GEORGE BARRIS (1922–2016)

George Barris, a Hollywood photojournalist known for his portraits of Charlie Chaplin, Clark Gable, and Frank Sinatra, but famous for his pictures of Marilyn Monroe—the last professional shots ever taken of the actress, just weeks before her death on August 5, 1962—has died, writes Anita Gates of the New York Times.

Barris served as an army photographer during World War II. Later, he worked for many publications, such as the newspaper supplement Parade, Cosmopolitan magazine, and the pulpy Real Detective magazine. He was also the set photographer for Twentieth Century Fox’s infamous Cleopatra (1963), starring Elizabeth Taylor and Richard Burton. It was, however, his pictures of Marilyn Monroe that brought him lasting attention. Barris and Monroe had been friends for nearly ten years, meeting in 1954 in New York on the set of the film The Seven Year Itch (1955). For Gloria Steinem’s 1986 book on the actress, simply titled Marilyn, illustrated with Barris’s iconic shots of Monroe, New York Times literary critic Diana Trilling wrote, “Mr. Barris was obviously a sympathetic coadjutant. Through June and July, Marilyn talked and posed—and drank Champagne. Mr. Barris took many soft, gentle pictures of her, in bathing suit, towels, beach robe, sweater.”

Barris’s book on Monroe, Marilyn: Her Life in Her Own Words: Marilyn Monroe’s Revealing Last Words and Photographs, was published in 1995. His photos of Monroe were also featured in “An Intimate Look at the Legend,” a 2012 exhibition about the actress at the Hollywood Museum.