For the usual motives, Manhattan memorabilia collector Keya Morgan has told New York Post reporter Hasani Gittens that he recently brokered the $1.5 million sale of a 15-minute silent stag film showing Marilyn Monroe doing some guy on her knees. Morgan is a reputable collector so authenticity doesn’t seem to be an issue. Obviously icky information, especially on a Monday morning, but I’m mentioning it because of a bothersome timeline thing.
Gittens’ story says that “the footage appears to have been shot in the 1950s,” although elementary logic would indicate the late 1940s. Why would an up-and-coming actress who’d finally broken into the big time, having been cast (most likely in late 1949) in John Huston‘s The Asphalt Jungle, which came out in May 1950, and then Joseph L. Mankiewicz‘s All About Eve, which opened six months later, want to risk her reputation by performing in a sordid 16mm sex film? Doesn’t add up. Monroe was no dummy.
It’s much more likely that this black-and-white quickie was shot in ’48 or ’49, when Monroe was struggling to make do. That’s all I’m saying. Morgan or Gittens didn’t think it through. If the film seems to have been shot in the mid to late ’50s, which would be confirmed by Monroe’s hair being platinum blonde as opposed to her natural light reddish brown (which is how she wore it in until ’50 or thereabouts), Gittens should have at least reported this aspect. It’s sloppy reporting any way you look at it.