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[01:12] Sometimes wearing a scarf and a polo coat and no makeup and with a certain attitude of walking, I go shopping or just look at people living. But then you know, there will be a few teenagers who are kind of sharp and they'll say, "Hey, just a minute. You know who I think that is?" And they'll start tailing me. And I don't mind. The kids, their faces light up. They say, "Gee," and they can't wait to tell their friends. And old people come up and say, "Wait till I tell my wife." In the morning, the garbage men that go by 57th Street when I come out the door say, "Marilyn, hi! How do you feel this morning?" To me, it's an honour, and I love them for it. The working men, I'll go by and they'll whistle. At first they whistle because they think, oh, it's a girl. She's got blond hair and she's not out of shape, and then they say, "Gosh, it's Marilyn Monroe!" And that has its ... you know, those are times it's nice. People knowing who you are and all of that, and feeling that you've meant something to them.

[03:35] Fame stirs up envy. People you run into feel that, well, who is she, who does she think she is, Marilyn Monroe? They feel fame gives them some kind of privilege to walk up to you and say anything to you, you know, of any kind of nature and it won't hurt your feelings. Like it's happening to your clothing. One time here I am looking for a home to buy and I stopped at this place. A man came out and was very pleasant and cheerful, and said, "Oh, just a moment, I want my wife to meet you." Well, she came out and said, "Will you please get off the premises?" You're always running into people's unconscious.

[04:56] I don't like to say this, but I'm afraid there is a lot of envy in this business. The only thing I can do is stop and think, "I'm all right but I'm not so sure about them!"

[05:32] If I'm sounding picked on or something, I think I am.

[05:47] You know, it's disappointing. People you aren't interested in, seeing every day of your life.

[06:05] When I was five I think, that's when I started wanting to be an actress. I loved to act. It was playfulness. When I heard that this was acting, I said that's what I want to be.

[06:24] Some of my foster families used to send me to the movies to get me out of the house and there I'd sit all day and way into the night. Up in front, there with the screen so big, a little kid all alone, and I loved it. I loved anything that moved up there and I didn't miss anything that happened and there was no popcorn either.

[07:02] The time I sort of began to think I was famous, I was driving somebody to the airport, and as I came back there was this movie house and I saw my name in lights. I pulled the car up at a distance down the street; it was too much to take up close, you know, all of a sudden. And I sat there and said, "So that's the way it looks," and it was all very strange to me.

[07:50] I really got the idea I must be a star or something from the newspapermen; I'm saying men, not the women who would interview me and they would be warm and friendly. By the way, the men of the press, unless they have their own personal quirks against me, they were always very warm and friendly and they'd say, "You know, you're the only star," and I'd say, "Star?" and they'd look at me as if I were nuts. I think they, in their own kind of way, made me realise I was famous.

[08:58] I've always felt toward the slightest scene, even if all I had to do in a scene was just to come in and say, "Hi," that the people ought to get their money's worth and that this is an obligation of mine, to give them the best you can get from me. I do have feelings some days when there are scenes with a lot of responsibility toward the meaning, and I'll wish, "Gee, if only I had been a cleaning woman." On the way to the studio I would see somebody cleaning and I'd say, "That's what I'd like to be. That's my ambition in life." But I think that all actors go through this.

[09:47] When you're a human being, you feel, you suffer. Like any creative person, I would like a bit more control so that it would be a little easier for me when the director says, "One tear, right now," that one tear would pop out.

[10:17] But once there came two tears because I thought, "How dare he?"

[10:38] Goethe said, "Talent is developed in privacy," you know? And it's really true.

[10:51] You know a lot of people have, oh gee, real quirky problems that they wouldn't dare have anyone know. But one of my problems happens to show: I'm late. I guess people think that why I'm late is some kind of arrogance and I think it is the opposite of arrogance. A lot of people can be there on time and do nothing, which I have seen them do. Gable said about me, "When she's there, she's there. All of her is there! She's there to work."

[11:48] Fame has a special burden, which I might as well state here and now. I don't mind being burdened with being glamorous and sexual. I think that sexuality is only attractive when it's natural and spontaneous.

[12:25] We are all born sexual creatures, thank God, but it's a pity so many people despise and crush this natural gift. Art, real art, comes from it, everything. I never quite understood it, this sex symbol. But if I'm going to be a symbol of something I'd rather have it sex than some other things they've got symbols of! These girls who try to be me, I guess the studios put them up to it, or they get the ideas themselves. But gee, they haven't got it. You can make a lot of gags about it like they haven't got the foreground or else they haven't the background. But I mean the middle, where you live.

[13:34] I was never used to being happy, so that wasn't something I ever took for granted.

[13:52] Once I was supposed to be finished, that was the end of me. It might be a kind of relief to be finished. Fame will go by, and, so long, I've had you fame. If it goes by, I've always known it was fickle.

[38:07] I remember when I got the part in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Jane Russell - she was the brunette in it and I was the blonde. She got $200,000 for it, and I got my $500 a week. Jane was wonderful to me. The only thing was I couldn't get a dressing room. Finally, I really got to this kind of level and I said, "Look, after all, I am the blonde, and it is Gentlemen Prefer Blondes!" They kept saying, "you're not a star." I said, "Well, whatever I am, I am the blonde!"