Clark Gable — PODCAST — Angelo D'Agostino

Long have we been told that when there's blood in the water, the shark comes chasing… but what if the shark was really the one bleeding…what if the desperation was not coming so much from the prey, but from the predator?

When Hildi Greenson gifted her late husband's collection of writings, lectures and ephemera to the UCLA Library of Special Collections, it should have been a relatively quiet transaction. A credit to any archive, some of the contents among the many, many boxes shuttled over from the Greenson residence came one strict previso…boxes concerning Dr. Ralph Greenson's work with Marilyn Monroe were to be sealed until January 1st, 2039.

"Box 39" as it's come to be known - may hold the answers some us are looking for, it may even disclose Greenson's own assessment of what happened that final day. Whatever the reason for sealing up those documents, it's apparent that Hildi Greenson was striving to guard the memory of Monroe her husband tried so hard to preserve. While all of the players in this tragedy are all gone from this world - the story is far from over.

The John Huston film 'The Misfits' remains Marilyn Monroe's final, completed appearance in a motion picture. Making the movie was like a trip to a salt mine for the entire cast…and for Marilyn the emotional impact was devastating. It left her depleted, defeated, depressed.
The whole endeavor was art imitating life for everyone involved…
'The Misfits' was Arthur Miller's warped "valentine" to Monroe…and their failing marriage. It would be a non-comedic role for Marilyn, one that allowed her to flex her chops and stage a bit of a Hollywood perception intervention. The personal and professional pressure Monroe was under was intensified by the location, the harsh, dry Nevada desert where they filmed.
Cast alongside the dark-hearted heartthrob Montgomery Clift and the "King" of the silver screen Clark Gable, ‘The Misfits’ was marquee gold. A tepid response at the box office, the loss of Gable (who suffered a fatal heart attack just two weeks after filming ended) and the collapse of her third marriage - Monroe soon found herself involuntarily committed to the Payne-Whitney Psychiatric Clinic in New York.

Marilyn Monroe

She was as much a myth in her own time as she is today. Her allure vibrates with glamour but isn’t limited to her obvious beauty or the whispers of manufactured scandal. Behind the marquee and in front of the celluloid character Monroe minted, is a woman who was fiercely alive, fighting to be recognized as her own genius, and not a byproduct of the Hollywood factory or an overexploited muse.

In this first season of FASCINATION we stitch the spotlight together with stories about Marilyn that personalize her impact and color the vibrant nature of her character. The approach is anchored in more editorial storytelling, anchored with discovery, opinions, interviews and more.