Despite Monroe publicly expressing her support for her husband, the cracks in their marriage turned into chasms. Arguments, a lack of trust, disillusionment, drugs, alcohol, all of it became too difficult to contain.
The point of no return was another feature film, The Misfits, written by Miller for Monroe.
The desert setting where it was filmed didn’t help. Amid hellish temperatures, Monroe and Miller were no longer on speaking terms, even though they were staying at the same hotel. Intermediaries were needed just to get them to communicate.
It was during this shoot that Miller met the photographer Inge Morath, whom he would later marry in February 1962.
They divorced shortly after The Misfits was released in theaters.
After The Misfits, Monroe went through one of the most difficult periods of her life. In 1961 she was admitted to the Payne Whitney Psychiatric Clinic in New York. Joe DiMaggio intervened to have her transferred to another facility.
Marilyn Monroe’s photo shoot at Hollywood agent Johnny Hyde’s backyard in Beverly Hills, California, 1957.
Michael Ochs Archives/Getty Images
Before her death, Monroe nevertheless continued to work, seek roles, and imagine a life different from the one others intended for her.
In a 1988 interview that aired on the Italian network Rai, journalist and writer Enzo Biagi asked Miller: “How do you want to remember Marilyn Monroe?”
He replied: “She made everyone believe she was very happy, but I didn’t believe it. She was very depressed, but she had the extraordinary talent of being able to mask her state of mind. She wore a mask because she was suffering too much. She was completely unable to cope with her depression, but she had been an abused child. She was looking for someone to save her.”
Originally published by Vanity Fair Italia.
