The continued exploitation of Marilyn Monroe

The Guardian's Sarah Churchwell, author of The Many Lives of Marilyn Monroe, has written an intriguing article about the exploitation and marketing of Marilyn. Andy Warhol made millions off his Lemon Marilyn silk screen painting, and even the people who Marilyn trusted to take care of her estate after she died, failed. Monroe left her estate to her mentor, Lee Strasberg, who died before he could fulfil her wishes. Her possessions and money were then inherited by Strasberg's third wife, Ana, who Monroe never met. Ana didn't honor Monroe's wishes either, and sold everything from her driver's license, to the dress she sang Happy Birthday to JFK in, instead of giving Marilyn's things to her friends, like she asked.

Churchwell says that Marilyn Monroe has become a "cartoon with a purple face", and is a victim of Hollywood's evils: "Hollywood once made movie stars by creating franchises out of personality; now it creates franchises out of spin-offs." Whatever Warhol's intentions and meaning behind his Lemon Marilyn painting have certainly been lost over the years. The essence of Marilyn Monroe has definitely been stretched to its limits. Admittedly, I never really thought about this, considering the same thing has happened to artists like Elvis, The Beatles, James Dean. However, I suppose the fact that you can go buy a Marilyn Monroe T-shirt for $9.95 at Target should make us wonder.

[image Getty]

Mark Hulbert

The judges' rulings effectively end any rights of publicity that MMLLC has.

They are not nor ever were the legal owners of these rights for Marilyn.

This also stops CMG from making any purported claims against uses of Marilyn on commercial products. The fees collected on behalf of MMLLC by CMG are in the tens of millions - all fraudulently obtained.

The appeal option is of course open to the lawyers at CMG. That, however, is a dead end because the argument made by the photographers is so indisputable.

D. McDonald, esq.

A federal court in California has rejected a right of publicity claim by Marilyn Monroe’s estate, one week after a federal court in New York issued a similar ruling.

Both decisions effectively clear the way for commercial use of images of Marilyn Monroe without permission from the estate, Marilyn Monroe LLC, or its agent, CMG Worldwide of Indianapolis, Indiana.

The court's ruling was essentially a simple one. The courts stripped Marilyn Monroe LLC of exclusive licensing rights for Marilyn Monroe.

And will open the doors for many of the manufacturers of Marilyn merchandise to assert claims against CMG, including claims that MMLLC and CMG fraudulently asserted publicity rights.

CMG are in deep denial, not to mention deep s--t.

Legal Gal

To most people, immortality is a metaphysical concept. In Hollywood, it's a business proposition.

A star who dies young like James Dean or Marilyn Monroe can enjoy a highly profitable afterlife-if they have a good agent.

As it happens, both Dean and Monroe have the same agent: CMG Worldwide, an Indianapolis firm that styles itself as "the premier company for representing the families and estates of deceased celebrities." CMG represents about 250 famous people, most of them dead.

Curiously, the celebrity supporters of Senate Bill 771 are clients of CMG.

The fact of the matter is the recent decisions on Marilyn Monroe by the Federal Judges from the United States District Court for the Central District of California and the Southern District of New York are detailed and well-reasoned and they merely confirm and apply long standing probate, estate and publicity rights laws of the states of California, New York and Indiana.

CMG is now waging a campaign to circumvent the Shaw decision and the Greene decision by enlisting a host of both living celebrities and the heirs of deceased celebrities to support a bill that would radically alter California law.

MMLLC and CMG Worldwide have improperly made many tens of millions on Marilyn Monroe for decades.

The Honorable Margaret M. Morrow, judge in the Greene vs CMG case said "Marilyn Monroe did not own a post-mortem right of publicity when she died and any license fees extracted from third parties through threats of suit asserting such non-existent rights are not lawfully acquired by the estate.

The amendment is an improper private interest legislation which serves no public benefit and seeks to overturn rulings of the United States District Courts in California and New York which are not claimed to be error or improper in any way, nor effecting any injustice.

Voice your comments to Tam Ma - Senator's Keuhl's aide.

Paris Hilton fanatic

I forgot to also mention besides Donelle Dadigan, who obviously extorted your collection from you, to also mention your amazing exposure of Mark Roesler, the former lawyer for Marilyn Monroe LLC (just learned that one from you, thanks!).

He is really a criminal and I agree that he must either go to jail or lose his title or possibly both. An $8.75 million fraud, that is big news and I still have to watch these videos to believe how obvious they are, the haunted video is so telling and funny. I love your comments as I couldn't agree more with them!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yKkHpJCZRGY

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vpZaTGiVvfA

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F41Q1828f-4

Paris Hilton fanatic

In case you have not see this one Mr. Bellinghaus, I just spotted this one on youtube and Paris Hilton is walking through your collection and obviously is wearing the same dress like in the photo above, so it must be the same event.

Here is the link to youtube and I hope it works :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7nOHpmXKwYc

oh and here is yours for the Hollywood Museum, the info on the side bar is really shocking. I would take this woman to court. She should never be able to do this to anybody else.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mz41awXMSq0

The continued exploitation of Marilyn Monroe

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