Marilyn Monroe: Beyond Comedy

Marilyn was especially known for her comedies, and it is not difficult to understand why: one only has to look at her five most successful films—Some Like It Hot as the undisputed number one, followed by Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, The Seven Year Itch, How to Marry a Millionaire and Bus Stop—to see that the public overwhelmingly associated her with laughter and light charm. Four of those five are comedies in the strict sense, and the fifth, Bus Stop, is a comedy drama in which laughter coexists with emotional depth. This concentration of hits explains why the popular image of Marilyn has tended to reduce her to the gag, the explosive blonde, and the iconic pose, but her complete filmography reveals a different reality: an actress capable of moving confidently across many different cinematic genres.

Before examining specific genres, it is useful to clarify the different types of comedy in her work. Marilyn appeared in pure comedies—Some Like It Hot, The Seven Year Itch, How to Marry a Millionaire—where the engine is the gag, the situation and the rhythm; musical comedies—Gentlemen Prefer Blondes—in which song and dance are an essential part of the narrative; romantic comedies—The Prince and the Showgirl, Let’s Make Love—focused on the sentimental relationship; and comedy dramas—Bus Stop—where humor coexists with a strong emotional charge. Marilyn’s pure comedies were also her most popular films and the ones that built her global fame. It is no coincidence that many consider her among the greatest comic actresses in film history: her control of timing, gesture, and physical and vocal play in comedy was extraordinary.

Within comedy, some performances deserve special mention. Her Elsie Marina in The Prince and the Showgirl is probably her finest almost entirely comic performance: a piece of character work, timing and nuance that combines intelligence and rhythm. Sugar Kane in Some Like It Hot, on the other hand, is a towering comic performance, but a more complex one, as it incorporates dramatic and musical components that enrich it. It is not “just” gag-based comedy; it is a layered character. This distinction is important for understanding why reducing Marilyn to “just comedy” is unfair and overly simplistic.

Turning now to genre by genre, it is worth lingering on the psychological thriller. Don’t Bother to Knock is a clear example: here Marilyn plays a mentally unstable young woman whose presence generates danger and growing tension. The film functions as a psychological thriller because it explores anxiety, vulnerability and threat from the character’s point of view; there are moments that verge on horror due to the sense of danger and claustrophobia. This is an intense, restrained Marilyn, convincingly fragile; even in these early roles, her ability to convey inner disturbance without excessive gesturing is evident.

In the line of criminal thriller or soft noir stands Niagara. It is not a classic noir in the vein of The Big Sleep, but it is a thriller charged with sexuality, latent violence and suspense. Marilyn appears as a seductive and dangerous figure, and the cinematography, editing and narrative structure all reinforce the sense of menace. In Niagara, drama and criminal tension dominate; however, there are flashes—almost by contrast—of something close to irony and small tonal variations that make the role even more interesting.

The adventure western is another register Marilyn explored, most notably in River of No Return. Although it is not a classic duel-centered western (the traditional masculine showdown and archetypal desert landscapes do not dominate), the film is very much an adventure western: action, survival in the wilderness, confrontation with physical elements and a frontier setting. In this film Marilyn is not mere decoration: she sings, sings with emotion, and physically endures the narrative. Her vulnerability in the face of the river, the climate and the other characters anchors her dramatic presence within the genre.

The musical is another field in which Marilyn left a mark. There’s No Business Like Show Business is a pure musical in which the demands are double: singing and stage presence combined with acting. Marilyn was not an operatic singer, but her musical work demonstrates interpretive sensitivity: voice, phrasing and body expression serve to characterize the role, not simply to display vocal ability. Moreover, in other films such as Gentlemen Prefer Blondes or Some Like It Hot, musical numbers are structural and require a different technique—breath control, intention and rhythmic precision—which Marilyn mastered intelligently.

In Bus Stop (1956), the film belongs to the comedy drama genre. The narrative combines moments of light humor with emotionally intense situations; the comedy comes primarily from Don Murray’s character, while the drama is largely carried by Marilyn in her role as Cherie. The story blends lightness and emotional tension, balancing gags with the sentimental and personal difficulties faced by the characters. The film is a clear example of how a narrative can alternate between laughter and emotional depth without breaking tonal coherence.

