cox. For you for everyone who for someone who doesn't know who Wally Cox is, look him up because he's he was a wonderful comic actor. He had a TV show called Mr. Peepers in the 50s, and that title alone, Mr. Peepers, gives you an idea of the little mouse that Wally Cox was. He's like a human mouse. So she brings him to the house to introduce him to Dean Martin as Stephen Burkett, as Adam. It's very funny, it's very cute. And when she's convincing, she's trying to convince, this is the script is very well, and Marilyn plays it so well. When she's trying to convince Wally Cox to come to the house and do this, she goes, Let me take you to lunch. Let me let me take you out for lunch. And he says, Oh, I bring my lunch in. And she says to him, I'd be so happy if you'd take it out. Yes. I got that. And the way she says it, it's just, it's got that little pause and that little lift, which gives it that double entendre, which is just so it's so delicious. It's so delicious. She's wonderful in that scene. You know, she's trying to guide Wallycox through where they were living on the island, what they did on the island. You know, was it a large, was it a big island or a small island? Medium, medium-sized island. I mean, it's just it's wonderful. Did you live on the trees or did you live on the ground? Well, when the raining season came, we went up into the trees. It's very, it's an adorable, dorable scene. And it was her last scene she ever shot. So that's a wonderful way to go out. It's a shame she had to go out, but that was her birthday. And that was the last, once they sang happy birthday to her, and she left the set. She uh went to a uh exhibition Dodgers game, and guess what happened? She caught a chill and got a cold. And Marilyn getting colds was never ever a good thing. A good thing. So the following Monday morning, she called in sick, and this was just like it wasn't the final straw, but it was almost the final straw. They sent a doctor to her house, she had 102 fever, and he verified this. But they told her she had to be on the set on Tuesday, June 5th. If she didn't arrive on set, the studio had two options, they said they would hire a replacement or they would shut down the production. So Tuesday came and Marilyn didn't show up. And Dean Martin himself had had enough and walked off the set. And when Dean Martin walked off the set, that was obstensibly the end of Something's Gotta Give. Uh on June 8th, Marilyn was officially fired from Something's Gotta Give. She had worked 13 days out of 30. So you really can't blame the studio in that case. No, but uh I've seen, and and you didn't touch on it here, but I've seen just only in print, so I haven't seen the details. The simple words, she was fired, rehired, and then fired. Yeah, no, she wasn't fired twice. Okay. She was fired. And what happened was she was good, she was fired, and they did not they didn't shut down the film yet. They were going to replace her. And they went to Shirley McLean, they went to Doris Day, and they finally went to Lee Remick. And Lee Remick agreed to do it. So they were going to replace her with Lee Remick. Lee Remeck even went and got fitted for her costumes and came to the set. And here's what I love about Dean Martin. Dean Martin had a clause in his contract of co-star approval. Now, when his co-star was Marilyn Monroe, there was no problem. But he wasn't exactly thrilled about doing this film with Lee Remick. He liked Lee Remeck, but she's no Marilyn Monroe. So basically, Dino said, no Marilyn, no film. And that's truly what ended the film over. He wouldn't do it with her. So they had no choice but to shut it down. Shut down the production. So what followed was all kinds of lawsuits. Everybody was suing everybody. Fox filed a suit against Monroe. Fox filed a suit against Dean Martin for walking off the set, even though it said in his contract he had co-star approval. Martin filed a suit against Fox. Sid Cherice filed a suit against Dean Martin. Everybody was suing everybody. And Marilyn, being the very canny, very smart woman she was, went to the press. She did a life magazine interview. She did all kinds of publicity talking about what had happened, what had been going on. And later in the summer, you're absolutely right. They came to a secret agreement that Fox would rehire her back for a million dollars and a contract for another film. Q-Corr was going to be replaced. He had to go on to My Fair Lady, so no problem there. And finally, Marilyn agreed that Paula Strasberg would not be on the set. Oh. So you're absolutely right. She was fired and she was rehired. But she didn't fire it again. She died. Life fired her because this was this was, you know, August 4th, 1962 happened, and that was it. And she was gone. She was gone. So it's a very sad. Well, this is what's unusual. This is where you people have problems with the idea of suicide. Because she wasn't despondent at this point in her life because of her career. She was rehired, and she was actually going to start the film again for even more money, for a million dollars. What Liz was making for Cleopatra. So she had a lot to look forward to. So that's what is so jarring and so confusing about the fact that they said she killed herself. I don't believe she killed herself. I believe it was she, so she was, she went into a depression and she over-medicated. You know, she wasn't sure. She liked to take sleeping pills with champagne. And, you know, while that can be fabulous, it can also be very dangerous. And that was a big problem for her. So on the night of August 4th, uh, she was supposed to have dinner with Peter Lawford and his wife at their house in Santa Monica. She turned him down, and later that night she called Lawford back, and she was her speech was very slurred. And she famously said, Say goodbye to the president and say goodbye to yourself because you're a nice guy. And then she hung up. And Peter Lawford did nothing. He did nothing. Now, if you got a call like that, wouldn't that be a red flag to you? Uh yes, it would. Yeah. Yes, it would indeed. And I don't know much about uh Peter Lawford, but his public persona doesn't that doesn't surprise me that nothing happened. Peter Lawford had a lot to answer for. And you know, and later in life, with all of the conspiracy theories about what happened to Marilyn that night, was Bobby Kennedy involved, was the mob invol involved, all kinds of things. Um, he knew. He knew what happened. And one of the reasons why he had such a after that, after the after Marilyn died, then after his brother-in-law, John Kennedy was shot, he went downhill. You know, it was he became he drank more and more, he was doing drugs. I mean, you see Peter Lawford near the end of his life, and he's a shell of who he once was, a beautiful man. Um, so he knew what happened that night, but he took it to his grave. So nobody really knows what happened that night. What they know is what Monroe's housekeeper said was she woke up about 3:30 the morning of August 5th and noticed the light was still on in Marilyn's room, which she thought was unusual. And she knocked on the door and there was no answer. So she went around to look in the window, and Marilyn was lying on the floor, lying on the her bed, naked, with the phone in her hand, dead. So that's that's they think she died between 8 and 10 on August 4th, 1962. But there's all kinds of theories about what happened, what really happened in those hours between 8 p.m. and 3:30. We don't know. We don't know. It's one of the biggest mysteries in Hollywood, it's one of those unsolved mysteries. Yeah. So um, as I said, uh Something's Gotta Give was remade in 1963 with Doris Day and James Gardner, and it's cute. It was the name of it is again Move Over Darling. But you know, as you were saying, your mind just kind of reels at what you think that what this could have been. I mean, the it move over darling is missing this wonderful sex and sophistication. I mean, it's the difference between Doris Day and Marilyn Monroe. I love Doris Day. Don't get me wrong. I think she's wonderful. She's not Marilyn Monroe. Uh nobody was. And we lost that when she died. Yeah, it uh yeah. I I it's odd for me to think of Doris Day in this role. It had to be a totally different film. I mean, it doesn't mean it's good or bad, it's just different for sure. Well, like they Marilinized my favorite wife to make something's gotta give, they Doris Dayed Move Over Darling to make it like Doris Day. So yeah, it's not nearly the level of sophistication and sexiness that we get. I guarantee you, Doris Day did not do a nude swimming scene. She did, not that point, for sure. Don't think so. And you know, we get in these 30 minutes of footage, we see so much that you don't necessarily see in 90 minutes of another film. So that's something's gotta give.

