Plot

Explores the mystery surrounding the death of movie icon Marilyn Monroe through previously unheard interviews with her inner circle.

Anthony Summers, the author of the book Goddess (1985), explains he began researching Marilyn Monroe after he learned that the Los Angeles County District Attorney was reopening the case of her death. The Cuban crisis, the Kennedy brothers and Monroe. Summers subsequently spent three years collecting 650 tape-recorded interviews with people who either knew Monroe in her lifetime or had knowledge concerning her death. The audio of the interviews is original, but actors perform lip-synced reenactments. Initially nobody would speak to Anthony. So, he went back to the beginning and traced Marilyn's life.

Monroe was fascinated with the movies in 1946. Al Rosen (agent who knew Monroe early in her career), says As Monroe began acting, she had affairs with multiple powerful men who helped advance her career. Back in those days it was normal to have sex with casting directors to land movie roles. Joseph Schenck was a studio head and was one of Monroe's benefactors, in exchange for sexual favors.

Gloria Romanoff (friend and owner of Romanoff's restaurant) says Monroe would visit the restaurant quite frequently, to meet the agents. She meets Johnny Hyde who was 53, 30 years older than her. Johnny left his wife and had only 18 months left to live on account of illness. He devoted those months to Marilyn. John Huston (the film director who directed Monroe in the films The Asphalt Jungle (1950) and The Misfits (1961)), says Hyde introduced Marilyn to her. Her career skyrockets.

Fellow actor Jane Russell (actress who costarred with Monroe in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes) notes Monroe had a particularly strong work ethic. However, Monroe suffered from poor mental health stemming from a troubled childhood.

Danny Greenson (son of the late psychiatrist Ralph Greenson), Joan Greenson (daughter of Ralph Greenson) & Hildi Greenson (widow of Ralph Greenson). Ralph treated Marilyn during her final years. Marilyn had a tendency to paranoid reactions, coming out of orphan girl rejections. She was a waif. Spent time in 10 foster homes, 2 years in an orphanage, 4 years with a guardian when her mom was sent to mental asylum. Marilyn told Joan that she was dating Robert Kennedy months before she died.

From her mid-20's Marilyn had romantic relationships with famous men. She married Joe Dimaggio in 1954. On her honeymoon to Japan, she made a side trip to Korea where US was fighting North Korean forces. Joe was very possessive about Marilyn. Marilyn was a national pin-up. The skirt scene in the 7 yr Itch pissed him off. Billy Wilder (film director who directed Monroe in The Seven Year Itch (1955)) says that 10,000 people turned up to watch up Marilyn's skirt when they shot the scene. Gladys Whitten (hairdresser on The Seven Year Itch (1955)) says that Joe didn't like Marilyn making a spectacle of herself. He beat her up. They got divorced in 9 months of their marriage.

Peggy Feury (actress who knew Monroe through the Actors Studio) says Marilyn started going into depression and recounted how she was molested as a child. Henry Rosenfeld (close friend and dress manufacturer) says Marilyn wanted to have a real relationship with her father, whom she never knew.

Arthur James (property developer and longtime friend) says Marilyn met Arthur Miller in 1956. He was a playwright. She was 29, he was 40. She moved to East Coast, studied at the Actors Studio and started her own production company. She wanted to be taken seriously as an actor. Miller felt Marilyn is intelligent and marries her. But soon, Marilyn finds Miller's notes lying around where he notes that she is a whore and that he was wrong about her intelligence.

Milton H. Greene (photographer and partner in MM Productions) claims Marilyn loved him. But she was a faithful wife to Miller. She got pregnant in 1958. Sydney Guilaroff (hairdresser on The Misfits (1961)) says her personal crises coincided with her miscarriages. She started consuming drugs. Monroe's third husband, writer Arthur Miller, was affiliated with communism. Both he and Monroe were observed by the FBI, and the couple was known to socialize with communist American ex-pats while abroad. As their marriage deteriorated, Monroe abused prescription drugs, and she became increasingly difficult to work with. In 1961, she and Miller divorced. The same day JFK was inaugurated as the President. But the affair started in the 50's.

In 1954, Arthur James, who knew Monroe from Charles Chaplin Jr. in the late 1940s, saw Kennedy with Monroe, walking on the shore, near the Malibu pier, and drinking at the hangout, Malibu Cottage. Monroe met the Kennedy family in the early 1950s, through Hollywood connections that likely evolved from the founding role of Joseph P. Kennedy Sr. at RKO Pictures during the 1920s. Jeanne Martin (actor and wife of Dean Martin) says that In the early 1960s, actor Peter Lawford and his wife, Patricia Kennedy Lawford, had a beach house in Malibu, California, where they hosted many social gatherings. Monroe had affairs with both President John F. Kennedy and United States Attorney General Robert F. Kennedy, often meeting them at the beach house.

John & Robert often had sex with ladies in the beach house, while their wives were in the next room.

Robert was prosecuting Jimmy Hoffa who was head of the trucker's union. The position was sanctioned by the mafia. Jimmy Hoffa was mafia. Robert and Jimmy had it in for each other. Hoffa hired private investigator Fred Otash to detail Robert and John's relationship with Marilyn. John Danoff (private investigator for Fred Otash) bugged the Malibu beach house and listened into all of Marilyn's conversations with the Kennedys.

Summers pieces together that Monroe was in a risky political position, as the Kennedy brothers would discuss with her current events including nuclear weapons testing. This was in 1962, during the height of the Cold War. Because of Monroe's leftist politics, the FBI worried she could pass along or make public anything the Kennedys told her. As a result, the Kennedy brothers eventually attempted to cut off all contact with her.

Monroe died on August 4, 1962, and it was ruled a probable suicide. The official time-line reports Monroe's housekeeper, Eunice Murray, checked on Monroe around 3am and found the bedroom door locked. Murray called Monroe's psychiatrist, Dr. Ralph Greenson, who arrived around 3:30am, broke in through a window, and discovered Monroe was dead. Paramedics and police arrived at 4:25am. Her death was ruled a probable suicide due to a drug overdose.

Summers discounts this time-line, as multiple interview subjects corroborate a rough sequence of events, although there are discrepancies. In this version, Monroe's medical emergency began earlier that night. Her public relations manager, Arthur Jacobs, arrived at Monroe's residence as early as 11pm. An ambulance was called, and Dr. Greenson rode with a comatose Monroe as she was transported to a hospital. She either died at the hospital or on the way. Her body was returned to her house, where she was placed in her bed and "discovered" in the early morning hours. Private investigator Fred Otash and surveillance expert Reed Wilson claim they were hired by Peter Lawford (actor and husband of Patricia Kennedy Lawford) to clear Monroe's home of any evidence that connected her to the Kennedy family before police and reporters arrived.

There was clear evidence that said that Robert was in town on the day of Marilyn's death. He visited Marilyn's house in the evening, when there was a fight. Robert was protected by his secret agents. Robert left town in the middle of the night using a helicopter. While Marilyn was taken to the hospital, but then brought back to her house, and "discovered" dead the following morning.

Despite Summers having accumulated information that was previously unknown about Monroe's death, he doesn't believe she was murdered. Rather, he maintains Monroe died by suicide or an accidental drug overdose. He suspects any type of cover-up was due to her connection with the Kennedy brothers. In 1982, the Los Angeles district attorney ended its review of the case and upheld the original recorded cause of death.