Overview
- First publicity images and feature reporting, published on July 27, showed Dakota Johnson as a younger Monroe and 93-year-old Ellen Burstyn as an imagined older version of the star.
- Maggie Gyllenhaal wrote and directed Flesh Impact as a 17-minute ‘love letter’ that she finished writing over a weekend and describes as a mixture of Marilyn and her own fantasy of the actress.
- The short is centered on an audition in a New York blackbox theater where Burstyn’s character performs for two audience members played by Peter Sarsgaard and Sepideh Moafi.
- Venice Film Festival accepted the film into its lineup and will honor Burstyn with a Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement, a notable endorsement given that the festival seldom programs shorts.
- Genesis Motor America commissioned the project to mark Monroe’s 100th birthday, and the film’s festival placement and high-profile cast are likely to shape public conversation about corporate-funded centennial tributes and reappraisals of Monroe’s legacy.