LEE - The Movie
Because celluloid heroes never feel any pain
And celluloid heroes never really die.
-- Ray Davies --
The movie LEE was released in the United Kingdom on September 27th, 2024. It is based on Antony Penrose’s 1985 book, The Lives of Lee Miller, (Lives) and it seems an appropriate ending to this forum to review the movie for accuracy of both its representations of the Penrose book and historical facts pertinent to Lee Miller.
Following the release of LEE, the pre-eminent Man Ray scholar, Steven Manford, made the following observation:
“Don’t believe everything you see in the movies. This is not a documentary. What we have here is the intersection of mythology and commerce” (1).
Manford’s observation is not only accurate as to LEE, but arguably to the entirety of the saga of Lee Miller from its inception in 1985. This has been a central theme of this forum which has essentially posited that Lives has set forth a storyline containing false footprints which have been followed without question for almost 40 years by museum curators, authors, documentary film makers, PhD candidates, commercial art galleries and now, Hollywood.
The mythology that has been created around Lee Miller’s life and work is of paramount interest to the forum, but the commercial implications should not be ignored to the extent that they have contributed to a mythology which, at this point, may well be FUBAR (an acronym appropriated from WWII which means F***** Up Beyond All Recognition). Nonetheless, an attempt will be made here to separate fact from fiction. This is not meant to be a movie review in the traditional sense. There will be no attempt to deal with the quality of the script, acting, production, or even the issue of artistic license. The goal is, as always, to remove the useless and distracting gild from the lily.
The problems that arise from and between Lives and LEE are not always a question of whether a particular fact is true or not. The film’s factual errors are relatively easy to identify.
By way of example:
LEE ignores Penrose’s claim that he never knew his mother’s past before her death, but in doing so, the film leaves a disconnect between the deep animosity between the pair and then Antony’s sudden devotion to her memory after her death. Kate Winslet, as Lee, attempts to remedy the storyline when she pulls out photos of baby Antony and a book that she read to him as a child in an effort to show that she did care, but this is taken out of thin air and is without factual basis. Oddly, the film’s epilogue references Antony’s attic discovery of Lee Miller’s work after her death even though the film is premised by Antony learning about his mother’s life through an interview with her before her death.
LEE depicts Lee Miller as revealing to Audrey Withers that she had been sexually assaulted as a child. There is no evidence that this revelation occurred and Antony Penrose steadfastly maintains that such an event was never reported by Lee to anyone. (For further discussion see What About Theodore? ).
Lee was sent to St. Malo to cover post-battle Civil Affairs activity but she was not involved in battle while snapping photographs or blown off her feet under fire as depicted by the movie. By the time that Lee arrived in St. Malo, the Germans were hunkered in a bunker several stories below ground with the exception of German troops three-plus miles offshore and a relatively few SS troops isolated at the entrance to St. Malo. The actual St. Malo photos taken by Lee do not reflect battle scenes, only distant bombing. (For further discussion see Lee Miller War Correspondent- Part I ).
In one scene in the movie, Lee is depicted as pulling a knife on a U.S. soldier in an alley as he assaults a French girl. This is an absolute misrepresentation that has no basis in fact.
Hitler’s apartment was not an Officer’s Club that she bribed her way into to take her famous bath in his tub as portrayed in LEE. It was a building occupied as a command and communication center by the U.S. Third Army 45th Division. Lee and David Scherman deliberately sought out the building and were invited to house themselves there by the U.S. Commander. As correspondents, Lee and Scherman held the rank of Captain and would have been allowed in even if it was an Officer’s Club. Contrary to the film’s depiction, the idea for Lee to obtain U.S. Correspondent credentials was initiated by Scherman, not Lee. (For further discussion see Lee Miller War Correspondent- Part II)
Solange d’Ayen (portrayed by Marion Cotillard in LEE) was a minor figure in Lee’s story and she was not at the Mougins picnic, nor did Roland Penrose meet Lee at the picnic. In fact, he met Lee in Paris some weeks earlier when Julien Levy escorted her to a Surrealist costume party where she was reacquainted with Max Ernst who then facilitated her meeting with Roland. Thereafter, Lee and Roland spent weeks in Cornwall, England at the so-called “Surrealists Holiday” and then Mougins in the south of France. The Mougins picnic scene is based upon a well-known photograph taken by Lee, but what is lesser known is that Roland took an identical photo. Although the Mougins conversation in LEE is all about Hitler and Germany, the conversation in reality is unknown. What is known is that in 1937, participants at the picnic were far more likely concerned about Franco and the Spanish Civil War. In fact, Picasso had just recently finished his painting, Guernica and Roland had yet to tour with it in England to raise money for the Spanish Republican cause. (For further discussion see There is No There, There).
