Michelle Williams is not Marilyn Monroe. But then, we already knew that. I didn’t walk into My Week with Marilyn expecting to see Marilyn
on the screen. What I was hoping for was a portrayal of Marilyn that was not insulting, degrading or utterly and completely wrong. And I
think that as a whole, Michelle Williams delivers.
Which is not to say I had no issues with this movie. At times I rolled my eyes or even snorted out loud at the more ludicrous parts of Colin
Clark’s tale. But then I didn’t go in expecting to see a true story either. Instead I approached this movie as the fantasy of a young man who
had the luck to come into contact with Marilyn and like everyone else was awestruck by her. And maybe exaggerated just how important his
role was in Marilyn’s time in England. A lot.
But let’s get back to Michelle as Marilyn. We’ve covered the look – Michelle is a little too angular to be Marilyn, her features just not quite
right. Moving on then to her voice. Michelle’s voice as Marilyn is, to my ear, relatively impressive. I actually spent a little time before I
headed out to the movie listening to recordings of Marilyn speaking – as herself in interviews and not as Lorelei Lee or any of her other
movie roles – so it would be fresh in my mind. Michelle keeps Marilyn’s voice normal; she doesn’t add any over the top breathiness or
exaggerated sexiness. She even does fairly well with Marilyn’s distinctive laugh. In the scenes where she is playing Marilyn playing Elsie in
The Prince and the Showgirl, she is downright impressive.
Michelle manages Marilyn’s mannerism pretty well. There are scenes, especially when seen from a distance, where I was very impressed
with her. And a few scenes where it felt like she was trying too hard. But the movement of her hands, the way she walked, and even the smile
– they were overall quite good.
Of course, Michelle could only play Marilyn the way the script allowed her to. And the script paints Marilyn as a vulnerable, lost, erratic and
slightly vague woman. Some of which is entirely wrong, and some of which I have to admit is probably accurate. In My Week with Marilyn,
the focus is very much on Marilyn’s lateness to the set, her already troubled marriage, her stage fright and general fear of failure, and her
need for validation which she finds in Paula Strasberg, who is played with almost miraculous accuracy by Zoe Wanamaker. At the same time
it portrays Marilyn’s free-spiritedness and girlishness. If nothing else this is at least a multi-faceted look at her.
Her on-set clashes with Laurence Olivier, ably played by the always wonderful Kenneth Branagh may not put Marilyn in the best light but the
film doesn’t make her appear to be the diva who simply doesn’t care. Instead the harshness of Olivier’s behavior is also fairly portrayed and I
think that those who don’t know the behind the scenes story of the filming will come away feeling both sides may have carried some
responsibility for the tension. The audience actually gasped when Olivier told Marilyn to “be sexy”. It’s clear how his impatience with her
only made things worse.
The kindness of Dame Sybil Thorndike towards Marilyn on the set is evident here and of course Judi Dench is spectacular in the role – I
expected nothing else. She may appear in just about every British movie requiring an older woman, but that is because no one does it better.
She also provides much of the comic relief to the film.
Arthur Miller, played by Dougray Scott, is almost non-existent in the film. He seems to float along on the perimeter, and then disappears
altogether, flying back to the US and leaving Marilyn to fend for herself. The scene where Marilyn finds the things he wrote about her is the
only one that puts any real focus on him, and Michelle portrays the heartbreak and betrayal that Marilyn must have felt very well. Miller
appears genuinely confused, a state in which I suspect he spent much of his marriage to Marilyn – it has always been my opinion that Miller
did not understand her at all.
Sent into a tailspin by her discovery of Miller’s private thoughts about her and his abandonment of her to return to the US, Marilyn in the
film then turns to Colin Clark to be her friend and her companion. Although I found the extent to which she attaches herself to him in the
film to be quite over the top, I believe that Marilyn’s sense of floundering for someone to be a rock in her world was real, and I do believe
that when she trusted someone she could very quickly become attached.
Colin Clark is played by Eddie Redmayne as a dashing young man excited to be a part of the film industry who somehow manages to seem
older and more mature than Marilyn, no doubt the way he wrote himself. The performance itself is very good; accuracy of the plot aside,
this young actor has talent. He falls easily into the role that many men have reported feeling around Marilyn – the desire to protect her, to
be there for her, to be her friend and confidante, to be her rock. He made Colin Clark likeable and a sympathetic character.
To round out the main characters, we have Julia Ormond as Vivien Leigh – and if we are to talk about a failure to capture a likeness we
should talk about this one, as Ormond looks absolutely nothing like Leigh. She comes and goes and appears an angry but resigned woman
who entirely expects her husband to have an affair with Marilyn. Then there is Milton Greene, played as an abrasive and jaded man with a
very proprietary interest in Marilyn by Dominic Cooper. And although she is really on the periphery of the story, Emma Watson is
adorable as the wardrobe girl Clark dates briefly and then leaves when Marilyn turns her eyes to him.
