Please don’t make me a joke.
Marilyn Monroe on character. (The Commonplace Book Project)
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“Please don’t make me a joke. End the interview with what I believe. I don’t mind making jokes, but I don’t want to look like one… I want to be an artist, an actress with integrity… If fame goes by, so long, I’ve had you, fame. If it goes by, I’ve always known it was fickle. So at least it’s something I experienced, but that’s not where I live.” — Marilyn Monroe, Her last taped interview, with Richard Meryman, published in LIFE magazine a few days before her death. (3 August 1962)
This quote is one of my favorites. To me, it is the essence of character.
It’s so easy to make Marilyn Monroe into a cliche. Sex pot. Shallow beauty. Breathy seductress. Blonde bombshell. Whatever.
But it’s a mistake to do that — in real life and when you’re writing.
Marilyn Monroe wanted to be taken seriously as an artist. She didn’t trust her fame. I don’t know. Maybe she realized that it would fade as she aged. Or change, anyway.
When you’re writing fiction, it’s so important to go deeper with your characters. If your hero is only good, if your love interest is only sex, if your sidekick is only goofy, if your villain is only bad — your writing won’t be what it could be.
Two things to keep in mind: wants and needs.
Wants are external. Marilyn Monroe wanted fame, even though she knew it was fleeting. I bet when she was very young, just transforming to Norma Jeane to Marilyn, she wasn’t thinking about how fleeting it was.
She grew up in foster homes, married at 16. And finally traded on her extraordinary physical beauty for the love and attention she wanted.
Needs are internal. And sometimes? They’re in conflict with external wants. Marilyn Monroe needed to be taken seriously as an artist. She articulated that, right before she died.
She needed to be more than a caricature of herself.
You need to know what your characters want and what they need, and how the two intersect.
As I wrote this post, I watched one of my favorite Marilyn Monroe films. Don’t Bother to Knock is a film noir where Monroe plays a seriously disturbed babysitter. It was her twelfth movie, and an attempt to prove that should could play a dramatic role.
It’s interesting to me that the movie poster shows Marilyn as a sex pot.
(Disclaimer: this post contains affiliate links.)
I’ve added Marilyn’s memoir, My Story, to my reading list. It was written at the pinnacle of her fame, but not published until well after her death.
Today’s Poem:
Untitled (with corrections) by Marilyn Monroe
Oh damn I wish that I were dead — absolutely nonexistent — gone away from here — from everywhere but how would I… There is always bridges — the Brooklyn bridge… No, I love that bridge (everything is beautiful from there and the air is so clean) Walking it seems peaceful even with all those cars going crazy underneath. So it would have to be some other bridge, an ugly one with no view — except I like in particular all bridges — there’s something about them, and besides I’ve never seen an ugly bridge.
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(DISCLAIMER: This post contains affiliate links.)
Shaunta Grimes is a writer and teacher. She is an out-of-place Nevadan living in Northwestern PA with her husband, three superstar kids, two dementia patients, a good friend, Alfred the cat, and a yellow rescue dog named Maybelline Scout. She’s on Twitter @shauntagrimes and is the author of Viral Nation and Rebel Nation and the upcoming novel The Astonishing Maybe. She is the original Ninja Writer.