LARRY JORDAN: Author of “The Real Marilyn Monroe”
A new 768-page book called “The Real Marilyn Monroe” by longtime, award-winning journalist Larry Jordan rewrites the history of the iconic actress who has been called “the movie’s Mona Lisa.” Jordan claims a mountain of lies about Monroe have unfairly slandered her legacy.
Larry Neal Jordan began writing professionally when he was only 15 and has had a long and distinguished career as an investigative journalist, award-winning author, publisher of a glossy regional magazine and producer of a weekly radio show heard on 52 stations across ten states for over 25 years. He has been quoted by the Associated Press, USA Today, Bloomberg, The Hill, Fox, CBS-TV, ABC Radio, Washington Post, Seattle Times, Boston Globe, Philadelphia Inquirer, Yahoo, Minneapolis Star Tribune, Connecticut Post, Japan Today, Miami Herald, San Francisco Chronicle, Billboard magazine, Nashville Tennessean, Country Music People, Catholic Digest and more. He has appeared on an hour-long special on BBC radio based in large part on his work, contributed to a BBC-2 TV special, been the subject of a one hour special on public radio, praised by fellow journalists Walter Cronkite and Tom Brokaw, and quoted by scores of authors of books on Abraham Lincoln, Hillary Clinton, Dr. Billy Graham, JFK, artist Grant Wood, Dorothy Kilgallen, child raising, Native Americans and more. President Bill Clinton called Jordan’s writing “very impressive,” and commented “I’m glad I had the opportunity to read it…I agree with much of it.” And former U.S. Secretary of State and 2016 Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton wrote “your analysis and argument hits the mark.” Jordan also is an acclaimed music producer who’s produced CDs (including overdubs by pro musicians) on iconic artists like Elvis, Frank Sinatra, Nat King Cole, Jim Reeves, Patsy Cline, Bing Crosby, Rosemary Clooney, Tony Bennett, Peggy Lee, Johnny Mathis, Ella Fitzgerald, Dean Martin, Connie Francis and other singers. Jordan’s background includes having worked in politics for Congressional candidates of both political parties as a speechwriter, issues strategist and fundraiser. His adopted hometown is Jacksonville, Florida.
Who was the real Marilyn Monroe?
First and foremost she was a woman who was vastly underrated because of her incandescent beauty and the roles she played on film. Born Norma Jeane Mortenson, she invented the character of “Marilyn Monroe” and could turn on and off that persona at will. The real woman underneath the facade was a frightened, vulnerable person who never knew for sure who her father even was, and whose mother was in and out of mental institutions. She was dyslexic and had a stutter. She grew up being transferred from one foster home to another, subjected to sexual abuse from an early age, dropped out of school and was pressured to get married at 16 to escape being sent to another foster home. She had a lifelong hunger for stability and paternal figures who would give her the support she felt she needed to vanquish her persistent self-doubts.
Yet paradoxically, by sheer dint of her own will, Marilyn first became a very successful model, whose pictures adorned magazine covers and pin-up calendars worldwide. She was incredibly adept at striking different poses such that she became a favorite of photographers because she could portray any character or emotion they wanted. As several photogs commented, it was impossible to take a bad picture of Marilyn! This led to the opportunity she’d dreamed of since childhood — to become a movie star. She pursued this with amazing dedication and hard work, taking acting lessons her whole life, as well as dancing lessons, singing lessons, horseback riding lessons and even lessons from a mime, so she could more persuasively and humorously portray a woman who was very awkward and near-sighted. She was a skilled comedienne with impeccable timing, the ability to convey nuance, and a sense of how a story should unfold. But she also proved she was a consummate dramatic actress, greatly admired by others in the acting profession, and yearned for more serious roles. When she was on screen, it was an act of will to look at anybody else.
By the age of 27 she was the most popular actress on earth. Today she remains a pop cultural figure without equal who has been described as “the movies’ Mona Lisa.” She was a trend-setter and proto-feminist, who broke the Hollywood “studio system.” Fed up with the roles she was being handed by Twentieth Century-Fox, she fled to New York where she set up her own company, Marilyn Monroe Productions and appeared in two films. Finally, Fox capitulated and she returned to Hollywood. She got creative control, story approval, director approval, even cinematographer approval. In doing so, she made history.
Marilyn was an introvert in an extrovert profession, who was highly sensitive and self-critical. While she had supreme self-confidence in front of a still camera, she struggled to overcome her fear of the actual film-making process. She had virtually no ego and seemed uniquely incapable of hurting others. Friends remember her softer side—her lingering shyness and compassion for people and animals. She was unpretentious and some of her closest friendships were with those of poor economic means. She was generous to a fault.
When delving into declassified intel documents and personal files, what became evident when it came to her death?
That there were a lot of questions that should have been asked—and answered—at the time of her death. Instead, there was a cover-up directed at the highest levels, probably so. I recount this in great detail in my book, with extensive documentation.
