As the world prepares to mark 100 years since the birth of Marilyn Monroe, a new exhibition at the National Portrait Gallery, a film season at the BFI, and several books, including Andrew Wilson's 'I Wanna Be Loved By You – Marilyn Monroe, A Life in 100 Takes,' are celebrating her life. Yet one aspect of her biography is often overlooked: her support for those suffering from mental health problems.
Now, this hidden legacy has been honoured with the launch of the Marilyn Monroe Mental Health for the Arts Program at Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. Lori Hall, who donated $100,000 to the initiative, said: 'Marilyn Monroe remains one of the most widely recognised and misunderstood figures in modern history.' The program aims to support performing artists with mental wellbeing issues, a cause close to Monroe's heart.
Monroe's Personal Struggles with Mental Health
Marilyn's interest in mental health was deeply personal. Her maternal grandfather, Otis, died in an institution from general paresis caused by syphilis. Her grandmother, Della, suffered from manic-depressive psychosis and attempted to smother baby Marilyn before being committed. Her mother, Gladys, was diagnosed with schizophrenia and placed Marilyn in foster care 12 days after birth.
For years, Monroe believed she had inherited mental illness, saying: 'For a long time I was scared I’d find out that I was like my mother and end up in the crazy house.' At age eight, she was sexually abused by a boarder in her foster home. Experts later linked this trauma to her emotional difficulties, describing her as 'a child in a woman’s body' who played the seductress to cope with abuse.
The Role of Therapy and Medication
Monroe first underwent psychoanalysis in 1951 and later saw Anna Freud in London, who diagnosed her with 'emotional instability, exaggerated impulsiveness, tendency to depression, and paranoid with schizophrenic elements.' Another doctor believed she had bipolar disorder. From 1960, she saw Dr Ralph Greenson, who wrote in an unpublished letter that her dependence on sleeping pills 'was her way of escaping the miseries of life.' He described her as 'a bottomless well' due to her lack of family.
By December 1961, Dr Greenson considered her a 'borderline paranoid addict' and placed nurses in her apartment to monitor her. In her last two months, she was prescribed 830 units of medication, enough to kill someone multiple times. On 4 August 1962, she died from an overdose of Nembutal and chloral hydrate, ruled a probable suicide.
Monroe's Philanthropic Legacy
Despite her struggles, Monroe advocated for mental health awareness. In 1959, she asked her lawyer to investigate organisations providing psychiatric assistance to children, hoping to start a foundation. Although unfulfilled in her lifetime, she left a quarter of her estate to Dr Marianne Kris, who later gave it to the Anna Freud Centre in London.
Andrew Wilson concludes: 'We should see Monroe as an incredibly modern and quietly subversive figure. As we remember her for her acting and beauty, it’s time to acknowledge this important legacy.' Lori Hall added: 'I can think of no better way to celebrate her 100th birthday than by fulfilling this wish.'
