James Dean

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Surprised I was when I found there wasn't a James Dean thread. I'm to young to have experienced the era when he was around and still know very little without having ever seen any of his films, aside from the clips I've seen on places like youtube.

Any thoughts on his work, his life, who he was?
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Surprised I was when I found there wasn't a James Dean thread. I'm to young to have experienced the era when he was around and still know very little without having ever seen any of his films, aside from the clips I've seen on places like youtube.

Any thoughts on his work, his life, who he was?
Elia Kazan, who directed both Dean and Brando, had this to say: "Dean's body was very graphic; it was almost writhing in pain sometimes. He was very twisted, as if he were cringing all the time. Dean was a cripple anyway, inside -- he was not like [Marlon Brando]. People compared them, but there was no similarity. He was a far, far sicker kid and Brando's not sick, he's just troubled."

Veteran character actor Hume Croym wrote in his autobiography about working once with Dean on a live TV program (something like Playhouse 90, I think). Croym played a guy who ran a roadside restaurant and Dean was the leader of a teenage gang that had taken it over and was causing trouble. In one scene, Croym was to jump Dean and get a pistol out of his coat pocket while they're wrestling around. So they're rehearsing the scene, and he puts his hand in the pocket, but the pistol isn't there. Dean had moved it to a new location in his waistband or another pocket--somewhere. His argument was that, in a real situation, Croym wouldn't know where the gun was and would have to look for it. At this, Croym explodes and lays into Dean, really telling him off. He reminds Dean they are going to be performing live on TV and everything is written and timed to fit the allotted show time and can't run over while they're playing grab-ass and looking for a gun that is not where the script says it should be. When performance time rolled around, Dean pretty much stuck with the script and had the gun in the right pocket, but Croym thought he was less than a professional actor. Sometime later when Dean had achieved some of his movie fame, Croym ran into him again and Dean starts to reminisce about when they worked together. “We’ll have to do it again,” he tells Croym. Croym is flabbergasted—says Dean just didn’t get that he never wanted to work with him again.


Then there's the story--don't know if it's true or not--but it's said that while rehearsing a scene with Liz Taylor in Giant, Dean unzipped his pants and proceeded to pee on the ground while saying his lines.



Wow, thanks for the major incite. I was wondering why his body seemed so attractive in such a different way.
That story was interesting as well



Wow, thanks for the major incite. I was wondering why his body seemed so attractive in such a different way.
That story was interesting as well
Do you think, if he had lived, Dean would have retained his popularity as much or more than Brando? Somehow, I can't see him playing some of the older roles that Brando took on later in his career. Dean played high school students in East of Eden and Rebel Without A Cause and a man/child who never grows up in Giant. Brando was playing older roles right from the start in The Men and The Wild One. I suspect that, had Dean not died young, he likely would have self-destructed in some other way before growing old.



Just yesterday I asked a few high schoolers who James Dean was and they didn't know who he was, it saddened me. Men, women, the world sees us as food that goes out of date. James Dean left before his expiration date the world would have given him. He was a gifted man and must have been made out of gods own rib, but he will be forgotten. I think even with his talent, he wouldn't have done as well in older roles simply because he had already been type cast as that young, attractive rebel. His expiration date was close by. In a way, I think he was lucky.



Bright light. Bright light. Uh oh.
There's nothing in here that wouldn't be in a trailer, and some of you might find all these scenes interesting, whether you've seen the movies or not.

Let me tell you first off that I don't want to think about his death and what we missed because he was an adrenelin junkie (you caught a glimpse of that during the "chicken" scene in Rebel Without a Cause. After all, people seem to forget that it was the other car that killed him. I'm sure he was driving too fast, so he was equally-responsible, but at least he was in the correct lane. I also don't want to get into any kind of Hollywood Babylon expose of his life. I'm not sure how anybody cannot watch East of Eden and Rebel Without a Cause without feeling extreme affinity for Dean and his characters. His emotional openness, combined with the fact that he was strongest when he had a significant other present, has to draw anybody to his shared humanity. It seemed to inspire at least two other actors who died far too young, River Phoenix and Heath Ledger.

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Dean was good in Giant, but he couldn't finish all his scenes in post-production since he was already dead. I also wondered if any key scenes were never shot for the film. Dean had to be dubbed by his buddy Nick Adams in the big scene at the end where he's honored and drunkemly breaks down and cries about his lost love. However, I've always felt that Giant had Rock Hudson's greatest dramatic performance, so I was more-impressed overall with him, but he IS basically the central character.



I would have loved to have seen more of Dean though because several actors haVe been able to transition from leading man to character actor. Now, as I implied earlier, maybe Dean would have to burn out because his life, both on and off screen, just seemed so intense. Speaking to darkrose now, Dean probably didn't make it to his "expiration date", but in retrospect, if you're a fellow fan, maybe we got more from him than we should have expected.

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James Dean secretly idolized Brando. Dean would go to parties that Brando was attending and watch and study how Brando conducted himself: particularly around women. I think that Dean's potential had just barley been tapped. It's unfortunate that he saw Brando as a sort of competition to himself; they could have worked wonders together.



Just yesterday I asked a few high schoolers who James Dean was and they didn't know who he was, it saddened me. Men, women, the world sees us as food that goes out of date. James Dean left before his expiration date the world would have given him. He was a gifted man and must have been made out of gods own rib, but he will be forgotten. I think even with his talent, he wouldn't have done as well in older roles simply because he had already been type cast as that young, attractive rebel. His expiration date was close by. In a way, I think he was lucky.
When I was 17 and thought Dean was the last word in cool, I thought it would be swell to die in my early 20s as he did so as not to grow old and stale in middle age like my parents. Gawd, all the great things I would have missed like my three children and the best 2 of my 3 wives, not to mention so many other sweet ladies and great times. I'm less than 2 months from my 67th birthday and still finding great things to enjoy, not the least being my 7 grandchildren. I hope I'm having as much fun in my 80s as my dad is having now. I wouldn't trade places with Dean for all the tea in China. He was not a happy person. And certainly not lucky.