Lee and David Scherman’s encounter with the death trains of Dachau were not in any way distinguishable from the multitude of other correspondents that arrived at Dachau as portrayed by the movie. This is not to diminish the horror of Dachau but to point out that Lee and Scherman were simply two of many correspondents, photographers, cameramen, civilians and miliary personnel. (For further discussion see Lee Miller War Correspondent - Part II). The camp had been liberated the day before Lee’s arrival and covered by other reporters including Marguerite Higgins. Lee and Scherman deliberately set out for Dachau from Nuremberg as did many reporters, including Hollywood and U.S. Army Signal Corps film crews who were strongly encouraged by Eisenhower and the U.S. Government to document the atrocities.
There is no evidence of Scherman’s breakdown and of an emotional embrace between Lee and Scherman after Dachau and subsequent to the Hitler bathtub photo as portrayed in the movie. Although this staged photographic session reveals a somber post-Dachau portrayal, the upbeat spirit of Lee and Scherman is reflected in other photos on the same contact sheet. There is a photo of Scherman in the same bathtub moments after Lee, with the same staging but comically grinning and doing a rub-a-dub with shampoo covering his head. Likewise, there is another photograph of an American G.I. in a bed happily reading Mein Kampf while holding Hitler’s telephone. It is doubtful that Lee and Scherman were the first Americans to use Hitler's bathtub. According to Scherman there was even an American Lieutenant banging on the door to use the bathtub during the photographic session. Looking at the evidence, their spirit appeared to be light at the time of the bathtub photographic session, which is not to say that Dachau did not leave them shocked and angry.
LEE ignores the fact that Lee’s primary purpose in being assigned to Paris was to cover lifestyle and fashion. She worked for Vogue, and this should surprise no one. Even her Vogue articles, for the most part, were lifestyle features covering Paris in the snow, hair salons being powered by bicycles, an interview with Colette (author of Gigi), and many other fashion photographs of Paris.
There are many other significant misrepresentations in the movie. The point is that, in addition to the false footprints laid down by Lives, there is now a major film, not only repeating falsehoods but adding more. There is ample reason that the acronym FUBAR is an entirely appropriate description of the state of the mythology surrounding Lee’s life.
Although LEE serves as an appropriate bookend to the Guardian article, which was randomly selected to undertake the analysis of the false footprints, the movie is somewhat of an anomaly because of its focus on Lee’s WWII period. As such, LEE manages to ignore many of the false “footprints” challenged by this forum, but at the cost of facts that are true and an essential part of Lee’s story. Consequently, in addition to including made up “facts” the movie suffers from its failure to include actual truths.
It is unimaginable to contemplate how the producers of LEE intended to convey a portrait of Lee without reference to her WWII coverage of the Colmar Pocket, prior relationship with Man Ray, her starring role in Jean Cocteau’s 1932 Le Sang d’un poète (Blood of a Poet), her involvement with Julien Levy and then exhibition at the Levy Gallery, her marriage and life with Aziz Eloui Bey in Egypt, her photographic apprenticeship with George Hoyningen-Huene at Vogue Paris and other significant points in Lee’s life that she occasionally referenced in her Vogue WWII articles. Incredibly, the Vogue WWII articles were themselves essentially ignored. This absence is particularly ironic because it could be convincingly argued that Lee’s writing represents better evidence of her unmet potential than her photographs.
It may be that the movie was aiming for an American audience and wanted to distance itself from pre-war European events and persons, but it seems extraordinary that Picasso would also be excluded from mention in the movie. In particular, Lee’s meeting with him subsequent to the liberation of Paris, which resulted in an iconic photograph of Lee with Picasso. No mention is even made of Picasso’s portrait of Lee at Mougins, although the Mougins visit is portrayed in LEE.
