One-time Hollywood actress Marilyn Monroe is causing a stir in downtown Chicago.
A 26-foot tall statue by J. Seward Johnson has been installed in Pioneer Court, on North Michigan Avenue in Chicago. Marilyn is striking her famous pose from the 1955 film The Seven Year Itch: standing over a subway grate as the wind blows her skirt up. For Johnson’s statue, that subway grate weighs 22,000 pounds as a counterbalance to the back of her skirt.
And it’s that back of the skirt where all the attention is. In the famous movie still, we see Marilyn from the front. We don’t see her underpants. But go to Chicago between now and next spring and you can see Marilyn’s underpants, which look to be several feet big.
Why is Marilyn Monroe in Chicago? That’s one of the questions of the statue’s critics, one of whom called the piece “just hideous.”
Maybe it’s because it’s the “windy city.” Maybe it’s because it’s the “hog butcher of the world.” Maybe it’s because it’s the “city of big shoulders.” Add those together and you get Marilyn Monroe’s eight-foot panties, as any fool knows.
A better question is why Marilyn Monroe at all? Why not Betty Boop, for petesakes. Or Papa Smurf? All these icons have about the same deep meaning, don’t they?
As an aside, there’s a J. Seward Johnson statue in my town, in Pioneer Square, called “Allow Me”:
