Marilyn Monroe (46 page)

It seemed that things could not possibly get worse, but by the end of the second week they had. Marilyn, searching for a copy of her script, wandered into the music room. Her husband wasn’t there. She saw the script of
The Sleeping Prince
on Arthur’s desk, with one of his notebooks lying open beside it. Like Pandora, Marilyn was unable to resist. The notebook entry, in Arthur’s hand, concerned her.

For a long time, it had been Miller’s custom to jot down random impressions, ideas for plays, lists of possible titles, snippets of dialogue, and even drafts of entire scenes. Sometimes, he wrote in the third person about a character named “Miller.” At least in this context, he was interested in other people less for themselves than for the conflicts they generated in him, conflicts that might provide the germ of a play. When Arthur was with his first wife, he had stockpiled his thoughts on marriage to a difficult, demanding woman. He had meditated on adultery and a husband’s search for ecstasy. Now that he was with Marilyn, he continued to take notes.

Marilyn was shattered. She reported to Lee Strasberg that in the notebook entry, Arthur had expressed his disappointment in her. According to Marilyn, Arthur wrote that he had believed she was an angel but now he realized he’d been wrong. She had turned out to be different from his fantasy, and she was convinced that he was sorry he’d married her.

It is important to understand why Marilyn responded to this discovery in catastrophic terms. As Miller himself later recognized, she lived with the expectation of being abandoned. Early on, life had taught her to anticipate rejection. There were her father, her mother, and all the others who for one reason or another couldn’t or wouldn’t keep her. Her mother, according to Marilyn, had done more than just walk away; she’d actually tried to kill her. Perhaps it was inevitable that the child would ask why she had been abandoned so often. Perhaps it was inevitable that she would conclude it was something in her that drove people away. Is it any wonder her sense of self-worth was so fragile? This would explain Marilyn’s lifelong terror of criticism. To have even her slightest flaws pointed out suggested that the familiar process of discovery and abandonment had begun. And it would explain why Marilyn reacted so strongly to Miller’s notebook. She feared that he had begun to perceive her unworthiness. She feared he was on to who she really was. She feared he was about to leave her.

On the night of Saturday, August 18, the Millers drove to Little Court for the second Rattigan party. This time, the host greeted them at the door alone. Olivier remained at Notley Abbey with Vivien. The Millers seemed like a different couple tonight. There were rumors of discord at Parkside House, though at this point no one yet knew how badly things had spun out of control. Arthur was handsome in a white dinner jacket, Marilyn oddly disheveled. Colin Clark later noted in his diary that Marilyn actually seemed a bit frightened of her husband. That was a far cry from the impression she had given last time.

Back then, Marilyn had been certain that in Arthur she had finally found someone who loved her. Confident in his feelings, she had dared to feel worthy of being loved. But the discovery of the notebook changed all that forever. Suddenly, Marilyn was convinced that he would abandon her as all the others had done. After this, she would never feel safe in Arthur’s love again.

TWELVE

O
n Friday, August 24, Arthur Miller announced that he had decided to interrupt his honeymoon and fly to the United States “to see my children.” He planned to leave on Sunday night. He did not anticipate any trouble at home. Assistant United States Attorney William Hitz, who handled contempt cases in Washington, had been out all summer on sick leave and vacation. Miller’s file had been placed on Hitz’s desk along with several others. Hitz was not due back at work until the second week in September. It was unlikely that anything would happen until then. Meanwhile, Miller planned to visit Jane and Robert for about ten days, then return to England.

For Marilyn, the announcement could not have come at a worse time. One week after she discovered the devastating entry in Arthur’s notebook, his decision to go home can only have confirmed her worst fears of abandonment. It wouldn’t be the first time he had chosen his family over Marilyn. Once before, in New York in 1951, Arthur, having decided to leave his wife, had abruptly changed his mind and gone back to Mary and the children. Marilyn was left alone in a Manhattan hotel room to be comforted by Elia Kazan.

On Friday afternoon, Miller appeared at Pinewood Studios to collect Marilyn. Things had been tense at Parkside House all week. In the past, when Arthur arrived on the set, he and Marilyn couldn’t wait to be alone together. That was far from the case today. Instead of going home with Marilyn, Arthur decided to remain behind. It was a most unusual thing for him to do. Marilyn left with Paula Strasberg and other members of her entourage. Miller accepted an invitation to join Laurence Olivier and Milton Greene for a drink in Olivier’s dressing room.

Olivier was at wit’s end as the third calamitous week of filming drew to a close. He was having trouble at work with Marilyn and at home with Vivien. Now he had two sleepless, mad women to contend with, though he loathed one and loved the other. He jestingly announced that he planned to leave for China. Greene, increasingly disillusioned by what it meant to be a partner in Marilyn Monroe Productions, laughed that he’d join him there. Arthur chimed in that he’d like to come, too. Olivier, surprised that Miller would say such a thing, reminded the man of his new wife. Miller declared she was devouring him.

In making that remark, Miller was clearly trying to distance himself from Marilyn. And he went considerably beyond merely sympathizing with Olivier about Marilyn’s behavior on the film. Miller was actually complaining to her director about Marilyn’s behavior at home.