First, it’s important to debunk the popular assumption that the actress, who died under suspicious circumstances on the night of August 4,1962, was becoming dysfunctional due to her alleged abuse of prescription drugs and alcohol. Long overlooked is that the Los Angeles “suicide investigation team” concluded Marilyn “was not an addict…had no physical dependency on drugs, her intake could be considered light to medium and she was certainly not mentally unbalanced.”
Most people may not know that no pill residue was found in Marilyn’s body, even under an electron microscope, despite the claim she had swallowed at least 64 pills in “one gulp” in “a matter of seconds.” Famed pathologist Cyril Wecht, whom I interviewed on tape extensively, raised suspicions that all forensic samples were quickly destroyed before all tests ordered by the coroner could be done.
Granted, Marilyn had her troubles, but the negative caricature of her was a gross exaggeration. This was a savvy woman who surmounted many obstacles, had no history of vengefulness, and was never going to hold a press conference to air her grievances as has been alleged. She kept her private life private, refused to speak ill of anyone—even ex-husbands—and was in the best physical and mental shape she’d been in for years. In stunning photographs and taped interviews near the end of her life she proved she was still luminescent, articulate and intelligent beyond dispute.
One of the major discoveries I made is that the two doctors treating her—psychiatrist Ralph Greenson and Hyman Engelberg, MD —were both affiliated with the Communist party. They were not just casually interested in this ideology; they were covert activists on behalf of the Soviet Union. At the height of Cold War tensions, neither of them would dare to have publicly revealed their affiliations, so Marilyn didn’t know either. Is it mere coincidence that they entered her life at precisely the same time that Marilyn’s long simmering flirtation with John Kennedy heated up in 1960? When in the military, Greenson even became adept at administering sodium pentothal—truth serum—and hypnosis. He had frequent therapy sessions with Monroe, sometimes twice daily, and was in a unique position to extract information from her pertaining to anything she learned from Jack or his brother Bobby, the latter of whom she also briefly dated near the end of her life. It was her undoing.
FBI files also reveal that Marilyn’s housekeeper, Eunice Murray—placed there by Greenson—was playing both sides of the tracks. Her former husband was a Communist organizer. She first put a target on Marilyn’s back by introducing her to Communist ex-pats living in Mexico during a shopping trip Marilyn and Eunice took there in early 1962. Then she blabbed information to the FBI about Monroe’s activities. All of this is deeply disturbing. A shadowy Mexican actor named Jose Bolanos befriended her in Mexico and he hung out with E. Howard Hunt of the CIA.
Bobby Kennedy unnecessarily involved Marilyn in one of his investigations. The Justice Dept. took antitrust action against MCA, the monopolistic entertainment giant, and Monroe knew about it before the lawsuit was filed. She had dropped MCA and turned to Frank Sinatra’s attorney, Mickey Rudin to represent her early in 1962, and the widespread but erroneous belief was that RFK was going after MCA to avenge the way they had treated Marilyn. This placed her in a very dangerous position and she even went to see an important lawyer for the mob who represented MCA, to disavow her interest in causing trouble.
The circumstances surrounding Marilyn’s death are very complex and NOBODY has reconstructed events with as much verified detail as I. On Thursday and Friday, Aug 2nd and 3rd — columnists Earl Wilson and Dorothy Kilgallen publicly hinted at a Marilyn/Kennedy romance. The Attorney General, Bobby Kennedy showed up at her Brentwood home unannounced on Saturday afternoon, August 4, 1962, to confront her. Neighbors saw him, and Marilyn described the frightening encounter to her hairstylist Sydney Guilaroff in two phone calls that afternoon. Guilaroff was highly respected in the film industry. That he was in touch with Marilyn was even confirmed by actress Debbie Reynolds and Rev. Billy Graham, the latter of whom publicly acknowledged he tried to get in touch with her to warn her of “mortal danger”! Sydney described Marilyn as terrified and quoted her as saying Bobby had manhandled and threatened her. She refused to relinquish her diary which—by the way—Kennedy knew she had, because three reporters a few months earlier had even printed stories about how she took notes in it when she met with Bobby at one party they also attended.
The Attorney General was a pit bull and was never going to leave without getting what he came for. Evidence shows he had her sedated so he could return to her home later that evening and search it with two members of the Los Angeles “goon squad” to whom he was close. Bobby had been the one to bribe, threaten, manipulate, lie or do whatever was necessary to protect his family’s political image and electoral viability, often at the behest of his older brother.
