On May 19, 1962, at a large party organized by the Democratic Party to raise funds, Marilyn Monroe sings Happy Birthday to John Fitzgerald Kennedy at Madison Square Garden in New York. Peter Lawford introduces MM She approaches the lectern, flirting, wrapped in her white fur coat. When he takes it off, the rapt reaction of the audience is heard. The dress, so tight that it tore slightly during the evening, and which Marilyn wore without underwear, was defined by some as the "illusion of nakedness embroidered with diamonds". In 2016, it was auctioned for 4.5 million dollars, converting MM. in the most profitable corpse in the history of cinema.
Marilyn defined that dress as "skin and sequins." That definition may well apply to her as she sings. At first stammering and lost, finally whispers "happy birthday" with eroticism and delicacy. The public and the power surrender to the myth. Less than three months later, Marilyn dies. The news of all the world opens with the news. Time, for a moment, is paralyzed.
The me of MM. seems to fight in this scene with the myth in which they converted it. The fragility, the eroticism, the delivery to the viewer, the conscious vacuum of itself and the consequent need for mask, are mixed in it, summarizing perfectly the historical evolution of the myth, from the primitive need to the current impossibility of it.
After the disappearance of the classical myth and its gods, the irrational belief of the caverns, the failures of reason to explain the human being, after the death of tragedy and the trance of nihilism, the world of beliefs has finished and that of the representation is put in doubt.
In this space, the myth becomes an object of publicity and consumption, which no longer seeks immortality or transcendence. Marilyn's self disappears. The need for a mask is torn like his "skin and sequins" suit that night. His face is already emptiness.
The public contemplates the myth created while devouring crunchy potatoes and mourns his death before taking a hamburger in the franchise on the corner. Even so, Marilyn gently whispers her happy birthday and struggles to dress with the gestures that are already there, in space, somewhere above man and that unites all its history. As Kundera explains, there are fewer gestures than men, therefore, it is inferred that the gesture exists before the man takes it for himself and uses it to create himself.
The work will try to represent the need of the gesture to be. And how to detach ourselves from it, it confronts us with our emptiness and in a certain way, it turns us into spectators of ourselves. On the other hand, the viewer, who knows all the codes, strips the myth of all power of transcendence, dressing him / it for the moment, turning it into crispy potatoes with the taste of a laboratory barbecue.
MM. He gives his image to the hungry public because it is the only thing he can deliver. The public devours this food of fragility, publicity and sex to, for a moment, satisfy their appetite. Faced with the impossibility of feeding on the myth, there remains the hologram of the image, the fallen bones of the mask. And finish the feast, consume the boundless, endless food of the void.
The work, for a single performer, is divided into three parts and preamble:
0. Preamble:
Presentation of the incarnation of myth in modern man. Duality, struggle and impossibility. Conversion in spectator and applause to the wind.
1.Chewing potatoes in front of blond wig. Marilyn's way to the stand.
The performer walks towards the microphone with steps of desecration, unconscious and joyful. The path will be repeated several times (forward and rewinding) while chewing and throwing potatoes creating a crisp, blond mantle on the stage. The repeated sound will be Peter Lawford's presentation of the actress. Every time Marilyn's name is heard in vain, the performer will be paralyzed and will look at the viewer showing the beginning of the fissure. Marilyn is delivered and consumed before the spectators with the ethereal sweetness of the dream before the routine.
2. Marilyn sings
The only music will be the "happy birthday" that will be repeated varying speeds and interferences, playing with the recorded laughter of the spectators. The performer will dance before the microphone through the following states:
2.1 Myth. Duality between Marilyn and Norma Jeane.
The gesture is released and grows immense and lonely over spectators and interpreter. Down there, everything remains the same. An actress sings.
2.2 Breaking off. Marilyn trapped.
The gesture struggles to be, or to exist within the performer.
2.3 Empty. Marilyn without face.
A blond wig frames the absence of the gesture, a large black hole that leads to no place. Search and impossibility of the mask.
2.4 Floor. The performer collapses on the carpet of potatoes.
Awareness of emptiness when detached from the gesture. The spectators disappear. The performer detaches himself from his blonde wig. Only the scream remains.
3. Death of Marilyn.
Marilyn's body lies in proscenium with the fallen wig. The performer sweeps the crushed potatoes on the stage and the blond wig. The voice of a speaker announcing the death of the myth is heard over and over again.