Long before she became one of Hollywood’s most enduring icons, Marilyn Monroe admired another platinum blonde star who had already captivated audiences around the world.
That star was Jean Harlow, whose glamorous image and meteoric rise helped define an era of filmmaking in the 1930s. Although they belonged to different generations of Hollywood stars, the two actresses shared many striking and eerie similarities.
Marilyn Monroe Idolized Jean Harlow
GettyPEOPLE Magazine reported that it was 89 years ago that Jean Harlow suddenly collapsed on the set of the Clark Gable film “Saratoga.” She passed away due to kidney failure at the age of just 26 on June 7, 1937.
Harlow was one of the first blonde sex symbols of the film era. She came of age in the industry just when films turned from silent movies to the those with sound.
According to the Hollywood Walk of Fame website, Harlow was known as the “Platinum Blonde” and the “Blonde Bombshell” due to her hair color. The website wrote, “Harlow starred in several films, mainly designed to showcase her magnetic sex appeal and strong screen presence, before making the transition to more developed roles and achieving massive fame under contract to Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer.”
In the 2011 book “Harlow in Hollywood” by authors Darrell Rooney and Mark Vieira, they discussed just how influential Harlow was on a young Monroe as she struggled to make it in Hollywood. Rooney shared Monroe’s fascination with the silver screen superstar.
“Jean Harlow was Marilyn Monroe’s idol. If there hadn’t been a Jean Harlow, there never would’ve been a Marilyn Monroe in that way,” he told Fox News. ‘
“She’s very important today because she had an incredible humanity about her. And what she wanted to do in films was have people sympathize with her. And the events that happened in her life made her accessible to people.”
What Were Marilyn Monroe and Jean Harlow’s Eerie Similarities?
Jean Harlow and Marilyn Monroe shared many of the same types of struggles, both personal and professional.
Harlow battled health issues throughout her life, per PEOPLE, which cited The Atlantic. These included pneumonia, two abortions, an appendectomy, the flu, and other maladies.
Monroe also battled health problems throughout her short life. She had chronic endometriosis, fertility challenges, and insomnia.
Harlow was married twice to businessman Charles McGrew and to MGM Executive Paul Bern. Monroe was also married two times, to baseball player Joe DiMaggio and playwright Arthur Miller.
Monroe was said to have told photographer Milton Greene, “I kept thinking of her, rolling over the facts of her life in my mind. It was kind of spooky, and sometimes I thought, ‘Am I making this happen?’ But I don’t think so.”
“We just seemed to have the same spirit or something, I don’t know. I kept wondering if I would die young like her, too,”
Monroe’s last completed film, “The Misfits,” co-starred Clark Gable, the same actor Harlow worked with when she collapsed on the set of “Saratoga.” Monroe was filming “Something’s Got to Give” when she tragically passed away at the age of 36.
