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when she raised herself from the water, I could see that her panties were gone. She’d done it! And she was having a lot of fun. She was enjoying it!
    And for a few minutes, while the crew repositioned the cameras, instead of returning to her dressing room a third time, she stayed and posed for the still cameras. Nobodyhad to ask her to turn right or turn left; she knew exactly what to do.

    Marilyn was a photographer’s dream subject with her clothes on and even more stunning with them off. Her wet skin glistened. Her eyes sparkled. Her smile was provocative. She was a week away from her thirty-sixth birthday, and she looked as good as she had ever looked. She was so sure of herself in front of the camera that her confidence was infectious. There was no hint of the woman who had been in trouble for most of her life. As I shot, I was sure that the pictures I was taking were going to be beautiful and unforgettable. The curve of her spine complemented her natural curves as the water reflected the lights, and the whole scene sparkled. I wasn’t even thinking about how many of these images she would approve. How could she not approve them all? She was giving it her best, and her best was as good as it got. She was, after all, Marilyn Monroe!
    In all, I shot sixteen rolls of thirty-six-exposure black-and-white and three rolls of color, constantly adjusting my cameras, checking exposure, checking the shutter speed, moving so that the key lights produced the right highlights on her body. The black-and-white film was Tri-X, and the color was high-speed Ektachrome. The scene was repeated time and time again so that the director could capture it from every conceivable angle. It wound up taking a full day, but the actual shooting was only two hours.
    The director finished at around five in the afternoon, and immediately I rushed to the phone, just outside the soundstage doors, to call Tom Blau and
Paris Match
to let them know what I had. I realized it was almost three in the morning in Europe, but I didn’t care. I told Tom, “You better get on a plane. I’ve got Marilyn Monroe in the nude, and we’re gonna make a lot of money.”
    Tom balked. “Can’t you put them on a plane?”
    “No, Tom, I can’t,” I said. “We’ve got a lot to do.”
    Then I called Roger Thérond, the picture editor at
Paris Match
. The magazine’s switchboard was open twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, because
Match
covered the world. Not having ever called Thérond at night, I needed the magazine to put me through to his home. Just then Woodfield came through the soundstage door, carrying his camera bags. I had barely talked to him all day, but I knew I had to say something before he left.
    “Billy,” I said, still holding the phone, “two sets of pictures only make the price go down. One set of pictures makes the price go up. I think we should become partners.” Woodfield kept walking and had passed through the outside doors just as I was put through to Thérond.
    “Roger,” I shouted. “You won’t believe what happened. The first nudes of Marilyn Monroe in over ten years. The pictures are going to blow your mind!”
    “How soon can we get them?” Thérond said in his heavy French accent. “Should we fly a writer there?”
    “No, no, you don’t need to. The pictures speak for themselves, Roger.” What I didn’t tell him was that Marilyn still had to approve them. I was just hanging up with Thérond when Woodfield walked back in.
    At first he didn’t say a word, but obviously he was ready to talk. “Let’s go to the commissary and talk about this,” he said in a low voice. On the way, I talked, not letting him say much. “Let’s put our pictures together, sell them all over the world—here in the U.S., in Europe, in Japan.” I didn’t even know whether Woodfield owned his pictures or Globe did. Maybe Billy didn’t even know at that point. All I knew was that I owned my photographs and he came back to