Voicemails, Links, And Happy Birthday

Brad Shreve 1:02:29

I've talked a lot, Brad. I talked right over your housekeeping stuff. I apologize for that. But I was on a roll. So, what do you want to say to the people? Well, you know, I gotta say something. We I had a voicemail message from a listener. Oh, talking about the wonderful inspiration, how great the show is, and it was it really made me feel good. But there's a problem. Uh oh. The message was left for my old show that hasn't had a new episode in four years. I didn't even know there was still anything for somebody to leave me a message on that show. Wow. So it was very exciting, exciting. It warmed my heart to know that people are still enjoying this podcast. You live on my old podcast, uh, queer Queer Writers of Crime. But it made me think, you know what? If somebody can find an episode that uh a show that hasn't had an episode in four years, call reach out. Why aren't people reaching out to us now? We're getting lots of wonderful feedback, but we would love to have a recording of your voice on our podcast. So, in the show notes, there is a link that says send a text or leave a voicemail. Leave us a voicemail that we can record. If you don't want us to have it on the show, that's fine. Let us know. And if you don't want to do that, that's fine too. You can send us a text and tell us whatever you want to say, or or best of all, rate and review this podcast on Apple, Spotify, or wherever you get this podcast. That sounds good. I like that. I like that. And we'll also leave a link in the show notes for something's gotta give on YouTube. So maybe in celebration of this incredible actress, woman, uh, this incredible star that is Marilyn Monroe, maybe you'll celebrate her 100th birthday by watching this confection of it's only 30 minutes, people. I mean, come on. And you can also get a sense of what we lost on the night of August 4th, 1962. You will be impressed. You will be impressed. I mean, a very, very young life, 36, a very young life cut tragically short. But she lives on, she lives on in legend, absolutely. Well, Brad, I guess that leaves us with just one more thing left to say. But as usual, I don't want to say it. So let's not say goodbye. Let's say happy birthday, Marilyn. Well, I have no snag comment to that. I have to join you. Happy birthday, Marilyn. Bye, everybody.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:14

Happy birthday. That's all, folks.