Marylin and Diana

[stuart.uk]

Certainly in the UK comparisons have been made between blonde sex symbols Marilyn Monroe and Diana Dors. though i believe Marilyn was the more talented of the two, she had far and away the better film roles. though both died young Diana had about 20-yrs more than Marilyn and i wonder if what she did in that time would have been an indication of Marilyn's later career.

i watched a full episode of British 1970s sit-com Queenie's Castle with Diana Dors. it was made just a few yrs after her failed Hollywood career had come to an end, after being misused by the studios. however, this showed what happened to her afterwards. she played a mother of three adult son's living on a council estate. it was as if she trashed in part her glamorous sex symbol image in much the same way Dietrich did on a much grander scale in Destrey Rides Again. i say in part because she still retained her sex appeal with her blonde hair and mini-skirts.

I think Marilyn would have thrived in the mid to late 60s. she would have matched Julie Christie and Susannah York as a short-skirted babe of the era. (i think one of the things that led to Marilyn's downfall was her celebrity status became bigger than her acting career. if she hadn't met the Kennedy's for example, she might have managed to keep a lower profile and survived that period of her life) however, possibly she might have ended up by trashing her image in the same way Diana did in the 70s on American tv.

Diana shortly before her death showed great potential as a character. she would have been a great London gangland boss with sons as her thugs. Marilyn i think was more fragile in that respect, but it sounds crazy, but i could have seen her as a Jessica Fletcher or in old age a Miss. Marple, playing it much like Helen Hayes did.

[Libertine]

You know, I do not really think that Diana was a bad actress. In Yield to the Night she was very good. It was my first Diana Dors film, and she did impress me. Not so much with some of her other movies.. too many were just bad material to begin with. She really had a bad luck with her movie career. She and Marilyn, I think they both would have been able to play more demanding parts if they would have been able to get off their bombshell image, and risk more to look ugly... etc.

DD had a good sense of humor, she wrote a bunch of books, and she proved it in them. I don't know exactly how many, but she found another niche for herself.

I can't see MM in the 60s... but I suppose that's because I don't really much like the general style of the 60s clothes- and make up-wise. I already don't like MM's Bert Stern pictures.