Marilyn Monroe Still Likes it Hot

By Charmaine Gooden

No, it’s not a mirage. As if in response to the current heatwave, a 26-foot-tall sculpture of Marilyn Monroe, inspired by her iconic pose from the 1955 movie Seven Year Itch, was unveiled in Chicago by New Jersey-based artist Seward Johnson, known for placing ginormous icons( ie. 20 ft. King Lear )in public spaces. It captures the iconic moment in the film as Monroe stands over a subway grate and she gets a gust of cooling breeze under her skirt.

That was just one of the novel strategies the girl in Billy Wilder’s Seven Year Itch devised to cool off in a sweltering heat wave. She also tells her new neighbor that she’ll join him for a cocktail once she gets her panties from the freezer because “when it gets hot like this, you know what I do? I keep my undies in the icebox.”

Keeping her cool even without the benefit of air conditioning.

Marilyn Monroe’s personal TV set is part of a collection owned by Moses Znaimer, founder of ZoomerMedia Limited. It is on display at the MZTV Museum of Television.