I can decide if I agree or really this is a big streth to find something sexist and offensive (which I sorta am finding alot these days). On one hand, it could even be an opening into WHY these things are so glamorous to the public eye, instead of being horrified by it.

This disgusts me. I just worry/wonder about the many millions of young girls who idolize Lindsay Lohan and yet see her doing such destructive things. Granted, she has the right to make her own choices and that includes drinking, etc, but I just wish that when she made these choices for herself, they were just that - for herself. That she wasn't doing these things in the public eye.

Meh. Are there really that many young girls who idolize Lindsay Lohan? Aren't the young girls idolizing Cyrus Miley (or whatever her name is) these days?

EG, probably. But I'm not so much worried about Lohan influencing younger girls (I mean, how many of them are reading NY Mag) as I am about why anyone in the world would think this is a good idea. It seems to rely so much on ideas of women celeb's destruction...

@katie: i don't think jessica's post intends to accuse anyone or anything as sexist and offensive for the sake of it. i think it is a reaction to a sick psychological state that our culture embraces, without much thought.

the marilyn monroe fetish is a classic. she is a pinup girl who met a gruesome death. her image has been used to conflate and enlarge the ideals of sex kitten + damsel in distress + party girl + a dramatic, premature death (which prevents her from aging). the story is so salacious, so unforgettable... it's easy to imagine that young starlets struggling with their identity and hungry for success would be attracted to her legacy, however tragic.

but we always romanticize tragedy. james dean and romeo and juliet... people want to be powerful, to make others feel something and remember them. i think that's the source of our sickness.

Right on, EG, and Jessica on the readership of NY Magazine. But the Marilyn Monroe fetish by sad, usually less than talented starlets (Lohan, Carmen Electra) is disturbing. It exacerbates the issue of glamorizing and cashing in on pain. Also, why does no one have any new artistic ideas?

@lizadilly: A lot of it is about this "eternal youth" bullshit, isn't it? For whatever reason, self-destruction is really ok, as long as it's practiced with a beautiful woman who will remain immortalized through her youth and beauty. Like it's treated as if it's a mercy to let a woman die young and beautiful rather than suffer through growing (gasp!) old. It doesn't seem to be so much about death (I'm not sure many tabloid-readers fany the idea of seeing Anna Nicole Smith's body right now) as it is about preserving youth through stopping life right at that point.

I'm bothered by it for a slightly different yet possibly linked reason...

Is LL being compared to Marilyn? Visually, artistically? By recreating something else the first will almost always be considered better.

I dont know how to put to words how i dont like it other than saying the whole deal is kinda lame.

"Also, why does no one have any new artistic ideas?"

for real

One can't reference Marilyn Monroe without referencing the way the culture uses and destroys women. That said, the thing it reminds me of is the creepy feeling I get listening to AC/DC's "Ride On," which is Bonn Scott singing his own epitaph. I guess the difference is that with Scott, the process was so self-conscious. He was by turns hopeful and resigned, but fully cognizant that he was drinking himself to death.

I guess if Lohan said, "you know, I've had problems with substance abuse and celebrity and being a sex symbol, and I don't know if I'm going to make Marilyn Monroe's mistakes or learn from them but either way I feel like I should do this ..." then I'd have a lot of respect for that, even if she does end up slowly circling the drain. But doing this without thinking about what it means that she died makes me think she doesn't even see it coming and therefore has little chance to get some perspective on it.

seriously why is EVERYTHING a throwback to something else these days?

why on earth would bert stern even feel the need to recreate this iconic photoshoot in the first place? this is a tangent, but i'm sick to death of remakes and sequels in hollywood.

anyway, marilyn fetishization is old hat, as is our cultural romance with beautiful people who die young. i don't think the fascination itself is dangerous or sexist, just the extent to which it is overdone. at least marilyn is a cautionary tale--i'm much more concerned with girls who come of age wanting nothing more to be rich, famous and vacuous (i.e., lindsay and her ilk). it just bothers me when the people with the least talent get the most attention and it seems particularly prevalent these days.

