Anna Nicole Smith Was Not Marilyn Monroe

I don't care if you say Anna Nicole Smith wanted to be Marilyn Monroe. Fine. That is obvious. But don't say Anna Nicole was a modern day Marilyn Monroe. They were not the same and the reductive comparison borders on insulting.

Granted there are similarities. Both were blonde sex symbols that were featured in Playboy. Both were the fantasies of many men. Both came from simple beginnings, changed their names, and climbed from total obscurity to fame. Both their deaths are shrouded in mystery. Both seemed to have an affinity for prescription drugs. Yet, although they both came from humble origins and achieved celebrity and wealth, the legacies they left behind are worlds apart.

Let's look at their body of work:

Marilyn Monroe posed for Playboy and was named Playboy's Sweetheart of The Month in 1953. In 1999 Playboy named her The Number One Sex Star of The 20^th Century.

Marilyn Monroe made thirty films with well-respected actors, some garnering rave reviews and awards. She personified Hollywood glamour. She was voted 4th Greatest Movie Star of all time by Entertainment Weekly. She is ranked #6 on the American Film Institute's "50 Greatest Screen Legends" list.

Sir Laurence Olivier, Marilyn's co-star in The Prince and The Showgirl, said she was "a brilliant comedienne, which means she is also an extremely skilled actress."

Marilyn won a Golden Globe for Best Actress in a comedy for her role in Some Like It Hot.

In 1955 Marilyn Monroe started Marilyn Monroe Productions because she wanted to be taken seriously as an actress. She studied acting under Lee Strasberg at his Actor's Studio in New York City in order to hone her craft as an actress. Twice the British Academy Awards nominated her for Best Foreign Actress, once for The Seven Year Itch and once for The Prince and The Showgirl. In 1961 she won a Golden Globe for Female World Favorite. She impressed people from Billy Wilder to Clark Gable, Lee Strasberg to Arthur Miller.

Her co-star in The Misfits Eli Wallach said, "She saw herself drowning in Hollywood in 1955 and told her studio, 'I'm not just wiggling my behind.' Marilyn is not any one thing; she's multidimensional. As an actress, she has lots of imitators- but only Marilyn survives."

Arthur Miller said, "I've learned about living from her. I took her as a serious actress even before I met her. I think she's an adroit comedienne, but I also think she might turn into the greatest tragic actress that can be imagined."

And Anna Nicole? Like Marilyn Monroe, Anna Nicole Smith posed for Playboy. She was Playmate of the Year in 1993.

Anna Nicole was a Guess Jeans model and PETA spokeswoman. She had small acting roles in The Hudsucker Proxy and Naked Gun 331/3 Final Insult. She also had a small part on the television show Ally McBeal and in Be Cool. Her last film Illegal Aliens, which she helped bankroll, went straight to DVD. She won a Razzie Award, an award given for worst actress, for her role in the Naked Gun film.

Anna Nicole is probably best known for her incoherent reality television show The Anna Nicole Show and for her work as a spokesperson for TrimSpa. The Teen Choice Awards nominated her for Choice TV Reality Star, but she lost.

Anna Nicole was a presenter at The American Music Awards where she famously slurred, "Want my body." She was also a presenter at The Australian Music Awards.

While both Anna Nicole and Marilyn Monroe had large bodies of work, the quality is far from similar and Marilyn's work is in a league entirely of its own. At best, one was a gross imitation of the other. Like comparing apples and oranges. Actually, more like comparing a willow tree to a chia pet. No disrespect intended. Chia pets are funny.

And what about the bodies they worked?

Marilyn Monroe was linked to Arthur Miller, Joe DiMaggio, JFK, Bobby Kennedy.

Anna Nicole Smith has been linked to J. Howard Marshal, Larry Birkhead, Howard Stern, Prince Frederic Von Anhalt.

A Pulitzer Prize winner, an adored American ballplayer, The President of The United States, A Senator. Although Marilyn Monroe's lovers were not without fault, they did seem to genuinely care about her. Arthur Miller wrote The Misfits, one of the best movies ever in my opinion, for her specifically. Joe DiMaggio left flowers on her grave until his death.

A 90-year-old millionaire, a photojournalist, her Svengali-like lawyer, and Zsa Zsa Gabor's husband. While the old guy probably really liked her, the rest of them seem to care more about publicity and the money they can get from her rather than her health or well-being. They want to be her baby's daddy, yet I wonder if they even hold the child when the cameras aren't rolling.

My point? Simply put, once again, they were not the same. Maybe it's just a question of semantics but I find word choice to be very important. Say one emulated the other, not was the other. Just because I wear a crown and parade around the house waving my hand at imaginary crowds doesn't mean I am a modern day Catherine The Great. (I'll spare you my sex with a horse comparison although it would be a good one.) I may think I'm an Empress, I may imitate an Empress, but a wave and a crown do not an Empress make.

One was a legend, the other a train wreck. Not that either one is better. We need good train wrecks and vulnerable legends alike, right?

In closing, I'll let their own words speak for themselves:

Marilyn Monroe: "It's not true that I had nothing on. I had the radio on."

Anna Nicole: "I don't drink as much as I use to could."

Marilyn: "I don't mind living in a man's world as long as I can be a woman in it."

Anna Nicole: "It's very expensive to be me. It's terrible the things I have to do to be me."

Marilyn: "Being a sex symbol is a heavy load to carry, especially when one is tired, hurt and bewildered."

Anna Nicole, "I have to go home and masturbate."