Tuesday 2 August 2022 03:48 AM Marilyn Monroe's estate stands behind casting of Ana de Armas in Blonde ... ... trends now

Marilyn Monroe's estate says it supports the casting of Ana de Armas as the Hollywood icon in the forthcoming Netflix film Blonde.

After a sneak peek of the film was released last week, a number of fans took to social media to criticize the casting, saying that de Armas' accent was not authentic to how Monroe's voice sounded.

Authentic Brands Group is the owner of the Monroe estate; while the group has not authorized the film, the organization's president of entertainment, Marc Rosen, told Variety Monday that 'it looks like Ana was a great casting choice as she captures Marilyn’s glamour, humanity and vulnerability.

'We can’t wait to see the film in its entirety,' Rosen said.

He called Monroe 'a singular Hollywood and pop culture icon that transcends generations and history,' adding that 'any actor that steps into that role knows they have big shoes to fill.'

De Armas, speaking with The Times of London last year, said that it took her 'nine months of dialect coaching, and practicing and some ADR sessions' to perfect Monroe's accent for the movie, which is based on Joyce Carol Oates' novel.

'It was a big torture, so exhausting,' de Armas said of the preparation for the part, adding that her 'brain was fried.'

In 2020, de Armas spoke to Vanity Fair about making the movie for director Andrew Dominik.

'I only had to audition for Marilyn once and Andrew said "It’s you," but I had to audition for everyone else,' de Armas said. 'The producers. The money people. I always have people I needed to convince. But I knew I could do it.'

She continued: 'Playing Marilyn was groundbreaking. A Cuban playing Marilyn Monroe. I wanted it so badly. You see that famous photo of her and she is smiling in the moment, but that’s just a slice of what she was really going through at the time.'

After Netflix "dropped the new trailer for Andrew Dominik's Blonde last Thursday, many took to Twitter to criticize the NC-17 Marilyn Monroe movie for being based on fiction as well as de Armas' Cuban accent.

The 34-year-old Golden Globe nominee - who learned English in 2015 - spent a 'whole year' attempting to perfect the legendary blonde bombshell's Hollywood accent with dialect coach Jessica Drake.

But the backlash has already begun with Twitter users blasting Ana's accent as 'awful' with some saying she 'looks nothing like Marilyn Monroe.'