Two unsigned typed telegrams from Arthur Miller to Billy Wilder, each two pages, 8 x 5.75, Western Union letterhead, February 11 and 12, 1959. The first, in part: “I cannot let your vicious attack on Marilyn go unchallenged. You were officially informed by Marilyn’s physician that due to her pregnancy she was not able to work a full day. You choose [sic] to ignore this fact during the making of the pictures and worse yet, assiduously avoided mentioning it in your attack on her. Fact is, she went on with the picture out of a sense of responsibility not only to herself but to you and the cast and producer. 12 hours after the last shooting day her miscarriage began. Now that the hit for which she is so largely responsible is in your hands and its income to you assured, this attack upon her is contemptible…Your jokes, Billie, are not quite hilarious enough to conceal the fact. You are an unjust man and a cruel one.” The second, in part: “The simple truth is that whatever the circumstances she did her job and did it superbly, while your published remarks create the contrary impression without any mitigation. That is what is unfair. She is not the first actress who must follow her own path to a performance. Given her evident excellence it was your job as director not to reject her approach because it was unfamiliar to you...Had I been her director, as you say, I would have resented but one failure, a failure to perform at her best. She has given your picture a dimension it would not have had without her and this is no small thing to be brought down by a quip. She was not there to demonstrate how obedient she could be but how excellent in performance.” Moderate toning to borders, otherwise overall fine condition.
Upon the completion of Some Like it Hot on November 6, 1958, the director—who was not on speaking terms with Marilyn at that point—made harsh public statements attacking her character. When one reporter inquired if he would ever work with her again, Wilder replied, ‘I have discussed this project with my doctor and my psychiatrist and they tell me I am too old and too rich to go through this again.’ Marilyn was very hurt by his comments and the repercussions were obviously felt by her husband.
However, Miller’s intensely critical tirade is ironic, since on the set of the film, he was just as upset as the director over Marilyn’s unprofessional behavior. Wilder himself recalled, ‘My feeling about Arthur Miller was that he was a little too resentful of his wife…I didn’t have to be patient and loving but he was her husband…I remember saying at the time, finally, I have met someone who resents Marilyn Monroe as much if not more than I do.’
Marilyn’s miscarriage traumatized her so deeply that she would not work again until 1960. In June 1959, she underwent several operations to determine once and for all if she would be able to carry a pregnancy to term. The news that she was, indeed, unable to have children devastated her beyond words. Having already been in a failing relationship with Miller, losing the baby made her feel more alone than ever and she never fully recovered. These private telegrams between the great playwright and director, reliving the tragic event, are an unbelievably rare and poignant piece of Marilyn Monroe history. RR Auction COA.