I am really troubled by the fetishistic way in which young women who obviously need medical or psychoiatric help are have every detail of their life raked over by male journalists.

'Referencing' should be using an old image in a new way. She should have went for a spot of genderfuck and been James Dean.

Oh yeah, Jessica, I got that--I was just responding to the comment just above mine.

And I agree that the fetishization of poor Marilyn Monre disturbing. And I find it even more disturbing to have a current starlet recreating her photo shoots, etc. It's like the culture is re-enacting Vertigo. Of course, the difference is that the audience of Vertigo and Hitchcock knew that the protagonist's obsession with a supposedly dead woman was creepy.

But what happened to Marilyn Monroe isn't a cautionary tale--she was abused as a child, was highly intelligent, realized early on that downplaying that intelligence could get her further than highlighting it, was beaten by at least one husband, and became addicted to drugs--at least in part as a form of self-medication. What's cautionary there?

Blondie said it best about the fetish of youth/marilyn monroe fetish in our culture:

"Are you waiting for the reaper to arrive?
Or just to die by the hand of love?
Love for youth, love for youth
So, die young and stay pretty

Leave only the best behind
Slipping sensibilities
Tragedy in your own dream"

ok i know this wasn't the point of the post... but i HATE HATE HATE when people compare modern-day actresses to Marilyn. i have always had a soft spot for marilyn.. i've read her biographies, collected various memorabilia...and I've always liked the photos of her that seemed to capture a different side of her (rather than just the glamorous poses).
It is in my understanding that despite her financial resources, Marilyn didn't have all the resources that these actresses do today to get help. Today, you could check into rehab without it damaging your career...back then, not so much. Marilyn was surrounded by emotionally damaging people who didn't support her, which helped lead to her downfall. Today, you could be addicted to crack, but as long as you check into rehab and do an interview with People magazine about it, the world will love you anyway.
I don't know... maybe its hard for me to explain...but I feel that the situation these young celebrities are in today differs from Marilyn's situation... I have more sympathy for Marilyn somehow. And I think that if anything, we should've learned from her situation...instead we seek to idolize the negative parts of it. Sigh.

EG - ehh, the power of addiction? the need to get/give help when someone obviously needs it? that making it in the entertainment industry often requires a lot of fucked up sacrifices?

i think the narrative is so powerful also because we see a talented actress destroyed when there were so many people around her who failed her in some way.

I guess I just don't like it when real people's suffering and death is flattened into a morality tale, and I think that's what often happens when famous people die young--the nuance is overlooked in favor of a fatalistic narrative about how the death was inevitable. Monroe had a lousy life, and she did a phenomenal amount to improve it when you consider where she started from.

I mean, back when she was addicted--there just weren't the kind of treatments we have now. They didn't exist, and psychotherapy was still horribly mired in sexism. I just don't think the help was there for her to get.

that making it in the entertainment industry often requires a lot of fucked up sacrifices?

Word. I'm with you on that one.

Is there anything inherently gender-specific about this, though. Don't so many people tend to do the same thing with men like James Dean or River Phoenix?

Is there anything inherently gender-specific about this, though? Don't so many people tend to do the same thing with men like James Dean or River Phoenix?

Is there anything inherently gender-specific about this, though? Don't so many people tend to do the same thing with men like James Dean or River Phoenix?

Trying to look at this in a positive light: Not sure if this has been mentioned already, but it could just be a symbol of how nothing in Hollywood/celebrity culture has really changed. Just how it's the same ol' tragic story that is constantly repeating itself. Granted not every celebrity is participating in destructive behavior from what we may/may not see. But the simple idea that it hasn't really changed. I personally think they should have just gotten a stick and other things to hold up the sheets but whatever. Lindsay Lohan doesn't have curves like Marilyn Monroe did so to even do this shoot was a retarded idea in the first place.

I'm not sure why Lohan was chosen, but the last *anything* of a person as famous as Monroe is going to be more popular..

I personally think the pictures (both sets) are tasteful. I know many people will disagree.

