ERNEST W. CUNNINGHAM

What you need to know about me


by Ernest W. Cunningham



I was born (June 1, 1938) in a Southern mill village ruled over by the J. P. Stevens Company. There was a company store, a school, a small town with two movie theaters and enough churches for every sinner in the county.

My four sisters and I were given movie names at birth: Shirley ( Temple), Margaret (O’Brien), (John) Wayne, Linda (Darnell), and Mildred (Pierce). My mother took me to the movies until I was old enough to remember the way home. I loved serials, and was in awe of “Nyoka the Jungle Girl.”

I went off  to college in Kentucky , and then to New York , which is movie-theater heaven. I wrote ads for Diener-Hauser-Bates, the world’s first and only agency for movie advertising (it’s now part of an agency that handles hardware accounts). I wrote “Hell, Upside Down” for The Poseidon Adventure ; “Where your nightmares end, Willard begins” for Willard; “Where do you go when the record’s over?” for Saturday Night Fever. Many more.

A small group from the agency tried to produce a movie—we had such great contacts—but couldn’t make it work. I moved to Los Angeles , to work for CBS and NBC. I collected movie memorabilia, specializing in Marilyn Monroe, because that’s where the collector interest was. Out of the blue, a publisher asked me to recommend someone to do a book on Marilyn. I was giving it serious thought until God slapped me in the back of the head, and I said “Aha!”

The Ultimate Marilyn sold very well—thanks to all you nice people. That led to The Ultimate Bogart  and then The Ultimate Barbra.