THE ANGELS — Marilyn Monroe fans have won a battle to preserve the actress’s footprint in Los Angeles and are also closer to seeing a towering statue of the big screen icon in Palm Springs.
The Los Angeles home where Monroe briefly lived and died was declared a historic cultural monument this week, while a decision by the Palm Springs planning commission raised the chances of a 26-foot (8-meter) statue named “Forever Marilyn.” stay in place.
The Los Angeles City Council voted in favor of the landmark designation on Wednesday after a lengthy battle over whether the house in the Brentwood neighborhood would be demolished, the Los Angeles Times reported.
The current owners live next door and wanted to demolish the house to expand their property. The council, however, was unanimous in taking steps to save it.
“There is no other person or place in the city of Los Angeles as iconic as Marilyn Monroe and her home in Brentwood,” area council representative Traci Park said before the vote.
Monroe purchased the house for $75,000 and died there a few months later, on August 4, 1962, of an apparent overdose. The current owners, Brinah Milstein and Roy Bank, purchased the house for $8.35 million and obtained a demolition permit, but were met with opposition.
The owners claim the house has changed so much over the years that it is no longer historic and has become a nuisance in the neighborhood because of tourist traffic.
The process that led to the appointment was “biased, unconstitutional and rigged,” Peter C. Sheridan, an attorney for Milstein and Bank, said in a statement to The Associated Press.
Sheridan said Park and his staff were unresponsive to homeowners’ efforts to find a solution and ignored opposition from civic and homeowner groups.
The attorney also said the city had “granted dozens of permits to more than 14 different previous owners to change the house through numerous renovations, resulting in nothing remaining to reflect the brief time Ms. Monroe was there 60 years ago.”
In Palm Springs, the “Forever Marilyn” statue depicts Monroe in the famous billowing dress scene from “The Seven Year Itch.” She has traveled throughout the United States and elsewhere, including a previous stint in Palm Springs, and now she is back. A hospitality industry group that owns the statue wants it to remain permanently, but some residents oppose it.
A technical decision on the location by the planning commission Wednesday marked a step toward preserving the statue, The Desert Sun reported. The matter remains before the Palm Springs City Council in the future.
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