On a much more superficial note, the photos just aren't very good. It feels like both LL and the photographer were trying too hard and it just feels forced, fake, and kinda sad. There's no energy in the 2nd photos, especially when compared to the first.

whitmanesque--certainly people fetishize James Dean, but I would argue not as great an extent. You don't see photographers, for example, dressing real life male actors up as dead actors and calling it sexy.

While Lohan's judgement may be a little shakey, I'm thankful that she has the option of making all the bad choices she wants. Too often women are viewed as victims of society, circumstances, etc. What ever happened to empowerment to lead your own life as you see fit? What we forget is that we all have choices each day which guide the paths of our lives. To think that someone does something simply because some celebrity does it is doesn't make sense, where is free will in all this? Reminds me of when I was a child and "peer pressure" was blamed for all bad behavior because no one had the guts to be accountable for their own bad behavior.

Is this any worse than dressing up like Elvis? And how many women dress up like Betty Page (who retired and went on to live a "normal" life and as far as I know never had any drug problems or felt she had to downplay her intelligence to be successful)? As long as Lindsey Lohan still has enough emotional grounding to see how Marilyn Monroe was destroyed (which she seems to in the interview) I don't think there's anything particularly problematic about the spread. Of course from an artistic point of view it might be lacking, I haven't looked at the pictures yet so can't judge.

While Lohan's judgement may be a little shakey, I'm thankful that she has the option of making all the bad choices she wants. Too often women are viewed as victims of society, circumstances, etc. What ever happened to empowerment to lead your own life as you see fit? What we forget is that we all have choices each day which guide the paths of our lives. To think that someone does something simply because some celebrity does it doesn't make sense, reminds me of when I was a child and "peer pressure" was blamed for all bad behavior because no one had the guts to be accountable for their own bad behavior.

I've seen plenty of male actors posed à la James Dean. Every time you see a man posed in a white t-shirt with cuffed blue jeans, it's a Dean reference. No one comments on it. Marilyn Monroe and James Dean are pretty much our cultural touchstones for the "live fast, die young" ideal.

What I find more disturbing is how many people seem to assume that Britney Spears will inevitably commit suicide soon. Honestly, they are betting pools on it right now. There seems to be a pretty big assumption on the part of many that she will conclude her own life drama by killing herself, and soon. What goes on in people's minds, honestly?

I am unsure how I feel about this shoot fetishizing death or MM; neither of those two fetishes need help and it's easy to see them if you look hard enough.

But why simply duplicate what has been done before? Short answer: money.

The last photo, though, the one with the red and white scarf, is visually stunning.

The first thing I thought of when I saw this photo shoot was the supposed interchangeability of different women, and how hard it is to be considered an individual human rather than a member of the monolithic group Woman.

But I'm also a little disturbed by some of the comments in this thread that seem rather sexist. Lohan has talent (or, arguably, had, before the descent into drugs). She is a good musician who can sing really well - this coming from someone who doesn't even really like her style of music - and she can act. But it seems like some people on this thread want to deny that because she also does things like pose nude. I don't think that two are mutually exclusive and I think it's imperative that feminists not refuse acknowledgment of her talent along with the rest of the world just because she also plays on her looks.

So I googled the photographer's book of photos from the original Last Sitting, and it seems he published the photos in their entirety, even those that Monroe crossed out with an "x" to indicate that she didn't like them or want them published. In fact, the cover of the book is one such photo: http://images.amazon.com/images/P/3823854836.01.LZZZZZZZ.jpg.

This just seems SO exploitative to me, taking the obvious exploitation -- she was drunk and naked -- one step farther by going against her wishes after her death, with no apparent motive other than profit. For this kind of "legend" to be replicated with such breeziness seems sick to me-- and deeply misogynistic.

Every time you see a man posed in a white t-shirt with cuffed blue jeans, it's a Dean reference.

No way am I buying that. White t-shirts and blue jeans? Every time? And none of that's a reference, to, I don't know, Marlon Brando, from whom Dean swiped that shit?

Find me someone putting, oh, say, Johnny Depp in an exact replica of, say, that famous shot of Dean in Times Square, and then I'll concede it.