As previously mentioned, and in addition to factual errors, there are important thematic implications made or conclusions drawn in the book Lives and/or the movie LEE that are also questionable, but more subtle. By way of example, did Lee suffer from alcohol addiction and depression because of undiagnosed PTSD from her war coverage? Was she a victim of discrimination as a woman and her work prejudiced or dismissed as a result of her sex? Did Antony’s discovery in the attic really reveal anything new and significant? Allegations of this sort are more discreet than factual assertions and require a broader inspection. As such, a somewhat random examination of the foregoing examples will be made beyond the four corners of the book and the movie to provide a glimpse at some of the golden threads that have been overlaid and woven into the mythology.
Treasure or Fools Gold?
In addition to ignoring major aspects of Lee’s life, LEE also deviated from the book Lives significantly. An important cornerstone of the mythology is Penrose’s account of how he discovered a treasure trove of his mother’s work in the attic at Farleys House after her death and that it was a revelation to him of a mother he never knew. LEE completely discards this claim of Penrose in its storyline and opts instead for framing the story as Lee being interviewed by Antony with her memories unfolding in response to his inquiries. The story of “lost treasure found” thus has no place in LEE, but ironically it happens to be, at the same time, a part of the mythology that is challengeable. On this point, the book says one thing and the movie another. Both defy fact and/or common sense.
The “lost treasure found” story of Lives resembles the Condé Nast saving Lee as the damsel in distress story in the sense that it calls to mind the artifices used by a 1930’s Hollywood agent to promote a young ingénue or actress with a discovery that has some ‘pop’ but again, no basis in fact. (For further discussion see The New York Cover Girl).
In essence, the story is that Antony Penrose and his late wife discovered 60,000 (the number varies) photographs, negatives, Vogue articles and other memorabilia in the Farleys House attic after Lee’s death. Lee had confirmed during her lifetime the existence of her work being stored in the Farleys House attic, but the question arises what was the big reveal to Antony and the world? (2). On the public side there was nothing new regarding Lee’s professional, commercial or artistic accomplishments in the “attic discovery”. In fact, at each of the stages of Lee’s life, her work had an extraordinary amount of public exposure. This puts into question the mythological overlay that Lee struggled and was victimized, as a woman striving for success and recognition.
Lee’s public exposure comprises of when she was a commercial model in New York, a photographer’s apprentice in Paris, and when her modelling work was published in Vogue U.S., U.K. and France. Her early Paris photos were also exhibited at the prestigious Julien Levy Gallery in New York City, and Blood of the Poet was distributed and seen in Europe and the United States. Furthermore, her Egyptian, Romanian, Libyan and Sinai photographs were exhibited at the Zwemmer Gallery in 1940 and her photograph Portrait of Space was published in Roland Penrose’s London Bulletin. In addition, the Lee Miller Studio photos reached audiences in fashion magazines and through Broadway marketing and of course, her WWII photographs and articles were published by both U.S. and U.K. Vogue.
Simply put, the “attic” contained nothing that the world had not previously seen. In addition to the full exposure that Lee’s efforts enjoyed, it was generally accomplished though the support of a lover, be it Man Ray, Julien Levy, Roland Penrose or David Scherman. It is difficult to understand the contention that Lee’s gender was somehow a hinderance. The notion that Lee was a feminist icon that fought and overcame discrimination, is without merit.
As a brief, but relevant aside, the restrictions placed by the U.S. Army on women reporters did apply in the weeks following D-Day but by the waning days of the war, when the majority of Lee’s war coverage occurred, the restriction had dissappated. During the last few weeks of the war, Lee and most of the Allied correspondents entered a defeated Germany going along the Rhine River south before the Russians took Berlin and reported on German cities that had fallen and on the concentration camps they encountered. (For further discussion see Lee Miller War Correspondent - Parts I and II ). The restrictions simply lost importance with the recognition that Germany was defeated. The proximity of Lee’s reporting to the surrender of Germany explains why much of Lee’s WWII reporting was published after Germany had already surrendered and all eyes were on Japan. In the movie there is a scene with Lee and Scherman randomly driving a Jeep through the countryside and a voiceover saying that they “traveled for 5 months”. In reality, this gap was because Lee’s reporting prior to the crossing of the Rhine was more often than not from the Hotel Scribe in Paris and not out in the field.