I even obtained copies of Bobby Kennedy’s “desk diaries” from the Kennedy Library to help reconstruct his movements, as well as that of President John Kennedy based on Secret Service, phone and visitor logs. Plus relied on previously unknown contemporaneous accounts and private diary entries by persons close to Marilyn or the Kennedys that have never been perused by others. I did lengthy, taped interviews with famed pathologist Dr. Cyril Wecht who strongly endorsed the scenario I outlined based on the revelation that Greenson’s own daughter accidentally “outed” her father by saying he sometimes tampered with Marilyn’s medication by pouring some of it out (i.e., opening up capsules and then putting them back in the bottle). So he is the number one suspect for spiking a Fleet enema that Marilyn self-administered the day she died. (She had been treated for diarrhea a few days earlier but the pendulum had swung, she had become constipated and did not eat anything on Saturday, but likely took one of the fleet enemies she was known to take, which could be self administered. She died in the guest cottage and the locked-door scenario of finding her in her bedroom was staged, according to evidence at the scene and handyman Norman Jefferies. Mr. Jefferies was confirmed at being at Marilyn’s home that day; he was on her payroll, she wrote him a check Aug. 4, 1962 and he was there to help unload the delivery of landscape materials that Saturday.
Monroe had dual lividity—proving she had been moved—and cyanosis (blue discoloration), which Dr. Wecht said indicated a quick death, something that would not have occurred through oral ingestion as was claimed. But Wecht said on tape to me that SMOTHERING was indeed possible and would have been easier once Marilyn had been given too much sedation. The FBI confirms that wiretapper Fred Otash had Marilyn under surveillance and he finally admitted years later he had a tape that confirmed RFK tried to subdue Monroe’s screams with a pillow.
I go into detail about the various participants in this tragedy and the information I’ve turned up will shock readers. The LA police chief William Parker got his job through blackmail and was close to Bobby Kennedy. Parker was feuding with J. Edgar Hoover (whose job he wanted) and declassified memos establish this. Kennedy also was friends with members of the Los Angeles “goon squad,” including intelligence chief James Hamilton. The bulk of the Marilyn file disappeared and correspondence between Parker and Robert Kennedy in the Kennedy Library confirms that Parker met confidentially with RFK on December 12, 1962 at the Park University motel in College Park, Maryland. If their meeting had a legitimate purpose, why the clandestine meeting site?
I also explore the “lost weekend” when Marilyn went to the Cal-Neva lodge. Other authors even get the date wrong. I reveal what happened, based on intel documents and credible persons (like a friend of Nancy Reagan) who were there who have never been quoted before. Among my explosive revelations is the fact that her ex-husband, baseball great Joe DiMaggio, officially became part-owner of the Cal-Neva in June 1962 as a front for his friend Sam Giancana. The other major owner was Joseph Kennedy, who by then was afflicted by a paralytic stroke. Marilyn was taken to Cal-Neva by Peter Lawford and his wife, Pat (a Kennedy sister) as a cover so as to not arouse suspicion about why they were at a notorious gangster hang-out. A final dispute between Giancana and the Kennedys had to be resolved with Peter’s help, and Marilyn was a pawn in that situation. While there, Giancana took her aside and tried to recruit her to set up the Kennedy men for blackmail, but she refused.
What was Marilyn’s achilles heel?
She was too trusting of the wrong people, who manipulated and took advantage of her for their own greedy or malevolent purposes. By the time she realized this—and fired some of them (like her psychiatrist, her housekeeper and her publicist Pat Newcomb the day Marilyn died)—it was too late.
Your book paints a very different picture of Marilyn Monroe from the narrative of a “dumb blonde.” What does your book show?
Marilyn Monroe was a woman of refinement and culture, who had broad intellectual interests. Her home library consisted of over 400 books. They covered works of literature, art, drama, biography, poetry, politics, history, theology, philosophy and psychology. Included were books by James Joyce, Walt Whitman, Saul Bellow and John Milton. She was friends with authors Truman Capote, Carl Sandburg, Carson McCullers and Isak Dinesen. John Steinbeck wrote her a fan letter. Marilyn’s collection also contained books on gardening (a passion of hers), Bibles, and children’s books, including her own copy of “The Little Engine That Could.” She was reading “To Kill A Mockingbird” at the time of her death.
The actress routinely attended plays, poetry readings, and concerts; admired Rodins at the Met; and traveled to Illinois to see a Lincoln exhibit. Her favorite classical pieces were Respighi Overtures and compositions by Albinoni.
When Marilyn met Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev at the studio during his 1959 American tour, they discussed the novel “The Brothers Karamazov” and her dream of playing Grushenka in a film version of the book.
Monroe took a public stand against nuclear proliferation, racial discrimination, poverty, Communism, and the red scare. She changed the way women in the world viewed themselves.
What should the legacy of Marilyn Monroe be?
Despite her tragic ending, her life was inspirational. She was a humble human soul who strove earnestly to do good work that edified and entertained, and she succeeded beyond her wildest imagination. She was always good to her fans and respected them. She never spoke ill of anyone and was a model of discretion and rectitude. She never turned sex into vulgarity. Marilyn was a true original and there has never been and never will be another actress like her.
www.amazon.com/REAL-MARILYN-MONROE-Debunking-Revealing/dp/0578325608
