Norma Jean: The Life of Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe remains the most provocative female legend of the twentieth century. What you may have known about her before was only the tip of the iceberg. For twenty years, the men and women who knew Marilyn best saw what they knew suppressed because certain important people were still living, and the tenor of the times prohibited frankness. Instead, rumors ballooned.

This book finally sets the record straight.

Fred Guiles—whom Norman Mailer acknowledges as the chief source of fact about Marilyn—has written the life behind the legend. He reveals what really happened in the careening career of the pretty waif named Norma Jean Mortensen, who married the boy next door, became a model, an actress, movie star, married an incompatible legend named Joe DiMaggio, sought to improve the mind that came with her near-perfect body, married playwright Arthur Miller, lent herself to the Svengalilike ministrations of Paula and Lee Strasberg, became the mistress of John and then Robert Kennedy when they ran the country, kept camera crews and studios waiting—but not death, which took her under the most unusual circumstances by the age of thirty-six. A legend, by definition, is unaltered by fact, but the enthralled reader will find the revelations in this book no deterrent to the love of Marilyn Monroe by understanding at last what happened to the Queen of Need.

Among the people interviewed for this book are Arthur Miller; James E. Dougherty, her first husband; Frank Taylor, the producer of The Misfits; Lee Strasberg; Otto Preminger; Billy Wilder; Joshua Logan and John Huston.

Tyrone Power was as versatile in life as he was on the screen. He was several men, and during the creation of this book I have been fortunate in having the other principal ‘lead” in each of these lives as an active partner, coming very close at times to the point of collaboration. He was the last idol created by the vast star-making machine, Twentieth Century Fox. 

Coming from a family of multi-generational actors, Tyrone Power broke the proverbial mold. His on-screen charisma in the 30's and 40's propelled him to the forefront of the "must have" actors. His on-screen accomplishments were many yet he did not hesitate to enter the military when his country went to war. After the war, he continued in his career but the years took their toll. 

A fascinating look behind the scenes of Hollywood of the 30's and 40's and the impact of the times on a great actor.

Jane Fonda has been in the public eye since birth; just being Henry’s daughter qualified her for celebrity status. However, her intelligence and talent compelled her to reach beyond this birthright to become an individual of extraordinary and diverse accomplishments. 

It would take a restless camera to document Jane Fonda’s life for she is a woman of formidable energy, but Fred Lawrence Guiles’ expert commentary captures her in motion. We pursue her in a tireless route of study, self-discovery, and social awareness that causes her to ultimately reject the “Beautiful People” life-style of her first husband, Roger Vadim, for the role of political activist with her present husband, Tom Hayden. We witness how the shift in political climate transforms her from history’s scourge to history’s darling. Yet despite governmental harassment and public scorn for her radical beliefs, she, nonetheless, achieves international acclaim for her acting and twice received the Academy Award for Best Actress.

Candid interviews with friends, relatives, and colleagues enrich this admiring but honest portrait; fifty-three black and white photographs complement an impeccable text vivifying an exceptional woman of many identities. An unmistakable impression remains that Jane Fonda will continue to grow, and the world will continue to watch.

Stan, surprisingly, is the first full-length biography of the legendary comic who was the creative half of the universally loved duo, Laurel and Hardy. Based upon scores of interviews with family and friends (including the intimate diaries of Virginia Ruth Laurel, whom Stan married three times) and enhanced by a magnificent collection of previously unpublished photographs, Stan tells the very human story of Laurel’s struggle to survive against difficult odds, personal and professional.

From precarious beginnings in vaudeville with Charlie Chaplin, skinny Stan changed his name and rose to enjoy success and universal acclaim with his big-bellied partner Oliver Hardy. Yet beneath the exterior of the wistful comic whose sense of humor gave pleasure to so many millions was a man beset by financial worries, alcohol, and unhappy personal relationships that encompassed many dalliances and six marriages. 

This superb biography provides new insight into the supremely talented man behind the screen image and a fascinating panorama of show business in the first half of this century.

Meticulously researched, Joan Crawford: The Last Word deals in full with her long movie career and explores in detail her turbulent private life. Respected biographer Fred Lawrence Guiles uses newly discovered sources and recent interviews with many who knew her, and some who loved her, to establish the person behind the carefully crafted screen icon.

For most of her adult life she was a Star who dedicated herself entirely to her career. But since her death her luster has been tarnished. Here, at last, is a biography that sets the record straight. In her heyday Joan Crawford was probably the most imitated woman in the world. Magazine covers featured her face, and high school and college girls copied her makeup and clothing.

Born Lucille LeSuer in Kansas City, she spent her childhood on the edge of poverty. But an iron will developed in adolescence drove her to New York City and eventual work in a chorus line. Spotted by a Hollywood talent scout, she was soon on her way to the film capital. Four times married (to actors Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Franchot Tone, Philip Terry, and Pepsi-Cola executive Alfred Steele) and driven by a powerful sexuality, Joan Crawford lived her life on the razor’s edge. Yet she was a woman of great generosity who cared deeply for her four adopted children, although her ideas of discipline were colored by her own harsh upbringing. Her professional career spanned more than forty years and included such classics as Grand Hotel, Mildred Pierce, and Whatever Happened to Baby Jane? Her remarkable progression from silent films to talkies to television exemplified her ability to adapt, chameleonlike, to the ever-changing demands of the industry that in many senses invented her.

In this detailed biography of film star Marion Davies (nee Douras) who was in so many ways created by and for William Randolph Hearst -- the symbiotic relationship spanned from 1915 when W.R. first ogled her chorus-girl charms to his death in 1951. But she was much more quickly superannuated cinema-historically speaking by the Orson Welles-Herman Mankiewicz dumb-blond caricature in Citizen Kane, paradoxically the most important film in her life.

Fred Lawrence Guiles presents the life story of one of the most deft comedians in silent pictures—up from Brooklyn, show biz, the engaging stammer, private then public Hearst inamorata, Hollywood, the Chaplin liaison, encounters with the famous, San Simeon, W.R.'s demise, the constant drinking (she hid her gin from Hearst in the water tank of the toilet), the quick marriage to Captain Horace Brown, finally her death from cancer in 1961. Now a deserving revival.