Candle in the wind MARILYN'S LIGHT SHINES ON

THE HOLLYWOOD LEGEND IS AGAIN IN THE SPOLIGHT AS THE MYSTERY AROUND HER GROWS

In all the years since Marilyn Monroe was discovered lifeless in her bed the victim of an apparent drug overdose - nobody has summed up her existence better than lyricist Bernie Taupin: Hollywood created a superstar And pain was the price she paid.

Since she died in 1962, not a single fact about Marilyn's life and death has gone unexamined: Her transition from plain old Norma Jeane Mortenson to shimmering movie goddess; the men she had dalliances with and those she married; the loneliness; the insecurities; the conspiracy theories. What more is there to say?

On August 4 this year it will be 60 years since the screen icon's untimely death, aged 36, and, it appears, there is still plenty to say about Marilyn Monroe.

To mark the anniversary, a plethora of books and TV offerings are scheduled for those who loved her, those who would have liked to have known her, and those who are curious about the woman whose mystique is endless.

For starters, French filmmakers last month wrapped production of a documentary titled Marilyn, Her Final Secret in which they claim to have solved the mystery of her paternity.

Marilyn was abandoned by her mentally ill mother and grew up in a series of Los Angeles foster homes and orphanages, never knowing who her father was.

The documentary makers have used DNA technology to analyse a lock of the star’s hair that was taken by an embalmer on the day she died. They say they’ve matched it to a living person who is related to Marilyn.