One Night with Marilyn Monroe

"Real beauty and femininity are ageless and can't be contrived. Glamour can be manufactured." -- Marilyn Monroe.


Douglas Kirkland, One Night with Marilyn, 17.11.1961




Assigned by Look Magazine to photograph Marilyn Monroe for its 25th anniversary issue in November '61, Douglas Kirkland was already well known for shooting the likes of Elizabeth Taylor and Marlene Dietrich.

Marilyn Monroe arrived with the usual entourage of assistants to pose for the photographs, however, she soon requested that she and the young photographer were left to continue the shoot alone.



'I can only say this: it was extremely intimate'' comments Kirkland. 'It was just myself, the camera and Marilyn.... Frank Sinatra filled the room with his seductive beautiful ballads. That was the atmosphere of the evening: quiet, soft and enticing...





'I had three encounters with Marilyn Monroe,' Kirkland said. 'The first took place at her apartment, which was small and unimpressive, not the type of place you'd expect to see a super star live in. She was disarming, she laughed easily, and I felt like I was talking with a sister. When she arrived at the studio for the photo session though, I felt I'd been hit by a lightning bolt. She didn't walk-she floated in slow motion'.




When Kirkland met Marilyn for the third and last time to review the photos, she was dark and depressed and at first unimpressed with the images, until finally she fell in love with them.



This was Marilyn Monroe only weeks before she died: “I feel if I fulfill myself as a person, I’ll find myself as an actress. The thing is, it seems like I have a superstructure with no foundation. But I’m working on the foundation!”