Marilyn Monroe’s Billowing Dress
One of the most iconic moments in movie history, the ramifications of which would prove to be as much personal as they were cultural
The dress in question appears in a sequence from the 1955 Billy Wilder film The Seven Year Itch in which Marilyn Monroe (playing “the Girl”) and co-star Tom Ewell (“Richard Sherman”) exit the Trans-Lux 52nd Street Theatre on Lexington Avenue in New York City having just watched Creature from the Black Lagoon. When they hear a subway train passing below the grate on the footpath, she steps on it and asks “Ooh, do you feel the breeze from the subway?” as the wind blows the dress up, exposing her legs and underwear.
The scene went on to become one of the most iconic moments in movie history.
Even though the shoot was scheduled for 1:00 am, a large gathering of boisterous and noisy onlookers (almost all men) had gathered across the street to witness the event. Wilder shot multiple takes, while photographer Sam Shaw snapped photo after photo for what had to be the biggest publicity stunt ever staged to date. Monroe wore two pairs of underwear for the shoot, yet, as noted in Lois Banner’s critical biography Marilyn: The Passion and the Paradox (2012), “a dark blotch of pubic hair” remained visible to the 100 male photographers and over 1,500 male spectators, all of whom crowded eagerly around the set to gawk and drool. Due to strict 1950s movie censorship laws, photos had to be doctored to white out the offending blotch, but those in attendance saw it, over and over, shot after shot.
To the enlightened reader, this might all sound rather sleazy, and yet Banner contends in his book: “The scene in the shoot is naughty, with the phallic subway train, its blast of air, and Marilyn’s erotic stance. Yet she is in control. She is the ‘woman on top’, drawing from the metaphor for women’s power that runs through Euro-American history.” Maybe.
The ramifications of that event would prove to be more than just cultural. Monroe’s husband at the time, baseball playing legend Joe DiMaggio, who was not at all comfortable with Monroe’s perceived complicity, stormed off the set in a huff. After returning to California, Monroe filed for divorce from DiMaggio on grounds of “mental cruelty” following a big fight that they had at their hotel later that night after the shoot, during which it is alleged that DiMaggio assaulted Monroe.
The controversy has continued into the 21st century. Forever Marilyn is a giant 8-metre tall stainless steel and aluminium statue of Monroe representing the image, designed by Seward Johnson. The statue has done some travelling, including to the Bendigo Art Gallery in Australia in 2016. By 2021 it had made its way back to Palm Springs where it had first been installed. But not everyone is smiling at the thought of the colossal statue taking up permanent residence in the heart of town. Forever Marilyn has ended up in front of the entrance of the Palm Springs Art Museum, but she isn’t facing the door, therefore baring her backside to visitors as they exit the facility. Institutionalised upskirting.
Enter #MeTooMarilyn. “She’s literally going to be mooning the museum,” said Elizabeth Armstrong, a spokesperson for a Change.org petition objecting to Marilyn’s objectification that garnered almost 42,000 signatures at the time. “It’s blatantly sexist,” says Armstrong. Misogyny in the guise of cultural nostalgia? You decide.
Story Idea: Bonnie Siegler
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