There are many publications on the Internet that one of the most famous blondes in history, despite the prevailing image, had the intellect of a genius. We have verified the validity of such claims.

In a variety of sources you can find reports that the famous actress refuted the stereotype about narrow-minded blondes, because her IQ was equal to 168. Although there are different IQ tests, in the vast majority of them this result indicates at least "exceptional talent", at most - oh "genius". Monroe's indicators are often compared with the IQ of Albert Einstein - for example, the portal did this "Culturology.ru" and presenter of "Public Television of Russia" in plot to the 95th anniversary of the actress. Monroe's intelligence is less often mentioned against the background of the IQ of President John F. Kennedy (he was also allegedly lower) - such comparisons were made, in particular, in the program "Neglyant" on "Echo of Moscow". The fact of the incredible test result did not go unnoticed by anyone. biographies Monroe, nor social networks - users mention him Facebook, "VKontakte", Twitter, "Yandex.Zena" and other platforms.

Apparently, this “interesting fact” only became really popular a few years ago. In 2013, BuzzFeed published selection "18 Facts You May Not Know About Marilyn Monroe." In particular, the author of the material stated: “Although she was the typical actress for the role of a dumb blonde, in fact she was incredibly smart. She had an IQ of 168."

Although the authoritative fact-checking project Snopes calls While a BuzzFeed post was the earliest mention of the actress's incredible IQ, there are older reports as well. For example, in 2009 in one English-language blog appeared this message: "According to a rumor on IMDb, 'with a score of 168, Marilyn's IQ is noticeably higher than John F. Kennedy's 129.'" This site, the world's largest movie database, verifies this fact appeared at the end of 2008, but now on the page about Monroe absent. Perhaps the user who added this fact had previously read article 2005 about actress Jayne Mansfield - both Monroe and an IQ test result of 168 points are mentioned there, but the latter is said specifically about Mansfield, and not about her more famous colleague.

We were unable to find any evidence that Marilyn Monroe took an IQ test, the result of which was announced publicly. Although the first such studies among children began conduct even before birth future star, in 1926, testing for quite a long time weren't massive - they studied mainly students and military personnel. Fact checkers from Snopes contacted with Scott Fortner, an expert on Marilyn Monroe's biography, and he called reports of a 168 score on the test "baseless." Nevertheless, Fortner emphasized the actress’s desire for self-development and her strong passion for literature, so her image in films often did not really correspond to the personality of Monroe herself.

We thank our reader Mikhail Yutsis for his help in preparing the publication.