There are scenes when Marilyn is portrayed as, if not stupid, then relatively ignorant. Colin takes her on a tour of Windsor Castle, and while
visiting the library she is shown a drawing by Leonardo Da Vinci. She says “Didn’t he paint that lady with the funny smile?” Definitely a
scene worthy of eye rolling, as I don’t believe for a second that Marilyn didn’t know the Mona Lisa; it’s the kind of thing she would have made
a point of knowing. She is generally portrayed as a wide-eyed innocent overwhelmed by the situation in which she finds herself, but we also
see a fun, comedic side of Marilyn. Although there were times when I was irritated with the film for making her seem unintelligent, there
were also times when I appreciated the very human side that is shown.
Although I don’t believe Marilyn went skinny dipping in a river with Colin Clark, it doesn’t strike me as something out of character for her to
do. Marilyn was impulsive and very free-spirited, and if the mood struck her to skinny dip I don’t doubt that she might have. I had to laugh
when Marilyn popped up in the back of the car to steal away for a day with Colin; I felt it was exactly the sort of thing she might do. In that
sense, I saw some of the real Marilyn in this film.
Back on the set, Marilyn’s excruciating stage fright and lack of confidence in her abilities are evident. Although the feeling of frustration
with her Method acting, her lateness, and her forgetting of lines can be felt strongly in these scenes, the audience is given a sense of why it
was so. Marilyn does come off as needing an incredible amount of coaching, prompting and general ego boosting from Paula, but I don’t
believe that is inaccurate. The tales of Marilyn’s difficulties on the set are widely known, and as much as her fans probably don’t like how it
makes her look, I don’t think it was unfairly portrayed.
For balance, we are also shown scenes where Olivier is watching the rushes and sees how she shines, recognizes her incredible talent and
admits he is out of his league. If the troubles of the filming are strongly portrayed, then so too is the perhaps begrudging acknowledgement
of the entire English cast and crew that Marilyn on screen is a miracle. Something all of us who have seen her on the screen already knew. At
the end of filming Marilyn apologizes to everyone haltingly, and again the heart could break to see her struggling to be understood.
Overall, we see a troubled Marilyn who in spite of everything finds joy in the small things in life, an actress who wants badly to be the best she
can and is somewhat oblivious to the fact that she is driving almost everyone else on the set crazy, a new bride who is hopeful for her
marriage while already seeing the cracks, a childlike innocent who still manages to be in no way childish, and a woman who wants only to be
loved while failing to love herself. It is annoying at times, especially when Marilyn comes off as dumb – but still it is the most complex and in-
depth portrayal of Marilyn I have ever seen. It is not a caricature for once; this is a real woman with real problems who rises above them in
the most spectacular ways.
When all is said and done, the viewer is left with a feeling of hope: Olivier watches the film and is blown away by her talent, she bids Colin a
smiling goodbye and leaves him a changed man – perhaps a man for the first time. There are fans who will hate this film because it tells some
lies. I realize many will be offended at the idea that she embarks on this relationship with Clark (and by the way it is never indicated in the
film that she has sex with him) simply because it is untrue, and because she was on her honeymoon with Miller and still very much in love
with him. But the untruth in the film in some way serves to reveal what I feel is truth. It allows the film to show the woman behind the image,
and not just as a pill popping mess or a dumb blonde for once. As someone who has such a passion for life and the beauty in it she sometimes
cannot contain herself, and as someone looking for that perfect love she sought all her life.
It would be easy to blow off this film because some of the plot is exaggerated or downright untrue. And as fans, we often cannot see past our
desire to protect Marilyn from the dumb blonde image, from the exploitation of her life to make a buck. I ask you to try, to go in to this film
and watch the story without letting gut reactions and protectiveness get in the way. If you can’t or don’t want to do that, My Week with
Marilyn is not for you. But if we as fans can be honest with ourselves about Marilyn’s struggles and vulnerability while still maintaining our
love for her and pride in her, then I think we can see in Michelle Williams portrayal a true effort to make Marilyn a real person. I don’t see
exploitation in this film, and what a relief.
Bottom line: this is a film about Colin Clark, and how he saw Marilyn. While it doesn’t do much to disabuse the general public of their
commonly held notions about Marilyn, it does offer a different view into her life and more facets to her personality than we have seen on the
screen before. It’s the view of a young, sheltered British man who is awestruck by an icon he gets closer to than he could ever have dreamed.
It is a mix of truth and fiction for sure, but in the realm of Marilyn movies it probably has more truth than most, and less that is hurtful.
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