Home on the Range: Reshaping Narratives of Domesticity in Marilyn Monroe’s Westerns

Although Marilyn Monroe is not best remembered for her performances in westerns, she starred in three: River of No Return (Otto Preminger, 1954), Bus Stop (Joshua Logan, 1956), and The Misfits (John Huston, 1961). Monroe’s western films contributed to mid-century domestic ideology for both men and women, firstly by featuring an independent, career-oriented woman as a prominent western co-star who ends her films no longer working in saloons and nightclubs but safely ensconced in the home, and secondly by advancing the western project of domesticating not the landscape but the male hero. Monroe’s star persona, as a sexy but not manipulative woman, when shifted into western films, shepherds the hypermasculine cowboys through a process of becoming more vulnerable, willing to choose domestic life, and more suited to a mid-century lifestyle. At the same time, for women, Monroe embodied the independent woman who would only be lured away from her career dreams by a companionate partnership of equals. During a time when both men and women had to adjust to shifting gender roles, western films starring Marilyn Monroe made those changes attractive. This article discusses how Monroe’s western films reflect mid-century gender ideology.