LONDON — Max Factor, the Procter & Gamble Co.-owned makeup brand, has looked to a late silver-screen icon for its latest face.
The firm has named Marilyn Monroe as its global glamour ambassador, a move that pays tribute to Monroe, who died in 1962. The company credited makeup artist Max Factor Jr. with her transformation from Norma Jeane Mortenson (as she was born) to a platinum-blonde Marilyn Monroe. Max Factor has partnered with Authentic Brands Group, which owns the Marilyn Monroe estate, on the project.
While the partnership is to promote the Max Factor brand rather than launch a line of products, the Marilyn Monroe campaign will see Max Factor spotlight products that reflect Monroe’s Forties and Fifties look. They include its Ruby Tuesday Color Elixir lipstick, a modern interpretation of Monroe’s favorite shade of red; False Lash Effect Mascara and Facefinity foundation.
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Pat McGrath, the beauty firm’s global creative design director, said of the partnership: “Marilyn made the sultry red lip, creamy skin and dramatically lined eyes the most famous beauty look of the 1940s….It is the ultimate look that defines glamour — nothing else compares.”
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Esi Eggleston Bracey, vice president of Max Factor Cosmetics, P&G, commented, “Max Factor has always believed that glamour matters and that glamour itself exists beyond makeup — it’s an approach to life that Marilyn embodied so perfectly.” She added that the brand hopes the campaign will “propel Max Factor to the front of women’s minds as the brand synonymous with glamour.”
Starting Tuesday, Max Factor will globally launch television, print and online ads and social-media activity featuring images of Monroe in both her Norma Jeane and film-star guises. Max Factor is sold in Europe, Russia, Latin America, China and Australia, but the brand is not sold in the U.S.
The ads also will fit in with Max Factor’s social-media campaign, #GlamJan, which aims to inspire women to “undergo a personal glamour transformation” in January, taking their cues from Monroe’s own evolution. The campaign will be led by McGrath and Max Factor’s faces, including the model Candice Swanepoel.