Everything to Know About Ana de Armas’ Marilyn Monroe Biopic ‘Blonde’

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Everything to Know About Ana de Armas' Marilyn Monroe Biopic 'Blonde'

Committing to the role! Bringing the story of Marilyn Monroe to life was a long time in the making before Ana de Armas joined the effort. Blonde, which is directed by Andrew Dominik, has been in development since 2010. Jessica Chastain and Naomi Watts were previously attached to the project before de Armas was officially cast in 2019. For the Knives Out star, the process of becoming Monroe came with its own set of challenges. "I had to go bald every day, because [of] the blonde wigs," de Armas said during an interview with Byrdie in March 2021. "[Marilyn] went through different shades of blonde from golden to really platinum, so for these wigs that are beautifully made, you can't have anything dark underneath, so we had to make a bald cap every single day from my forehead to [around] my whole head." The Cuba native detailed spending "three-and-a-half hours every day" in makeup, adding, "I think I actually cried the first time I saw [the wigs] on. Probably because I was terrified. But I'm so proud." The Deep Water star also opened up about the insight she gained while trying to put herself into Monroe's headspace. "She went through a lot of things that were not easy at the time — it would not even be easy right now. I was lucky I had months to prepare," she said at the time. "We don't usually have that luxury — we usually have to rush into the project and make it as you go, but that one I really had the time to study. There's so much material about her, like so much to watch and listen to. It's incredible." The Blade Runner actress previously confirmed that it took a while for her to score the role. “I only had to audition for Marilyn once and Andrew said ‘It’s you,’ but I had to audition for everyone else,” de Armas told Vanity Fair in 2020. “The producers. The money people. I always have people I needed to convince. But I knew I could do it. Playing Marilyn was groundbreaking. A Cuban playing Marilyn Monroe. I wanted it so badly. You see that famous photo of her and she is smiling in the moment, but that’s just a slice of what she was really going through at the time.” Dominik, for his part, teased that he considered Blonde to be "one of the ten best movies ever made" before the biopic was even filmed. "It's basically the story of every human being, but it's using a certain sense of association that we have with something very familiar, just through media exposure," he told Collider in 2016. "It takes all of those things and turns the meanings of them inside out, according to how she feels, which is basically how we live." He continued: "It's how we all operate in the world. It just seems to me to be very resonant. I think the project has got a lot of really exciting possibilities, in terms of what can be done, cinematically." Scroll down for everything to know about Blonde: [podcast_block]

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What Is the Movie About?

Blonde is based on Joyce Carol Oates' fictionalized book about Monroe’s life. The novel focuses on the relationships that the late actress had throughout her life and the abuse that she dealt with.  

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When Will It Be Released?

Netflix is set to release the movie on September 23.

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Who Else Appears In It?

Adrien Brody, Bobby Cannavale, and Julianne Nicholson have been all been cast as real-life people from Monroe's life.

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What Is the Rating?

In March, Netflix confirmed that the biopic was given the NC-17 rating by the Motion Picture Association due to “some sexual content.”

Dominik previously weighed in on why he felt the film would receive an adult-only rating, telling Screen Daily in February, “It’s a demanding movie. If the audience doesn’t like it, that’s the f--king audience’s problem. It’s not running for public office. It’s an NC-17 movie about Marilyn Monroe, it’s kind of what you want, right? I want to go and see the NC-17 version of the Marilyn Monroe story.”

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What Does Joyce Carol Oates Think About the Adaptation?

After watching a rough cut of the move in August 2020, the author tweeted, “It is startling, brilliant, very disturbing and perhaps most surprisingly an utterly ‘feminist’ interpretation. Not sure that any male director has ever achieved anything [like] this.”

One year later, Oates reflected on Twitter about the "exquisite portrait of Marilyn Monroe by Ana de Armas & director Andrew Dominic; one without the other could perhaps not have worked this magic. The tone of the film is hard to classify, not surreal but not totally realistic, not ‘horror’ but suffused with the dread of horror.”

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What's Controversial About It?

"If it had come out a few years ago, it would have come out right when #MeToo hit and it would have been an expression of all that stuff," director Dominik told Vulture in May 2022, explaining that now is a more "interesting time" to be releasing the film."We're in a time now, I think, where people are really uncertain about where any lines are."

He continued: "It's a film that definitely has a morality about it. But it swims in very ambiguous waters because I don't think it will be as cut-and-dried as people want to see it. There's something in it to offend everyone. ... It's not, like, depictions of happy sexuality. It's depictions of situations that are ambiguous."

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How Much Work Went Into 'Blonde'?

“We worked on this film for hours, every single day for almost a year,” de Armas told Netflix Queue in June 2022. “I read Joyce’s novel, studied hundreds of photographs, videos, audio recordings, films — anything I could get my hands on. Every scene is inspired by an existing photograph. We’d pore over every detail in the photo and debate what was happening in it."

She added: "The first question was always, ‘What was Norma Jeane feeling here?’ We wanted to tell the human side of her story. Fame is what made Marilyn the most visible person in the world, but it also made Norma the most invisible.”

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What Does the Trailer Explore?

In June 2022, Netflix released the first look at Blonde which was all about Monroe's most iconic moments from her career.

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What Is the Message Behind 'Blonde'?

“The film is sincere. It’s made with love. It’s made with good intentions. But it’s full of rage at the same time,” Dominik said during an interview with Netflix Queue in June 2022. “I seem to get myself in these situations where people regard me as provocative, but it’s never what I’m trying to do. I’m just trying to say it as clearly as I can. My ambition is to make you fall in love with Marilyn.”

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Does de Armas Look Like Marilyn?

In the film's full trailer, which was released in July 2022, de Armas transforms into the spitting image of the late actress. "I've played Marilyn Monroe, Marilyn Monroe, Marilyn Monroe. I can't face doing another scene with Marilyn Monroe," she says in the clip as a haunting version of "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" plays in the background. "Marilyn doesn't exist. When I come out of my dressing room, I'm Norma Jean. I'm still her when the camera is rolling. Marilyn Monroe only exists on the screen."

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The Estate Gets Involved

Monroe's estate stepped in to defend de Armas after online trolls criticized her accent following the release of the film's trailer. “Marilyn Monroe is a singular Hollywood and pop culture icon that transcends generations and history,” Marc Rosen, president of entertainment at Authentic Brands Group (ABG), which owns the Hollywood icon's estate, told Variety in a statement in August 2022. “Any actor that steps into that role knows they have big shoes to fill. Based on the trailer alone, it looks like Ana was a great casting choice as she captures Marilyn’s glamour, humanity and vulnerability. We can’t wait to see the film in its entirety!”

Brad Pitt also express his support for the actress, telling Entertainment Tonight that de Armas is "phenomenal" in the role. "That’s a tough dress to fill," said the Oscar winner, who worked as a producer on the movie. "It was 10 years in the making. It wasn’t until we found Ana that we could get it across the finish line.”

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Does Ana de Armas Agree With the Movie Rating?

“I didn't understand why that happened,” the Gray Man actress told French magazine L’Officiel in August 2022 of learning about the film’s rating. “I can tell you a number of shows or movies that are way more explicit with a lot more sexual content than Blonde. But to tell this story it is important to show all these moments in Marilyn's life that made her end up the way that she did. It needed to be explained. Everyone [in the cast] knew we had to go to uncomfortable places. I wasn't the only one.”