The Misfits (1961) is classified as pure drama. The film is built around the emotional and existential conflicts of its characters, with no comic or musical elements to soften the intensity of the story. The plot, centered on Roslyn, her relationship with the cowboys and her growing disillusionment with the life around her, maintains a consistently grave and realistic tone. It is a paradigmatic example of dramatic cinema focused on the complexity of human emotions and their interaction with a harsh environment, where tension and vulnerability drive the narrative.

It is also worth adding a specific paragraph on her supporting roles and cameos, as they further expand the idea of her versatility. In secondary parts, Marilyn explored registers ranging from noir in The Asphalt Jungle, to sports dramas such as Right Cross, and multi-story films like O. Henry’s Full House or We’re Not Married! (anthology or portmanteau films). In these shorter appearances she often shone with flashes of comedy or dramatic intensity, demonstrating that not only in leading roles but also in minor ones she possessed the resources to transform a scene.

Marilyn genuinely worked within dramatic genres and tones far removed from easy laughter. Films such as Don’t Bother to Knock, Niagara, River of No Return, Bus Stop (in its dramatic dimension), Ladies of the Chorus and, at the peak of her dramatic career, The Misfits, reveal an actress whose approach is predominantly dramatic. In these titles her work is intense, controlled and often surprising for those who know her only through her comic numbers. Even before her Method training, Marilyn already displayed restraint and dramatic subtext; after her time at the Actors Studio in the mid-1950s, her range deepened and became more psychologically complex. This is why Bus Stop and The Misfits are now widely regarded as her dramatic high points: roles in which technique and vulnerability converge with force.

If we analyze her films one by one according to the predominant type of performance, an interesting and non-rigid map emerges. In Some Like It Hot and Let’s Make Love, Marilyn’s performance combines comedy, drama and musical elements in a balanced way: there are gags and comic climaxes, but also musical numbers requiring a different technique and moments of contained emotion. In these two examples, no single type of performance clearly dominates; they are multifaceted roles. In Bus Stop, drama predominates, but there is room for irony and a minor musical impulse; in River of No Return, drama is dominant, but the character sings and there are sequences of action and survival; in Gentlemen Prefer Blondes, comedy leads, but the musical component is structural and essential; in There’s No Business Like Show Business, musical and drama are the main axes, although comedy appears in fragments; in Don’t Bother to Knock, drama stands out with touches of action and, in a sense, elements of psychological horror; Niagara is above all thriller and drama, with moments of sexuality, some action and, surprisingly, traces that could almost be called comic by contrast; and films such as How to Marry a Millionaire, The Seven Year Itch, The Prince and the Showgirl or The Misfits are, respectively, examples of films that largely concentrate on a single register—pure comedy, pure comedy, romantic comedy and pure drama—although even in these cases a minimal presence of other tones remains.

A crucial point in understanding this progression is her turn toward Method acting. Marilyn studied with Paula Strasberg and attended the Actors Studio in the 1950s; this stage did not transform her comic talent, but it refined her dramatic work. Method acting added greater interiority, greater psychological truth and a new emotional palette that she exploited to remarkable effect in Bus Stop and especially in The Misfits. In other words, the Method-trained Marilyn consolidated an actress who already possessed dramatic resources and elevated them to levels that place her among the most interesting performers of her generation in non-comedic scenes.

To conclude, it is worth insisting on one definitive nuance: it is entirely possible—and defensible—to argue that Marilyn Monroe was the greatest comic actress in film history. Her ability to make audiences laugh through a character who was simultaneously vulnerable and shrewd, her control of the gag and her technical charisma place her on a pedestal. But that assertion should not erase the other truth: Marilyn was also a high-level dramatic and musical actress, capable of transforming her voice and body into very different acting tools. Few performers have maintained such a high standard simultaneously in comedy, drama and musical cinema. That dual nature—the queen of laughter and the actress of inner depth—is what makes Marilyn, today more than ever, a fascinating and difficult figure to pigeonhole.