In the second footnote of Chapter 3 in Lives, Antony Penrose references a conversation with Lee’s brother, Erik Miller, in July 1974 concerning their time working together at the Lee Miller Studios in New York City between 1932 and 1934. The interview occurred three years before Lee’s death and puts into question the assertion that Penrose was unfamiliar with or had only casual knowledge of his mother’s work. Prior to Lee’s death, Mario Amaya had proposed and Lee had agreed to cooperate in the preparation of her biography. Although the biography never came to fruition, a question arises as to whether the conversation with Erik occurred in the course of Penrose assisting Lee with the biography. In other words, did Penrose suddenly take an interest in Lee’s work and that is why he conducted an interview with her brother Erik? In any event, Erik’s detailed description of his work with Lee at the Lee Miller Studios is extensively quoted in 1985’s Lives.
It is perhaps an interesting sidebar to note that the 1974 exhibition featured a replication of the White Ball (Bal Blanc) that Lee and Man Ray orginally attended in 1930. Man Ray writes about this event many years later in his autobiography and offers the following memory:
“In keeping with the theme of the ball, I was dressed in white as a tennis player, bringing as assistant a pupil who studied photography with me at the time—Lee Miller. She too was dressed as a tennis player in very smart shorts and blouse especially designed by one of the well-known couturiers. A slim figure with blond hair and lovely legs, she was continually being taken away to dance, leaving me to concentrate alone on my photography. I was pleased with her success, but annoyed at the same time, not because of the added work, but out of jealousy; I was in love with her” (3).
In 1974, at the age of sixty-seven Lee employed her culinary skills to cook for the attendees of the replication of Bal Blanc. A replication of a Ball where she had been the Belle some 33 years earlier. Man Ray’s words convey an unexpected pathos and poetic commentary on the brevity of youth and beauty.
The notion that Antony Penrose was unfamiliar with his mother’s acquaintances within the art community and Vogue before her death also defies blind acceptance. Throughout the 40’s and 50’s, Max Ernst, Man Ray, Edward Steichen, Audrey Withers, Picasso and many others made regular appearances at Farleys House and Antony in turn, made trips with his parents to Paris and the south of France to see his parent’s friends. Picasso’s portrait of Lee even hung in Farleys House along with some of her own photographs.
The complete details of his mother’s life may have been vague to Penrose prior to her death, but the idea that she was tabula rasa is unlikely. However, it is a necessary overlay of the myth to explain how the disdain between mother and son flipped with a discovery that turned into a lifetime of devotion to her memory. The depth of this conflict between mother and son was a dynamic not caputured by the movie LEE . For example, Lee was known to comment that she would have committed suicide but for the pleasure it would give Roland and Antony. According to Diane Deriaz, Roland Penrose’s longtime lover, the divide between Antony and his mother affected Roland deeply and she specifically mentioned pain caused to Roland when Antony wrote to his father to let him know how he felt about his mother Lee.
“…Roland, très perturbé lui-même par une letter de son fils Tony (<<Dad, I hate your wife >> - Papa, je hais votre femme, lui avait-il écrit à propos de Lee)”.
[“…Roland, himself very disturbed by a letter from his son Tony (<<Dad, I hate your wife>>- he had told him- he writes about Lee)](4).
Diane Deriaz has a voice that is rarely heard from the chroniclers of Lee Miller and during the few times that Diane is mentioned, her role is underplayed. Diane wrote a book about her life in 1988 in which she devoted significant commentary about her relationship with the Penrose household. The book is in French and possibly this is the reason that it has escaped more attention but it is one of the more important resources available for researchers of Lee Miller. Diane’s impact on Lee’s life constitutes another form of trauma that Lee suffered.
Diane met Roland in 1953 at the entry of the Institute of Contemporary Arts (ICA) in London. Deriaz had been an acrobat and her beauty rivaled Lee’s in her youth. Diane was almost twenty years younger than Lee and twenty-six years junior to Roland. After retiring from acrobatics due to an injury, she was introduced to and became friendly with many people of the same group as Lee and Roland. She was acquainted with and portrayed by Man Ray, close to Paul Eluard and also friends with Picasso and Françoise Gilot, who painted her more than once. Diane frequently attended gatherings with Lee and Roland when they visited France. According to Diane and others, Lee hated her because she had stolen Roland’s heart at a time when Lee’s looks were gone and after her sexual desires had evaporated.
