--- title: Sheree North: The Woman Who Would Be Marilyn description: Photos of a young actress who, at the start of her movie career, was reportedly "kept on ice merely as a decoy to scare Marilyn Monroe." canonical: https://time.com/3879945/life-with-sheree-north-the-woman-who-would-be-marilyn/ author: Ben Cosgrove article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-05-24T18:42:40.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:03:41.858Z og:title: Sheree North: The Woman Who Would Be Marilyn og:description: Photos of a young actress who, at the start of her movie career, was reportedly "kept on ice merely as a decoy to scare Marilyn Monroe." og:url: https://time.com/3879945/life-with-sheree-north-the-woman-who-would-be-marilyn/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt951edf70b7e729b9/69884bc9428a9edd25cccd3c/140508-sheree-north-02.jpg?branch=production&width=805&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 805 og:image:height: 453 og:image:alt: Sheree North 1955 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: Sheree North: The Woman Who Would Be Marilyn twitter:description: Photos of a young actress who, at the start of her movie career, was reportedly "kept on ice merely as a decoy to scare Marilyn Monroe." twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt951edf70b7e729b9/69884bc9428a9edd25cccd3c/140508-sheree-north-02.jpg?branch=production&width=805&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # LIFE With Sheree North: The Woman Who Would Be Marilyn > Sponsored content. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. by [Ben Cosgrove](https://time.com/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove May 24, 2014 6:42 PM UTC  Not published in LIFE. Actress Sheree North in 1955. Not published in LIFE. Actress Sheree North in 1955. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images by [Ben Cosgrove](https://time.com/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove May 24, 2014 6:42 PM UTC “Sheree Goes in for Marilyn,” read the title of an article in the March 21, 1955, issue of LIFE magazine — reinforcing the message splashed across the cover of the issue itself: “Sheree North Takes Over From [Marilyn Monroe](http://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000054/).” (See the cover below.) Monroe, it seemed, was irritating her bosses at 20th Century-Fox by turning down scripts for what she evidently considered weak roles, and North was by all accounts being groomed to try and fill her ultimately unfillable shoes. Meanwhile, the “champagne-haired, bop-tongued movie hopeful,” as LIFE described the 22-year-old North, seemed well aware that “replacing” Monroe wasn’t really in the cards. “Let’s not kid,” LIFE quoted her as saying, “Marilyn’s an institution like Coca-Cola and who’s gonna replace that?” Born Dawn Shirley Crang in Los Angeles in 1932, North had already appeared with varying degrees of success in movies ([_Living It Up_](http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0047184/) with Martin and Lewis, for example), on Broadway and on TV by the time 1955 rolled around. Her energy — a frenetic dance number in a Broadway musical reportedly got her noticed by Hollywood in the first place — and her vaguely Monroesque good looks probably seemed like a godsend to studio producers and suits tired of dealing with Marilyn’s sometimes erratic behavior in the mid-1950s. That Monroe’s marriage to baseball superstar Joe DiMaggio was in trouble probably contributed to what so many saw as her instability. North never became the star that 20th Century-Fox hoped for — for almost a decade. from the late ’50s through the mid-’60s she had no film work — but she nevertheless ended up enjoying a longer and fuller career than most actors and actresses can dream of. Her television credits, for example, range from appearances in classic shows like _The Untouchables_ and _Gunsmoke_ in the early 1960s to _Mannix_, _Kojak_, _Hawaii Five-O_ and _King Fu_ and, well into the ’80s, _Magnum, P.I._ and _The Golden Girls_. In the 1990s she even starred in a couple of episodes of [_Seinfeld_](http://topics.time.com/jerry-seinfeld/) — as Kramer’s mom, [Babs](http://seinfeld.wikia.com/wiki/Babs%5FKramer). (It was Babs who revealed that Kramer’s first name, long a secret on the show, was Cosmo.) A working actress across five decades; not too shabby for a woman who, at the start of her movie career, was (according to LIFE) “kept on ice merely as a decoy to scare Marilyn Monroe.” Sheree North was married four times and was the mother to two daughters. She died in Los Angeles in November 2005\. She was 73 years old. \_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_\_  Caption from LIFE. "Sheree's thigh-length stockings have fake tops which studio later removed for fear of censorship." Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Actress Sheree North in 1955. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Actress Sheree North, 1955. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Sheree North, 1955. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. "Steam bath after physical workouts keeps Sheree from getting stiff and also helps her relax her nerves." Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Sheree North, 1955. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. "Pajama top she will wear in movie \[How to Be Very, Very Popular\] hides Sheree North's figure. 'All the dieting,' she complains, 'and now I'm always wrapped up in a tent.'" Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Sheree North, 1955. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. "Getting in shape for her big chance, Sheree rehearses a vigorous dance routine still wearing her coat." Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Caption from similar published picture: "Daily diet for Sheree consists of six raw eggs, two tomatoes, and half a grapefruit, usually eaten at once." Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Caption from LIFE. "Studio hairdresser Gladys Rasmussen wears three heads after wig test with Sheree. On left is wig, on right is Sheree, posed in front of Gladys." Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Sheree North during filming of How to Be Very, Very Popular, 1955. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Sheree North, 1955. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Sheree North, 1955. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Actress Sheree North and producer/director Nunally Johnson on the set of How to Be Very, Very Popular. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Sheree North, 1955. Loomis Dean—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Not published in LIFE. Actress Sheree North, 1955. 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