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Marilyn Monroe Confidential: An Intimate Personal Account |  | Authors: Lena Pepitone, William Stadiem
Publisher: Simon & Schuster
Category: Book
List Price: $9.95
Buy Used: $1.28
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Seller: gr8lakesbooks1
Rating:  8 reviews
Sales Rank: 801493
Media: Hardcover
Edition: 1St Edition
Pages: 251
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 1
Dimensions (in): 8.5 x 5.4 x 1.1
ISBN: 067124289X
EAN: 9780671242893
ASIN: 067124289X
Publication Date: May 29, 1979
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
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Showing reviews 1-5 of 8
 One of the best books I have read of Marilyn May 8, 2008
Jemaha (California)
1 out of 2 found this review helpful
All I could say is that I have read a few books about Marilyn,but if you are a fan this is a MUST to buy, Lena Pepitone makes you go back in time to the years she was with Marilyn living in New York and through her last years although she talks alot of when Marilyn was a starlet and her early days in Hollywood,Marilyn was a very lonely person it is a very sad book, when I got to the last page I cried, Lena gives lots of details of how Marilyn lived,all she wanted was to make people happy ,her marriage with Arthur Miller how unhappy she was,and how she had a poster of Joe DiMaggio and sang to him,how she wanted Frank Sinatra to marry her, which never happened.Great book I truly recommend it.
 The lowdown on a Fifties High Flyer: Marilyn Monroe October 11, 2006
Stephanie DePue (Carolina Beach, NC USA)
7 out of 8 found this review helpful
OK, so we're all celebrity-mad these days, and even a 1950's actress like Marilyn Monroe, whose life, granted, was mysterious and controversial; and whose death was even more so, cannot enjoy the privacy of the grave. For, among numerous books, theories, television treatments, etc.,there was this book, by Lena Pepitone, her former personal maid and wardrobe mistress. And what a chronicle of popped buttons and burst zippers it is.
But let's be fair. "Marilyn Monroe Confidential" is, at the very least, professionally written. For which, I suppose, we can thank William Stadiem, the as-told-to. The book's lucid, reasonably well-organized, and it coheres. Furthermore, considering its gamy reputation, it treats its subject with respect and affection. And there are a couple of nuggets in it that were fresh way back when.
But there are problems. Pepitone lived in New York, and Monroe in California. The most important events in Monroe's life-- the making of the movies-- happened in Hollywood, or on location. So this is hearsay about the most important side of Monroe's short, unhappy life. Furthermore, as people hardly ever study acting, or double-date, with their maids, we're pretty much just getting alleged girl talk for anything that happened when Monroe was out of the house.
What happened with Yves Montand, Monroe's co-star in Let's Make Love ? People have been wondering about that for years. Pepitone says Marilyn told her they did. What happened with Lee and Paula Strasberg, heavyweight acting coaches who were to make Monroe a "serious dramatic actress?" All we know is what Pepitone says Marilyn said. How about the two famous husbands, baseball player Joe Di Maggio, playwright Arthur Miller. Ditto. Frank Sinatra, Monroe's most famous attested-to affair? Ditto. The brothers John and Robert Kennedy, equally famous 1960's President and Attorney General of the United States, whom, we know, did not meet good ends? Ditto. And then, for good measure, there's Laurence Olivier, with whom Monroe made The Prince and the Showgirl. Ditto.
All we can know is what Pepitone says Monroe told her. Finally, what happened at the dismal, controversial end, Monroe's ambiguous suicide, at age 37, in Los Angeles? Pepitone was 3,000 miles away, in New York, and had always been so.
Mind you, this is not to accuse Pepitone of holding back, or dishonesty. But the perspective of a personal maid is not the most useful one when it comes to the star of The Seven Year Itch;Some Like It Hot;Bus Stop, and other films that lit up the dreary Eisenhower Fifties with MM's special incandescence.
