Joan Collins: 'Marilyn Monroe Warned Me About the Wolves in Hollywood' | This Morning

was it only a matter of time before this happened I think that it's been something that's been going on certainly since I started as a young actress of 1617 and in fact one of the reasons my father who's a theatrical agent didn't want me to go into the business didn't want me to become an actress is because he warned me about bad men I didn't exactly know what he meant because when I you know as a 16 17 year old coming into starting in movies I was about as innocent as a 10 year old today we did not know anything about anything certainly not the S word you know so when I first started and I did my first couple films when I first went up for a a call a sort of audition just to play a maid it was a Greek maid in a movie and the director wanted me to pull down my top so that he could see my cleavage and pull up my skirt so he could see my legs and this was for a one-liner in a in a movie and which I did because it wasn't showing a lot you know and then I thought it was a bit strange but then you sort of forget about it because at this time I was also doing photography and the photographer's would think nothing of touching you here pinching your bottoms slapping you on the bottom calling you sweetie honey Tootsie lovey anything like that treating you like a box of candy what about when you went to went to Hollywood Hollywood well the first time that I had an experience was with two very very famous mega stars and it was at a party and I'm very new in town and I was 21 but I was still quite innocent and I was wearing an off-the-shoulder top and these two guys I mean there was so famous I can't tell you who they are because your lawyer said I'm not to mention any names and I said because I wanted to make conversation uh-huh I don't really like this music and one of them said and I don't really like this and he grabbed my top which was the last to size and pulled it like that and the other one laughed at me and I felt so humiliated I like just ran away but that was just a social if you do you end up sitting down and talking to Marilyn Monroe about it yes that was yes shortly after that I met Marilyn at a party at gene Kelly's house and I was playing in this role in the girl in the red velvet swing and she said that she was considered but she was too old it was another one of those ages things and then she told me she said watch out for the Wolves in Hollywood honey and I said well I've been in British films for three years I can handle wolves and she said well not the power buses honey and she said if they don't get what they want they'll drop your contract they've done it to lots of girls it did affect your career because you didn't you didn't miss out on roles and Cleopatra was one of those that was the main one I had tested several times and both the head of the studio which was an old very old guy old enough to be my grandfather he was an old Greek guy he was the CEO that the whole 20th Century Fox and they had the the see yeah well what was that he was a CEO and then the head of the studio was another man and both of them after me and hope dangling the cherry which was the role of Cleopatra and I did about four tests for it and at one industry party I was dancing with the head of the studio who is an attractive man in his 50s but I am now twenty four or five and he said I would like to get your little apartment I'll come and visit you two and three times a week and I will guarantee that you will get the pick of all the scripts at 20th Century Fox and you know I'm an attractive man I said what you're married and he said and he just raised his eyebrows I said really and he said you know you will also I'm sure be frontrunner Cleopatra at which point I said well I'm here with my agent let's ask him about the deal yeah and I can't walked away and I didn't get the wrong I don't know whether it was that or whether it was that they're the they decided they want to get a much bigger biggest my suit must been difficult then because women that sort of were doing well at that time around you you must have had that sort of feeling of were they doing it because they were the best for that role and they were great actresses or were they doing it because you knew what they'd done I mean it must sort of taken taking the edge off it in a way well I did I was a little shocked hearing about Marilyn because apparently Marilyn had been so abused by men and had done there's so many things to get roles that she hadn't wanted to do and most of these men Holly were fat and old and ugly and hideous you have to remember that when I came into the business in the mid 50's these men had been in the business since they were young in the twenties so they were all old now what about the people around them they must have been complicit you tell a story I think it was in New York and you went to see a producer and his secretary said he's in there and he was in the bath she must have known he was in the bath I'll send you in there yes yes a woman sent you into here well he was there there's the famous oak bar thing and he was said you know the first thing he said was come on in and no no no I I can't I got a date and he said who width I said my boyfriend Warren Beatty and he said who's that I said well he's a new actor and he said why are you bothering to go out with unknown actors Zilla I'm an important man come on get in the bath come on we'll talk about this role you want to play this role it was a great role it had been done by Betty Davis of Human Bondage and I knew I was perfect for examle and I said well you know I can't get in the bath I mean I I'm busy I have to go and then he said how old are you and I said twenty-five he said twenty-five that's not young in this business anymore and that's when I realized there was also the age thing as well in Hollywood 25 was not young and 27 was the cutoff age you

Channel: This Morning

Views: 3,668,302

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Keywords: this morning, interview, holly willoughby, phillip schofield, ruth langsford, eamonn holmes, chat shows - topic, chat show - topic, talk shows - topic, Joan Collins, Marilyn Monroe, Harvey Weinstein, Sexual Abuse, Sexual Harassment, Film, Cinema, 1950

Id: lx-Zs8VXLpc

Length: 6min 40sec (400 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 16 2017

Reddit Comments

[u/abbzug]

In Marilyn Monroe's time the only place without wolves would've been a monastery.

[u/oldspice75]

Moses warned her about idols