Celebrity Deaths and the Legends that Surround Them

As a society, most of us at one time or another find ourselves intrigued by stars and their scandals. Be it a sudden birth of a child nobody knew was coming or even a tragic, unexplained death, we as a society can become extremely absorbed in these stories. In fact, given the right celebrity and the most intense scandal, we can even forget our own lives in exchange for the stories of those in the limelight. Looking into recent history and even back into the golden age of film, I did a little research on several celebrities who had such an intriguing story that it left people hanging onto every word... perhaps even still do to this day and age. Below are only a few of the greats no longer with us, but also the ones who still to this day carry such legends about their deaths that many don't even know where the truth lies.

George Reeves

While there are some younger people who go, "George Reeves who?" many, many older people know the actor who became the typecast Superman from the 1950's series: "Adventures of Superman". Most forget that beyond Superman, George Reeves was a professional actor who played in many movies preceding his days as the Caped Hero everyone came to know and love. However, his life and death were both intriguing, even up to today leaving many people to wonder, "how and why did George Reeves die?"

There are only minimal facts as to his death, such as the standards most anyone could find out easily reading a paper or watching a news story. Who died, where they died and general knowledge of how.
We know that George Reeves was found lifeless in his upstairs bedroom. It is also common knowledge (and perhaps why this story was so intriguing in both the past and up to current day) that somehow George Reeves was shot in the head with a gun. This is where the story turns intriguing. Many people have woven tales of how they think he died, however, nobody knows for certain.

The first popular rumor of George Reeves celebrity death was suicide. After George Reeves run as Superman ended, it became extremely hard, as most typecast actors may experience, to find a new job now that he was the stereotypical superhero. This, according to some left him miserable and depressed - but was it enough reason to end his life when there was hope just around the corner of a reprisal as Superman? Yes, some say. He disliked being considered Superman and wanted something else, so this left many saying the thought of returning as Superman made him even more depressed. There was also the nay sayers who swore adamantly that he was thrilled to be picked up for the 1960 season of Superman. Not to mention, how the shell casing got under his body if it were a suicide is the biggest mystery of all in the suicide aspect.

The next rumor is about as far-fetched as one can go in regards to George Reeves. It's also a widely known legend and varies from location to location. However, the basic story was that George Reeve went crazy and jumped off a building to see if he could fly. Rest assured, this is merely a fable that someone probably said in sarcasm or in some sort of sadistic humor that went haywire like many rumors tend to do. This can be 100% ruled out of being this celebrity's death.

The third and more believable by most is murder. But, just like with how he died, there are some ways people feel he could've been murdered. The first and most obvious was a direct result of the affair he had with Toni Mannix - then wife of MGM executive of Eddie Mannix, who supposedly had ties to the mob. Why would an affair lead to his possible murder? Simple. George Reeves broke his relationship off with Toni Mannix and began to see Lenore Lemmon. One of the more common whispers I have heard about his "murder" are the ones about Toni Mannix killing George because she was jealous of his newfound love with Lenore or even the fact the two were engaged to be married.

The second possible murderer that has been in gossip is that of Lenore. During their party with friends the two went upstairs, had a quarrel and then in anger Lenore shot him. While far fetched, nobody will ever know for certain, except people claimed at the time of the gunshot she was downstairs with her guests and not up with George.

The final possible suspect that people seemed pretty chitchatty about is Eddie Mannix, himself. Perhaps not doing it himself, if he truly had ties to the mob he could've paid any person to "knock" off George and make it look like suicide. Why would he want George dead? George was, as I mentioned earlier, having a rather long term affair with his wife Toni. That, alone, was a pretty decent motive for George being murdered.

Marilyn Monroe

For female celebrities, Marilyn Monroe's mysterious and untimely passing is perhaps the equal in my eyes to George Reeves death. Now, for those who have lived under a rock or don't care about old, dead models, Marilyn Monroe was perhaps (and is still considered to many) to be the ultimate sex symbol. Not only was Marilyn a beautiful model, but she was also an actress with an incredible voice. There are two main rumors as to how Marilyn died: murder and suicide. I will dive into the latter first.

Many people felt that with how Marilyn was found dead and what she was surrounded by mainly hinted at a lethal overdose of medication (much like the recent death of Anna Nicole). What facts are known? She was found in the nude, face down on her bed with her arms at her sides and legs completely straight. We also know that she was on medication. This is where people feel the suicide rumor comes into play. After the autopsy on Marilyn was performed, they announced that there was chloral hydrate in her blood along with a trace of sleeping pills still in her liver. With this information, the more common rumor of suicide came into play. Why, you ask? Marilyn was known to be depressed. Some wonder what on earth a beautiful, talented woman has to be depressed over, but it was commonly known that she had a borderline disorder. This caused her to be in and out of clinics for a while in her life.

If anyone out there knows the stress of being in the limelight, it was definitely Marilyn. In many ways the demanding schedule interrupted her life and affected her happiness, definitely a reason to make anyone less than chipper. It was especially hard for Marilyn knowing that her marriage to Joe DiMaggio was distressed almost from the start due to her performance for the troops and Joe's jealousy. There was, of course, stress from his supposed mental abuse on her which ended the marriage before even a year was up. Likewise with the next marriage to Arthur Miller, Marilyn's happiness was once again to be short - after citing that Arthur felt Marilyn to be like his ex-wife (whom he loathed) the two ended up divorcing only after 4 1/2 years together. With so much sorrow in her life in just one aspect, there were plenty of reasons for her to end her life.

The second (and more interesting in my opinion) rumor as to how and why Marilyn died in 1962 involves a rather intriguing love triangle between herself, Robert and John F. Kennedy. Almost anyone who hears "happy birthday, Mr. President" can almost visualize Marilyn's seductive voice singing to John F. Kennedy, which made it seem very obvious that there was some kind of relationship there. How, you ask, does a simple love triangle result in a possible murder?

Much alike George Reeves, Marilyn had a certain party interested in her and the affairs with the two Kennedy Brothers: The Mafia. With this known, it was quite obvious the FBI would be watching Marilyn and create a file which grew pretty quick, especially since the Mafia's main interest in Marilyn was on her goings on with the Kennedy's. Of course, with Marilyn and her love affair with these two, especially John, there was a growing concern over a possible scandal. As the rumors of the affair grew, it was only a matter of time before Marilyn was considered high risk and was given the request to leave both Kennedy brothers alone. With the worry of Marilyn and the President's affair leaking out (along with information) there were rumors that a week before she was found dead she was lured to Tahoe for reasons that are in dispute even to this day. Some say she was going to remarry Joe DiMaggio, but others say that with her addiction to drugs, she was lured there with hopes of creating blackmail so she wouldn't leak information out about the Kennedy's.

Was Marilyn murdered for what she knew, or was she merely a victim of the heart who couldn't take life anymore? We may never know for sure, just as we may never know how George Reeves really died. However, what we learn from rumors is that these simple whispers keep these two legends alive. While there are no doubt more ways and rumors as to how these two passed on, these were the more common ones given to me by poll. It would be amazing in time to know for certain what happened on those nights, but, for now we listen to rumors and wonder, "what if that is what truly happened?"