Sale of Monroe Photos Raises Eyebrows

Of all the photos ever taken of Marilyn Monroe, early nudes that graced the pages of Playboy magazine and helped launch her to stardom are among the most famous.

Now Ventura photographer Tom Kelley is about to test the value of the so-called “Red Velvet” series--which his photographer father shot and which he now owns.

In a unique auction set for next month, Butterfields and its parent company EBay will put on the block five images taken during a 1949 shoot that would produce the world-famous photo used as the centerfold in Playboy magazine’s inaugural issue.

The March 22 auction, to be held simultaneously at Butterfields in Los Angeles and on EBay’s Internet site, will not include that centerfold image.

But it will include the five other photos generated during the session, as well as the intellectual property rights--negatives, copyrights and Monroe’s signed release--to those images.

With bidding set to start at $700,000, Kelley said Thursday he expects the final sale price to exceed $1 million because Monroe’s release will allow the high bidder to use her name and likeness for trade and advertising purposes.

“Marilyn hasn’t gone away, she’s just as strong today as she ever was,” said Kelley, 49, whose father, Tom Kelley Sr., met the would-be actress in 1948 and later convinced her to pose nude for a pinup calendar.

“These have been in my family for 50 years now, and there’s still tremendous interest for this type of thing,” he added.

Along with the images--Monroe lounging against a blood-red velvet curtain--Kelley also is auctioning off the camera and tripod used for the session and his father’s appointment book, which listed the 7 p.m. meeting with Monroe and the amount she was paid, $50.

Butterfields has also assembled a range of other Monroe memorabilia, from the floor-length silk-and-chiffon gown she wore in “The Prince and the Showgirl” to a handwritten note of her reasons for seeking a divorce from first husband Jim Dougherty.

But it’s the “Red Velvet” series that promises to be the star of the show.

“In our normal day of business, we don’t usually sell intellectual property rights,” said Catherine Williamson, Butterfields’ director of entertainment memorabilia. “And these are not just any intellectual property rights. These are probably the most famous images of the most famous star of the 20th century.”

Monroe was not yet famous when Tom Kelley Sr. ran across her. He witnessed a minor car accident she had on Sunset Boulevard. He gave her $5 for cab fare and a business card from the Hollywood photography studio where he did advertising work.

When he passed away in 1984, the Monroe photographs became part of the studio’s archives. The younger Kelley said he considered selling the photos for several years, even as he relocated the studio to Ventura in 1992, but the timing was never right.

Now it is. Advances in computer technology have opened untold opportunities to make commercial use of the images, he said.

But he said he also wants to share the images with a larger audience, and perhaps bring long overdue recognition to this area of his father’s work, which at the time was largely viewed as unseemly.

“It would be nice to get these in the proper hands and let people work with them,” Kelley said.

Questions Raised Over Sale of Negatives

That approach is not universally embraced. Some photo collectors and dealers have raised concerns about Kelley’s willingness to give up his rights by including the negatives and Monroe’s release in the sale. The images are historically significant and should be treated as such, critics say.

But Gary Saal, Kelley’s Northern California-based agent, said he and his client have always guarded against exploitation.

“We have had numerous offers to do lots of things that would have detracted from the value of the property, and we have chosen not to do that,” he said.

Kelley said for his part, he hopes an American buys the images, since Monroe is an American icon. And he hopes the buyer takes as much care with them as he and his father did all these years.

“We’re talking about pictures of historical significance,” he said. “I’d like to see them be treated with the integrity they deserve.”