Marilyn, the dress and the subway...

These poses of Marilyn have been used in thousands of venues including posters, comics, lampoons, t-shirts, ceramic statuettes, and have been repeated on stages by actors from look-alike mimics to female impersonators. It’s famous.

The image has reached a visual familiarity status like Mickey Mouse or Joe the Camel, the portraits on paper money or the Che Guevera stencil, the Statue of Liberty or the Michelangelo’s statue of David. It’s very famous.

Betty Boop

mmPod,
originally uploaded by
Daisuke Tanaakaa

Sure, with today’s computers one could make a capture of each unique frame of the whole sequence if one wanted to bother. But that’s not the mystery here. Where are the photographs caught by maybe hundreds of still cameras on the scene? Had the paparazzi not been invented yet?

In the crowd there must have been other cameras. Where are those pictures?

The film crew and actors drew crowds of casual onlookers, news photographers and fans. There were many pictures taken. Many. Some were deliberate poses for promotional purposes; others were shot by professionals. Some of these photographs have reached artistic fame. Where are their out-takes and rejects? Are they still tied up in copyright protection? It’s been fifty years!

Some of the posed shots were used for posters, print advertising and labels, often artfully adjusted to fit many venues.
It has become the prime scene of the movie. Iconic if you wish.

I count is now up to just 44 unique shots. How many have you seen?

One

Two

Three

Four

Five

Six

Seven

Eight

Nine

Ten

Eleven

Twelve

Thirteen

Fourteen

Fifteen

Sixteen

Seventeen

Eighteen? No! This is actually a cropped version of number four!

Eighteen

Nineteen

Twenty

Twenty-One

Twenty-Two

Twenty-Three

Twenty-Four

Twenty-Five

Twenty-Six

Twenty-Seven

Twenty-Eight

Twenty-Nine

Thirty

Thirty-one

Thirty-two

Thirty-Three

Thirty-Four

Thirty-Five

Thirty-Six

Thirty-Seven

Thirty-Eight

Thirty-Nine

Forty

Forty-One

Forty-Two

Forty-Three

Forty-Four

The total is up to Forty-Four now. It has taken more than a year to find one new one. Is everyone looking?

Thousands of people visit this page. Some from Morgan Hill, California, download every picture on it.

These pictures were all found on the net somewhere but it took a long time. Isn't it nice to have them all in one spot?

Is the total really just 44?

I suppose everyone has seen this photo more than once.

Or was it this one…?

These shots with Tom Ewell were done apparently during shooting or rehearsal or set up. (#'s 1, 2, 3, 4)

#'s 10 and 11

You think maybe that these shots might be just seconds apart? Almost a sequence?

Look at the pictures again, only this time examine the clothing on Tom Ewell. The coat tail and the pants cuffs will tell you that he has moved around quite a bit between those two shots.

(#5)
Here is Ewell on the other side of Marilyn, a still from the movie for sure. You usually see this shot cropped to just Marilyn. (see the media jackets and posters above)

mmPod,
originally uploaded by
Daisuke Tanaakaa

This is a long shot by professional photographer Sam Shaw showing some of the crowd behind the camera.
(#8)

This is a new addition as of 04/19/2008. It is almost the same moment as the Sam Shaw photo above but from a different angle. It is likely a Sam Shaw photo too. It was located by DRXBLOG who has quite a store of Marilyn Monroe pictures as well as other celebrities. Note: It is entered as #09 so that it will appear with the similar shot.

Getting just the right amount of "wind" blowing up through the grating, appeared to take some experimenting. (#21)

Here is a bit of what has probably happened to many of these photographs. The shot on the left (#26)is probably the original and the one on the right is a combination of #26 and some other shots. In the Photo-shopped version on the right, the right arm has been brushed out and certain bits(nickers) from another shot have been substituted...

Which is the original?

The dapper gentleman(identified as Billy Wilder himself) enters. These three shots were done apparently within a second or two of each other, only from different angles. See the position of the flood light or the iron grate in the sidewalk.

The gentleman is in the right panel but gone in the left one. He might have just stepped aside or was he erased?

These three panels are by photographer George S. Zimbel. There are two more from the "Stand-On-One-Foot" pose.

These six look similar to the camera position of the three above. The origin is uncertain. More from the session in front of the merchant's door.

This sensitive shot from that same night and the strip of five (right) are all by
George S. Zimbel.

The photographs in this strip are all by the excellent photographer, George Zimbel. Starting from the left, the numbers are:43, 37, 36, 39 and 35.

This pair compares one shot from "Seven Year Itch" to a scene from a very old silent movie. This is from a site that theorizes that that maybe, just maybe Billy Wilder might have remembered this scene and used the idea for the famous Marilyn subway scene.