“Mais, au lieu de se lasser et de m’oublier, il m’écrivait constamment. Aux escales, je trouvais des lettres où il me disait qu’il rêvait de moi, que j’étais au-dessus de toutes les femmes, m’appelait « Madiane » .... Par Valentine, j’apprenais ce qui se passait dans la maisonnée Penrose, les fureurs de Lee contre moi. J’ai fini par dire à Roland : « Tu puex dire à Lee que jamais je ne t’épouserai et que nous ne serons jamais qu’amis. » Je tins parole, totalement, au grand regret de Penrose”.
[“But, instead of getting tired and forgetting me, he wrote to me constantly. At the stopovers, I found letters in which he told me that he dreamed of me, that I was above all women, called me « Madiane »….Through Valentine, I learned what was going on in the Penrose house, Lee’s fury against me. I ended up saying to Roland : « You can tell Lee that I'll never marry you and that we'll never be anything but friends. » I totally kept my word, much to Penrose's regret”] (5).
Diane describes Lee as a woman who self-destructed through alcohol abuse. She describes Lee as being so deteriorated that even Jean Cocteau, producer of Blood of the Poet, did not recognize her at a luncheon in France. This description reflects Lee’s progressive alcohol dependance throughout her adult life which is recounted time after time in both the Antony Penrose and Carolyn Burke biographies of Lee.
Although Diane’s book treats Roland with obvious fondness, she also describes him as a victim of severe alcoholism who would drink “tons of whiskey”. Nonetheless, it is clear that Diane and Roland loved each other and that Roland wanted to divorce Lee and marry Diane. Diane refused because of Roland’s family obligations, but he persisted apparently unconcerned with Antony being raised by a nanny and Lee moving back to New York. Roland made no pretense of his feelings for Diane (6). Her words regarding Antony Penrose, however, carry even stronger elements of animosity, mistrust and even warning.
According to Diane, she was staying at Roland’s artist’s studio at Farleys House during Roland’s final days in 1984. On the day of Roland’s death, Antony appeared at her door and said simply “It’s over”. Antony and his wife thereupon took Diane to the Penrose London apartment where they met an unidentified partner of an art dealer and friend of Antony. They immediately removed all canvasses from the walls, books and everything of value from the premises. Even before Roland’s funeral, Diane describes the apartment as empty and mutilated and states that, “Le fils mettait l’héritage à l’abri de toute considération sentimentale.” ['“the son shielded his inheritance from any sentimental consideration”]. Diane then notes that she threw her clothes in a suitcase and returned to France with her home dissolving upon Roland’s death (7).
“Depuis Paris, j’ai appelé Elsa, la domestique. Elle m’a dit : « Je suis tellement choquée ». Elle m’a appris qu’après mon départ, Tony avait pris les deux photos de Man Ray me représentant, que Roland gardait en permanence sur son bureau, et une assiette, que j’avais fait réaliser pour son quatre-vingtième anniversaire avec ces trois mots : « Paul, Diane, Roland », et lui avait tendu le tout, en disant : « Dad a laissé ça pour vous. » J’avais souvent dit à Roland : « N’oublie pas Elsa, n’oublie pas Patsy (la nurse), n’oublie pas Freddy (le jardinier). » Qu’ont-ils eu? Je ne sais pas. Je ne suis pas allée aux obsèques. J’étais trop secouée et écoeurée. Roland a été incinéré comme il l’avait demandé, en présence de quelques amis. Peu après, l’I.C.A. a organisé une soirée hommage. Tony, plus tard, me rendit deux œuvres qui m’appartenaient, un dessin de Man Ray et un petit peinture de Miró que celui-ci nous avait donnée à Palma. Sur la fin et l’après-fin de Penrose, il y aura un deuxième livre à écrire, que je ferai si Dieu me prête vie.”
