millerHere is celebrity wedding number 2 brought to you by the team who supply you with wedding lanterns on your special day…

On June 29, 1956, in the same year that Grace Kelly married her prince, an altogether different pairing was being officially recognised. Marilyn Monroe, pioneer of the dumb blonde stereotype, famed for her high pitched simple characters and blazing hot sex appeal, married playwright Arthur Miller. It was certainly not the most obvious match, but nevertheless it gave every beta-male, every underdog, every nerdy intellectual in America a little hope.

Monroe first met Miller in 1951, and it was at a party, a few days after their first encounter that the relationship between the two seems to have started. The party was thrown for him, and a number of young and attractive women were invited, but it was Marilyn whom Miller was drawn to. There was something about her, the vulnerability that seeped through her brazen surface, that attracted him- years later Miller reflected, She was a whirling light to me then, all paradox and enticing mystery, street-tough one moment, then lifted by a lyrical and poetic sensitivity that few retain past early adolescence -He felt protective towards her. The two of them danced together, and that, as they say, was that.

Happier Times

Happier Times

They got married un-announced, in a civil ceremony in White Plains, New York. City Court Judge Seymour Robinowitz presided over the somewhat hushed ceremony in the law office of Sam Slavitt (the wedding had been kept secret from both the press and the public). Monroe converted to Judaism (she was raised a Christian) before marrying Miller. It seemed to the casual observer that the happiness Monroe had been seeking for years, had finally been granted to her. With Miller on her arm, she was no longer perceived as a joke- something she greatly feared. But- as is so often the case, especially for such high profile lovers- the marriage was not to last. The couple divorced just a few tempestuous years later in 1961, and by 1962, Marilyn was dead.

This is not the happiest of celebrity wedding stories, and certainly not one you’ll wish to emulate, but its a little snippet of history that may just make you thank your lucky stars that you’re not media fodder, a vitim of the public’s quenchless obsession, a celebrity…