I really think this is a stretch. People copy Monroe all the time (how many white halter dresses and blond wigs do you see every Halloween?), just because this one shoot happened to be her last doesn't mean recreating it is fetishizing death or downfall. If we wanted to do that, couldn't we just take real life footage of Lohan going out at night? Or pose her in a bed with her eyes rolled back and drool on her chin while cigarettes burn in an ashtray on the nightstand?

Maybe they just wanted to recreate a famous shoot. Maybe someone thought it was beautiful and wanted to pay homage. Why Lohan, I couldn't tell you, but that's a whole other argument.

This stuff is sad, and not in a good way. There are beautiful people in the world who destroy themselves in terrible ways, and I don't care to watch.

It has always stuck with me: in the 90s, Playboy experienced a significant anniversary, and they did a commemorative issue featuring Marilyn. I believe it was Harlan Ellison who wrote the article in tribute, and in it he said Marilyn was fatter than what we now considered sexy, but still, she was an icon. ...something to that effect.

Now, with this photo shoot, not only are they re-enacting it, they are re-making Marilyn to be smaller, almost boyish. They are updating the fetish for the age of eating disorders. Lovely.

"Now, with this photo shoot, not only are they re-enacting it, they are re-making Marilyn to be smaller, almost boyish. They are updating the fetish for the age of eating disorders. Lovely."

Did you look at the pictures? Are you familiar with Lindsay Lohan?

There's nothing boyish about her, nor is she super-thin like some of the girls today, in fact I'd say she is just "normal", whatever that means. And no boy I know has breasts that big.

Marilyn was before my time, so I don't quite get some of what is being said here about fetishes her death. All I can comment on is the pictures themselves, which are actually quite tasteful IMO and not that racy considering how some had explained them to me.

I don't think it's alarming that a person looks up to someone who's passed. Nor do I think that it's alarming that our culture idolizes those who've died prematurely. It's not a sexist thing, we've been doing this as a human race for millennia. You can look to the story of Mark Antony, Romeo and Juliet, James Dean. Those who die in their prime carry a sense of longing for the human race.

And if Lohan want to pose for nudes, I'm fine with that too. It's her body. They're artfully done, if a bit uncreative.

There's nothing boyish about her, nor is she super-thin like some of the girls today, in fact I'd say she is just "normal", whatever that means. And no boy I know has breasts that big.

I think the OP was referring to her hips when talking about her body being boyish. I agree that in these photos her body is healthy, but when compared to Marilyn Monroe's body (as inevitably happens when you're mimicking iconic photos) she appears much more sporty or even boyish than Monroe.

Just from an aesthetic standpoint I think that's why this project fails. If she sets herself up to be compared to an icon of femininity and curves Lohan loses. If she was featured instead in a shoot that celebrated the beauty of her own body on her own terms the whole project might seem more lively and less forced.

None of which addresses Jessica's point about how scary it is to see troubled young actors rehearsing scripts of self-destruction. They might do it naturally, but do people have to develop stroke material to go along?

“I personally think they should have just gotten a stick and other things to hold up the sheets but whatever. Lindsay Lohan doesn't have curves like Marilyn Monroe did so to even do this shoot was a retarded idea in the first place.�- LP

“Now, with this photo shoot, not only are they re-enacting it, they are re-making Marilyn to be smaller, almost boyish.� – Heidi

Stick? Boyish? Are you all looking at the same photos I am? She may be a bit smaller that MM in the hips, but if her breasts are boyish then I just came out of the closet (does this mean I need to register?).

I REALLY don't think it's cool to criticize her body, she doesn't look anorexic at all. So she doesn't have big hips; we can't all be super curvy.
That aside it freaks me out how glamourized drug use and so on is in celebrity culture. It also very much scared me when she was quoted as saying 'i won't let it happen to me' or something along those lines, regarding overdose deaths and so on, as if people who have overdosed really had control over themselves when they did so.

With all due respect, Jessica (and commenters), I think you are reading a lot more into this than is actually there. It is at most yet another comment on the sorry prevalence of celebrity worship in our society. By celebrity worship, I mean the worship both of individual celebrities and of celebrity in the abstract. Sad, but may I suggest that there are more important things to command our attention?