[“From Paris I called Elsa, the maid. She said : « I am so shocked ». She told me that after I left, Tony had taken the two photos of Man Ray representing me, which Roland always kept on his desk, and a plate, which I had had made for his eightieth birthday, with those three words: « Paul, Diane, Roland » and handed it all to her, saying « Dad left that for you ». I had often said to Roland, « Don’t forget Elsa, don’t forget Patsy (the nanny), don’t forget Freddy (the gardener).» What did they get? I don’t know. I did not go to the funeral. I was too shaken and sickened. Roland was cremated as he requested, in the presence of some friends. Soon after, the I.C.A. organized a tribute evening. Tony later gave me back two works that belonged to me, a drawing by Man Ray and a small painting by Miro that he had given us in Palma. In the end and after the end of Penrose, there will be a second book to be written, which I will do if God grants me life”](8) (Emphasis added).
Unfortunately, the time was not granted and the second book was never written. It is worth noting that Lives was published in 1985, La Tête à l'envers: Souvenirs d'une trapéziste chez les poètes in 1988 and Diane died in 2013. Penrose has never publicly offered anything other than respect and praise for Diane and the role she played in Roland’s life both before and after Lee’s death.
The bottom line is that while Lee undoubtedly suffered from depression, alcoholism, sexual addiction and other afflictions that affected her life as a daughter, sister, lover, mother, wife and artist, it is impossible to attribute a causation. It may have been Roland’s lengthy affair with Diane, childhood sexual abuse, WWII, or any number of other things including that she was simply a spoiled, self-absorbed “mean girl” or as Roland Penrose concluded in his autobiography, Scrapbook, simply a hedonist. Furthermore, the principal biographers of Lee, Antony Penrose and Carolyn Burke, provide descriptions of Lee’s extended bouts of depression and periods of hyperactivity. Without falling into the trap of a layperson making an undiagnosed conclusion, the possibility of manic depression/bipolar disorder certainly checks many of the boxes. The fact is, that nobody knows, and nobody ever will know, what brought on Lee’s “demons” but explanations based upon speculation, predictably yields FUBAR. It is perhaps best to acknowledge the problems that Lee evidenced and how they impacted her life without seeking a particular undiagnosed causation.
In summary, the movie LEE contributes nothing to the understanding of Lee Miller. The movie was not only underwhelming, but also confusing. It chose to focus on parts of Lee’s life that didn’t make sense or were completely made up. There is no doubt that Lee Miller led a fascinating but troubled life and it is in her honor that this forum attempts to strip the gild from the lily. In Hollywood’s attempt to further monetize Lee’s life, it is a shame they left out so many true and interesting aspects of her life and chose to instead inject further falsehoods. Many more people now know about Lee Miller, or at least the Hollywood version, due to LEE, so in some sense, the movie was a success.
Footnotes:
(1) Manford, Steven “Don’t believe everything you see in the movies. This is not a documentary. What we have here is the intersection of mythology and commerce. #manray #manraystamp #manraytrust #manrayphotographs #manrayphoto #stevenmanford #ruecampagnepremiere #heonlyknowsstamps @manfordmanray #manfordmanray #lee #leemiller” Instagram, 25 September 2024. https://www.instagram.com/p/DAVzyXGuVIp/
(2) Burke, Carolyn (2005). Lee Miller: A Life. Knopf, New York (pages 193, 364)
(3) Ray, Man (1963) Self- Portrait Little, Brown & Company, Boston (page 170)
(4) Deriaz, Diane (1988) La Tête à l'envers: Souvenirs d'une trapéziste chez les poètes Albin Michel, Paris (page 248) * Google translate was used and may be subject to error*
(5) Deriaz, Diane (1988) La Tête à l'envers: Souvenirs d'une trapéziste chez les poètes Albin Michel, Paris (pages 239-240) * Google translate was used and may be subject to error*
(6) Deriaz, Diane (1988) La Tête à l'envers: Souvenirs d'une trapéziste chez les poètes Albin Michel, Paris (page 240) * Google translate was used and may be subject to error*
(7) Deriaz, Diane (1988) La Tête à l'envers: Souvenirs d'une trapéziste chez les poètes Albin Michel, Paris (page 261) * Google translate was used and may be subject to error*
(8) Deriaz, Diane (1988) La Tête à l'envers: Souvenirs d'une trapéziste chez les poètes Albin Michel, Paris (page 261) * Google translate was used and may be subject to error*