Marilyn Monroe

Marilyn Monroe is known for her many of her features but few realize that she had an extremely thin back. In fact, her spine bones would stick out like a row of bony beads when she bent forward even a little bit.

Here, she sits at the edge of a pool and barely even bending forward or slouching at all, you can count the bumps on her lower vertebrae already peeking out. This, of course, was never shown on screen or in pictures back then.

She was often told to hold unnatural and sometimes painfully arched backward poses whenever her back would be visible.

She had to hold those positions till it hurt because, you know, no one would ever find seeing her bony spine bumps sticking out sexy!

Everybody who appreciates a visible spine knows that this deep of a line in the middle of her arched back usually means her bones would start to show if she relaxed her posture.

Some people remarked around the time that she looked too thin by the '60s while others pointed out that her weight had just gotten back to being closer to earlier in the '50s. Nobody can deny she was gorgeous.

Fortunately, at least one behind the scenes picture from Something's Got To Give was taken where you could see some of her spine in her lower back.

There's also a still from The Misfits where her spine is sticking out very clearly. This, of course, was also an outtake, since we can count each of the vertebrae in her naturally thin lower back.

 

It's a beautiful trait on bodies of all shapes and sizes and it's time we appreciate it. For some of us, it's not exactly a choice.