Road Trip–Marilyn: Forever Blonde
This weekend my best friend and I took a short trip to the Dayton Art Institute to take in the exhibit, Marilyn Monroe: Life as a Legend, and the accompanying play, Marilyn: Forever Blond.
I must say that as a long time fan of the iconic beauty, I found the play to be much better and more interesting than the exhibit.
The exhibit is good enough, and if you are a fan of adaptive art you will enjoy it. My favorite pieces were the photos of Marilyn that I had never seen before. There were a lot of well known pieces, but I found special joy in seeing the more earthy and candid photos that were new to me. The Marilyn inspired art, including a Marilyn as a multi-armed goddess and Marilyn on the cross, was not really my cup of tea, but several others seemed to be very intrigued.
The one woman play, Marilyn: Forever Blonde, was very, very good. Actress Sunny Thompson captured Marilyn’s timeless spirit perfectly. The play tells the story of Monroe’s life from her point of view. The first half keeps the audience laughing, while the second half is poignant and reflective. Ms. Thompson reaches into the hearts of the audience and takes them with her through Monroe’s beautiful and often very sad life.
Afterward, we stopped at Smokin Bar-B-Que on 5th for some good, and inexpensive, American fare.
Good to know before going:
Marilyn: Life as a Legend and Marilyn: Forever Blonde are both featured at the Dayton Art Institute through June 24th.
Adult combination tickets (both exhibit and play) are $34. Separate tickets to the individual events are also available.
The doors to the exhibit close exactly at 4pm. There are no late admissions to the play.
The City of Dayton is approximately one hour and fifteen minutes from downtown Columbus.
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