That once again Miller was thinking of himself in the role of the betrayer is suggested by the way he rewrote
A View from the Bridge
in this period. There was a noticeable softening in the play’s attitude to Eddie Carbone. Instead of merely condemning the betrayer as in the earlier version, the two-act
View
sought to understand, even to love him. In part, this was probably a response to Eric Bentley’s criticism that the original was preachy and melodramatic. But it may also have reflected the playwright’s changing attitude to his new wife. Marilyn demanded that in her conflict with Olivier, Arthur take her side completely and unquestioningly. That, more and more, he was unable to do. In the past, when Miller identified with the betrayer, it had been in terms of his actions to Mary. Now for the first time, it was Marilyn he found himself turning against. This was the personal conflict that preoccupied Miller as he revised
View;
is it any wonder he had new sympathy for Eddie?

As it happened, Arthur did not leave on Sunday, but postponed his trip until Thursday, August 30. Before returning to America, he planned to stop in Paris to see Yves Montand and his wife, Simone Signoret, who were filming an adaptation of
The Crucible
with a screenplay by Jean-Paul Sartre. The Montands had appeared as John and Elizabeth Proctor in the highly successful French stage production. Meanwhile, Parkside House rocked with the Millers’ quarrels. Marilyn roamed the corridors of the enormous house, her drugged trance leading Olivier to compare her to Ophelia.

On Monday, Marilyn stayed away from work altogether. She
reported to the studio on Tuesday in a barbiturate blur. Late that night, Greene had to be summoned to bring more pills to Parkside House. She and Miller had been fighting, and eventually the husband just seemed to withdraw. Finally, over the telephone, Marilyn’s psychiatrist in New York was able to soothe her sufficiently to let the sedatives work and send her to sleep.

Marilyn didn’t show up at the studio again on Thursday. Instead, she saw Arthur off at the airport. The next day, Milton Greene telephoned Irving Stein in New York to report that Marilyn was pregnant. A gynecologist visiting Parkside House confirmed the pregnancy. Fearful she was going to lose her baby, Marilyn began to drink heavily, liberally supplementing champagne with tranquilizers. Hedda Rosten sat with her. Three sheets to the wind, Marilyn grew maudlin. She wept that she simply had to complete
The Sleeping Prince.

Marilyn called Arthur in New York and they talked for hours. Olivier, worried that his leading lady might not be able to finish, had a business associate check his insurance policy in the event that the production had to be shut down. Miller wasn’t due back in London until September 12, but he returned suddenly on Wednesday the 5th, only six days after he had left. By Saturday, word was out that Marilyn had miscarried.

She would be in no physical or mental condition to go back to work until the middle of the week.
The Sleeping Prince
seemed hardly to matter to her anymore. Marilyn had never recovered from the moment when Olivier urged her to “be sexy.” From then on, her hopes for the film had died. But Marilyn’s attitude to her marriage was a very different story. She was utterly determined to keep that dream alive. It was clear that the notebook entry, followed by Arthur’s departure, had terrified her. She could not bear the thought that she might really lose him. When Arthur returned from America, Marilyn intended to hold onto him. She would do whatever it took to prove herself worthy of his love.

Despite her condition, Marilyn insisted that she drive to London with Arthur on Sunday. She might not be well enough to return to work, but this was something she had to do for her husband. There was a problem with
A View from the Bridge
, and Marilyn was in a unique position to help. The Lord Chamberlain, taking objection to the notorious scene in which Eddie kisses Rodolpho full on the lips, had refused Binkie
Beaumont a permit for public performances at the Comedy Theater. The censor of plays demanded that the scene be cut.

Instead, Beaumont had decided to stage the play under the auspices of the newly constituted New Watergate Theater Club. The censor had no authority over private theater clubs. In order to see
View
, one had to join Beaumont’s club at least forty-eight hours before the performance one wanted to attend. There was a small membership fee (which Binkie happily pocketed) and one had to be certified by another member as not “undesirable.” Eager to sign up as many members in advance as possible, Beaumont invited reporters to what was billed as the club’s “first meeting,” its principal attraction being an appearance by Marilyn Monroe.

On Sunday night, Marilyn looked wan as she arrived at the Comedy with Arthur Miller. They were met by a crowd of photographers. Inside the theater, Marilyn made much ado of paying her membership fee. Her husband certified that she was not “undesirable.” The publicity that followed Marilyn everywhere benefited ticket sales immeasurably. As a result of all the press coverage, Binkie Beaumont had to assign nine extra assistants to handle the torrent of mail. In the end, they signed up about thirteen thousand members. Miller exulted about the heavy advance ticket sales to Kermit Bloomgarden, neglecting to point out that Marilyn might have had anything to do with it.

Kermit Bloomgarden hadn’t had a chance to see Miller during his brief stay in New York, but the producer and the playwright had talked on the phone. Upon Miller’s return, Bloomgarden telegraphed inviting Marilyn to appear on Broadway as Athena in Paul Osborn’s
Maiden Voyage.
Soon, a copy of
Maiden Voyage
followed. Osborn was the commercially successful author of such plays as
The Vinegar Tree
and
Point of No Return.
Bloomgarden was careful to say he didn’t want Marilyn simply for her name but because he was sure she would be terrific in the role.

Miller declined on Marilyn’s behalf. He made a point of reaffirming his belief that Marilyn was going to be a great stage star, but as far as he was concerned, making her theatrical debut in Paul Osborn’s play was simply out of the question. He noted that Marilyn was exhausted and couldn’t possibly work that winter. As soon as she completed
The Sleeping Prince
, the Millers wanted to go home and settle down. Arthur had reached a point where he believed that only when the film was in the can could their life together really begin. Marilyn’s first independent
production, once the object of such high hopes, had turned into something merely to be endured and put behind them.