In a development so predictable it would make a Tory MP blush, news has emerged that Marilyn Monroe's personal effects are to be auctioned off to mark what would have been her 100th birthday. Yes, you heard that right. A century since the birth of Norma Jeane Mortenson, and the vultures are circling, wallets agape, ready to part with obscene sums for a smudge of her lipstick or a thread from her gown. The Daily Express reports that British collectors are particularly keen, because let's face it, nothing says 'I've made it' like owning the foundation that once clung to the pores of a dead star.
But let's pause for a moment, shall we? In a world where children go to bed hungry, where the homeless freeze on our streets, where the NHS is reduced to a skeleton crew fighting a losing battle, the real news is that some bloated plutocrat is prepared to drop fifty thousand quid on a dress Monroe wore in 'Some Like It Hot.' And why? Because it's 'iconic.' Because it's 'a piece of history.' Because it's a one-way ticket to the dinner party conversation hall of fame.
Let's be honest. What we're really buying is the fantasy. The dream that if we wrap ourselves in her fabric, we might catch a whiff of her aura. That we might, for a fleeting moment, be as desired, as worshipped, as tragic. But here's the rub: you can't buy tragedy. You can't auction off the loneliness. The pills. The whispers in the night. The President's brother. The CIA. The mafia. The whole grimy carousel of exploitation that spun her into a final, fatal spin.
And yet, here we are. The auction house, Julien's, will be waving their gavels like wands, transforming dead cotton into pure, untaxed lucre. They'll have you believe it's about 'preserving her legacy.' Bollocks. It's about making a killing. It's about turning grief into gold, nostalgia into a second Bentley.
But let's not be too harsh. After all, what's a little necromancy between friends? If I had a spare ten grand, I'd probably bid on her half-empty bottle of Chanel No. 5, just to see if it smells like fame. Like desperation. Like the last gasp of a woman who never belonged to herself.
So raise a glass, or rather, a gin and tonic, to the ghost of Marilyn Monroe. To the curator of our collective loneliness. And to the fine, morally bankrupt tradition of auctioning off our heroes' bones while they're still warm in the ground. Happy 100th, darling. You'd have hated every minute of it.
- Barnaby 'Biff' Thistlethwaite, reporting from the bar of the Ritz, where I'm conducting important research on the price of closure.