An even more serious problem is the fact that Pepitone only came to work for Monroe when the great star was already on her long mental-emotional slide down, after the marriage to Miller had begun to sour. Pepitone paints an horrific picture( in which other sources concur) of a woman who is no longer functional. MM is addicted to a wide variety of pills, Bloody Marys, and Piper Heidseck Champagne. Pepitone meets the great star in a state of total, filthy nudity, which we soon learn is her normal state when she's at home, which is her normal state, too. Though, occasionally, we're told, she puts on a white terry cloth robe.
Pepitone says,"Her surroundings certainly weren't anything to get excited about. The large living room where we sat was a far cry from "House Beautiful." It seemed half-finished, half-furnished, and reminded me of a hotel. There was a white piano, some nondescript white sofas, and wall-to-wall carpeting marred by many stains.
"Marilyn's bedroom was definitely not a queen's chamber. In fact, it was all queen-sized bed and little more. The room itself was tiny. The bed had no headboard. The only other furniture was a rickety gray nightstand with a lamp, a small matching bureau, a little record player on the floor, and a black telephone by the bed, also on the floor."
Pepitone "never saw Marilyn read a book or newspaper. She didn't own a television, never listened to the radio. Marilyn had few interests. She spent most of her time in her little bedroom, sleeping, looking at herself in the mirrors, drinking Bloody Marys and Champagne....Marilyn didn't have much to say to her husband, she had even less to say to anyone else. She didn't seem to have any real friends of her own."
We already know she was none too fond of water in those last years: Bloomingdales' saleswomen often complained of her smell. Her hair was a mess. She wore her clothes without underwear, as most of us know, and so tight that buttons and zippers were always at risk, giving Pepitone enough work to keep her job.
Does all this distressing information help you to understand how the world's favorite blond could still uncork remarkable performances? Then you will love the crucial event of maid and mistress's early relationship.
"The trouble started when Marilyn decided, on a whim, that she wanted all her blouse collars heavily starched like the collars on men's shirts. I tried to convince her that a soft collar, which lay flat, was more feminine, more flattering to her, but she insisted on having her way. When I returned hours later, arms full of freshly starched and ironed blouses, Marilyn ordered me to wait. She tried on each blouse in turn, complained that its collar wasn't stiff enough, and then threw it into a pile of crumpled laundry on the floor. My heart sank as I saw all my hard work destroyed."
Angry words followed, and then Marilyn "flew into a blind rage, tore all the buttons off the blouse she had on, and tried to rip off the entire collar. Then she hurled the tattered blouse in my face. 'There, take your goddamn soft collar.'"
Well, if tales from the laundry room are what you're looking for...
My Review May 30, 2002
Brad Walker (Ontario, Canada)
2 out of 4 found this review helpful
I thought this is book was pretty good but I find some things in the book hard to belive. This is the first book I have read about Marilyn Monroe so I can't compare to any other book. But just like in the t.v. movie "Norma Jean and Marilyn", I don't think everything that they say is true.
Overblown account of marilyn.. May 15, 2002
2 out of 3 found this review helpful
This is certainly an interesting Book...painting marilyn as a neurotic,spoiled,champagne swilling slob...and also as a sweet, misunderstood and lonely woman.
At it's worst this book recounts marilyn's Life (standard stuff) and claims that marilyn gave birth to a baby boy....at it's best it gives a clear picture of marilyn's marriage to Arthur Miller, her apparent lack of real friendships and a look at the reality of marilyn's day to day Life.
There are also revealing glimpses of marilyn's thoughts about her career and herself.
This would make a hell of a movie!!
 Hard to take seriously March 26, 2002
Grover (Edmonton, AB Canada)
2 out of 4 found this review helpful
This is an interesting book indeed. Unfortunately I find most of what's written very hard to believe. The way Pepitone describes Monroe goes against almost everything else that has ever been written about her. The book paints her as a lazy, dumb, immature and half crazy child. I kept an open mind while reading it but when the author claimed that Monroe had a child in her early teens I took the rest of the book with a grain of salt. If you don't really care about how accurate the content is then go ahead and read it to get a good chuckle if nothing else. Otherwise, I wouldn't bother.
Showing reviews 1-5 of 8
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