Marilyn Monroe Version
The song is perhaps most famously performed by Marilyn Monroe in the 1953 film Gentlemen Prefer Blondes. Monroe's character, Lorelei Lee, has been followed on a Transatlantic ocean liner by a detective hired by her fiance's father, who wants assurance that she is not marrying purely for money. He is informed of compromising pictures taken with a British diamond mine owner and cancels her letter of credit before she arrives in France, requiring her to work in a nightclub to survive. Her fiance arrives at the cabaret to see her perform this song, about exploiting men for riches. Diamonds are an element in another story line in the film, in which Lorelei is given a diamond tiara by the mine owner, in gratitude for her recovering the photographs. In a later scene, Jane Russell, who played opposite Monroe, sang "Diamonds Are a Girl's Best Friend" in court, while pretending to be Lorelei.
Most of the song in the film is Monroe's own voice but she needed help in two phrases – "These rocks don't lose their shape, diamonds are a girl's best friend", and at the beginning with a series of high-pitched "no's", all of which were dubbed in by the soprano Marni Nixon.
The song was listed as the 12th most important film song of all time by the American Film Institute.
Monroe's rendition of the song has been considered an iconic performance and has since been copied by other entertainers ranging from Madonna and Kylie Minogue to Geri Halliwell, Anna Nicole Smith and Thalía. Madonna's video "Material Girl" uses a similar set and costumes for the singer and her male dancers. A decade after Thalia's performance of the song in Spain (see below), her fellow Mexican entertainer, Aida Pierce, co-hosted an episode of Humor es...Los Comediantes dressed in a similar evening gown.
Read more about this topic: Diamonds Are A Girl's Best Friend
Famous quotes containing the words marilyn monroe, marilyn, monroe and/or version:
“People feel fame gives them some kind of privilege to walk up to you and say anything to you, of any kind of nature—and it won’t hurt your feelings—like it’s happening to your clothing.”
—Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962)
“Ah, Marilyn, Hollywood’s Joan of Arc, our Ultimate Sacrificial Lamb. Well, let me tell you, she was mean, terribly mean. The meanest woman I have ever known in this town. I am appalled by this Marilyn Monroe cult. Perhaps it’s getting to be an act of courage to say the truth about her. Well, let me be courageous. I have never met anyone as utterly mean as Marilyn Monroe. Nor as utterly fabulous on the screen, and that includes Garbo.”
—Billy Wilder (b. 1906)
“Fame will go by and, so long, I’ve had you, fame. If it goes by, I’ve always known it was fickle. So at least it’s something I experienced, but that’s not where I live.”
—Marilyn Monroe (1926–1962)
“Remember that you were a slave in the land of Egypt, and the LORD your God brought you out from there with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm; therefore the LORD your God commanded you to keep the sabbath day.”
—Bible: Hebrew, Deuteronomy 5:15.
See Exodus 22:8 for a different version of this fourth commandment.