{"id":839660,"date":"2026-06-02T18:16:13","date_gmt":"2026-06-02T18:16:13","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/839660\/"},"modified":"2026-06-02T18:16:13","modified_gmt":"2026-06-02T18:16:13","slug":"marilyn-monroe-fans-descended-on-palm-springs-for-her-100th-birthday","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/839660\/","title":{"rendered":"Marilyn Monroe Fans Descended on Palm Springs For Her 100th Birthday"},"content":{"rendered":"

When Marilyn Monroe sang \u201cI Wanna Be Loved by You,\u201d<\/a> she would have never expected that one day, 1,037 people would gather beneath her giant statue in downtown Palm Springs to dress as her in celebration of her 100th birthday as they did on Saturday, May 30th.<\/p>\n

In doing so, they set a Guinness World Record in the very place where her career began. Palm Springs \u2014 whose identity is inextricably linked with the star \u2014 likes to claim Marilyn Monroe, born Norma Jeane Mortensen, and the feeling was mutual.<\/p>\n

\u201cThis was always her escape,\u201d said Mariah Pryor, a Palm Springs resident who was carrying a Marilyn-themed handbag she once rescued from a lost-and-found box.<\/p>\n

Not only do fans remain devoted to Monroe 100 years after her birth, but it seems as if each person carries a personal version of her.<\/p>\n

Gays and lesbians. Trans people. Straight men and women. Retirees. Teenagers. Couples. Families, big and small. Single people. Palm Springs residents. Visitors who drove for hours just to be here (a few even flew in!). They all converged at the sculptor Seward Johnson\u2019s \u201cForever Marilyn\u201d statue, depicting the film legend in her famous scene<\/a> in \u201cThe Seven Year Itch\u201d (1955), each of them dressed like her, wearing a blonde wig and white dress, items that were provided by Palm Springs Pride, the organizers of the citywide birthday party.<\/p>\n

Joshua John Miller is the grandson of Bruno Bernard, the pinup photographer known as Bernard of Hollywood, who famously introduced Marilyn Monroe to the talent agent Johnny Hyde at the Racquet Club in Palm Springs. Soon after, Monroe signed her first studio contract. \u201cIt paid $125 a week, plus a $20 bonus,\u201d Miller said.<\/p>\n

The transformation from everyday Monroe fans into her look-alikes began long before the official Guinness world record count. People arrived with Marilyn handbags, Marilyn necklaces, Marilyn earrings, Marilyn umbrellas and \u2014 thanks to Shelley Michelle, a longtime Marilyn impersonator, body double and founder of Billion Dollar Marilyn Lipstick \u2014 enough red lipstick to supply the entire city.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe knew there would be a lot of women and gays,\u201d said Jason Backe, the business partner and husband of the celebrity hairstylist Ted Gibson, whose team is responsible for the sea of white wigs throughout the weekend. \u201cBut seeing all these straight couples fully commit has been really inspiring.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cAll the wigs here are the same,\u201d Gibson said. \u201cEvery transformation reveals a different Marilyn.\u201d After all, he has fitted at least 1,037 wigs over the course of two days.<\/p>\n

And yet no one appeared to be celebrating the same Marilyn Monroe.<\/p>\n

I asked dozens of participants what Marilyn Monroe meant to them. They began by talking about the cinematic legend \u2014 and ended up talking about themselves.<\/p>\n

Christina Dahling, who performs as Marilyn Monroe every week at the Hyatt Palm Spring\u2019s I Heart Drag Brunch, put it simply: \u201cI always felt like I was her reincarnation.\u201d<\/p>\n

Richard Alegre, a Palm Springs stylist who wore a custom Marilyn Monroe-inspired outfit, said her influence could still be felt in the city\u2019s fashion, film and cultural traditions.<\/p>\n

That said, Pryor, the local resident, surmised that Monroe \u201cwas more introverted than people realize\u201d and would be stunned by all the adulation. Pryor re-created Monroe\u2019s subway-grate pose at the \u201cSome Like It Shop\u201d photo station inside Marilyn Boutique 100, a pop-up boutique offering Marilyn costume necessities and memorabilia. <\/p>\n

Tracy Burwell celebrated by attending a Monroe-themed yoga class wearing a floral jumpsuit that belonged to her mother in the 1960s. She said the film icon has been a part of her life since childhood. \u201cWhen I think of Marilyn, I don\u2019t usually feel sadness,\u201d she said. \u201cI always feel happy.\u201d<\/p>\n

Monroe Rose, who came to the event from Mississippi, feels similarly. \u201cShe means the world to me,\u201d Rose said. \u201cShe helped me through so many dark times.\u201d<\/p>\n

Judging by the 1,037 blondes gathered beneath her statue, the Hollywood icon got exactly what she wanted. To be loved.<\/p>\n

Boop-boop-be-doo.<\/p>\n

The photographs in this feature were made using a star filter.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When Marilyn Monroe sang \u201cI Wanna Be Loved by You,\u201d she would have never expected that one day,…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":839661,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":"","_share_on_mastodon":"0"},"categories":[9],"tags":[343952,171,311691,118336,245402,226542,343951,228571,67,132,68,85369],"class_list":["post-839660","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-entertainment","tag-birthdays","tag-entertainment","tag-fans-persons","tag-guinness-world-record","tag-marilyn","tag-monroe","tag-palm-springs-calif","tag-records-and-achievements","tag-united-states","tag-unitedstates","tag-us","tag-vis-photo"],"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@us\/116681886516712187","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/839660","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=839660"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/839660\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/839661"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=839660"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=839660"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=839660"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}