James Dean secretly idolized Brando. Dean would go to parties that Brando was attending and watch and study how Brando conducted himself: particularly around women. I think that Dean's potential had just barley been tapped. It's unfortunate that he saw Brando as a sort of competition to himself; they could have worked wonders together.
Everyone who writes about Brando and Dean say they were not into the Hollywood social set and didn't often attend parties. That was especially true for Dean even in the cast and staff get-togethers on dull evenings in Marfa when they were filming Giant (you don't know what dull is until you see Marfa!). So realisticly, how many parties could Brando and Dean have attended silmultaneously?



There's nothing in here that wouldn't be in a trailer, and some of you might find all these scenes interesting, whether you've seen the movies or not.

Let me tell you first off that I don't want to think about his death and what we missed because he was an adrenelin junkie (you caught a glimpse of that during the "chicken" scene in Rebel Without a Cause. After all, people seem to forget that it was the other car that killed him. I'm sure he was driving too fast, so he was equally-responsible, but at least he was in the correct lane. I also don't want to get into any kind of Hollywood Babylon expose of his life. I'm not sure how anybody cannot watch East of Eden and Rebel Without a Cause without feeling extreme affinity for Dean and his characters. His emotional openness, combined with the fact that he was strongest when he had a significant other present, has to draw anybody to his shared humanity. It seemed to inspire at least two other actors who died far too young, River Phoenix and Heath Ledger.

Dean was good in Giant, but he couldn't finish all his scenes in post-production since he was already dead. I also wondered if any key scenes were never shot for the film. Dean had to be dubbed by his buddy Nick Adams in the big scene at the end where he's honored and drunkemly breaks down and cries about his lost love. However, I've always felt that Giant had Rock Hudson's greatest dramatic performance, so I was more-impressed overall with him, but he IS basically the central character.

I would have loved to have seen more of Dean though because several actors haVe been able to transition from leading man to character actor. Now, as I implied earlier, maybe Dean would have to burn out because his life, both on and off screen, just seemed so intense. Speaking to darkrose now, Dean probably didn't make it to his "expiration date", but in retrospect, if you're a fellow fan, maybe we got more from him than we should have expected.
I think Dean was already dead when I first saw Rebel Without a Cause, the first of his movies I saw when it finally got around to our small Texas town and the one with which I most identified being a teen myself. I was an instant fan and was caught up in Giant, because of the whole Dean tragedy and also because it was about the Texas I knew. I even knew the oilman on whom the character Jett Rink and the big hotel opening (in Houston, not Dallas, which has never been an oil town) was based. He claimed the Bic Bennedict character was also based on him, his good and bad sides. But over the years, I've come to believe that his first film, East of Eden, was really his best, largely because of the real conflict Elia Kazan encouraged between Dean and Raymond Massey.

I agree with you, Giant was more a vehicle for Hudson and Liz Taylor. However, Mercedes McCambridge stole scenes from Dean, Hudson, Taylor, and everyone else on the set.



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Everyone who writes about Brando and Dean say they were not into the Hollywood social set and didn't often attend parties. That was especially true for Dean even in the cast and staff get-togethers on dull evenings in Marfa when they were filming Giant (you don't know what dull is until you see Marfa!). So realisticly, how many parties could Brando and Dean have attended silmultaneously?
According to Brando, he did attend some gatherings (which is where he first met Monroe: the wall flower) and Dean was present. Those who wrote about Brando also noted that Dean did indeed study Brando and was trying in many ways to imulate his persona. You are right however, when you say that the two didn't so the 'party set'. They were someting of recluses in sme ways, but both were more intrested in being just regular people rather than Hollywood stock.

A lot of this stuff is covered in Brabdo's auto biography.



According to Brando, he did attend some gatherings (which is where he first met Monroe: the wall flower) and Dean was present. Those who wrote about Brando also noted that Dean did indeed study Brando and was trying in many ways to imulate his persona. You are right however, when you say that the two didn't so the 'party set'. They were someting of recluses in sme ways, but both were more intrested in being just regular people rather than Hollywood stock.

A lot of this stuff is covered in Brabdo's auto biography.
Did Brando say whether these gatherings were primarily in New York or Hollywood? I can picture it happening more in New York where they both were on stage and both attended the same acting studio (possibly at the same time?) and where the theater group is more inclusive and the parties are cheaper and lower key, less publicity prone than the "flaunt-what-you-got" Hollywood galas. I don't doubt that Dean and Brando sometimes showed up at the same gatherings--I just wonder how often that might have been, given their reclusive natures. I know in New York Dean spent a lot of time buddying around with Martin Landau, and I've always thought it was unusual at least that one of Brando's best buds was Wally Cox. Wouldn't you have liked to see those two together?

One of Lee Marvin's best pals in Hollywood in the early years was Keenan Wynn--they used to participate in an annual desert motorcycle race down in Baja. Wonder if Brando or Dean ever got into that?



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Did Brando say whether these gatherings were primarily in New York or Hollywood? I can picture it happening more in New York where they both were on stage and both attended the same acting studio (possibly at the same time?) and where the theater group is more inclusive and the parties are cheaper and lower key, less publicity prone than the "flaunt-what-you-got" Hollywood galas. I don't doubt that Dean and Brando sometimes showed up at the same gatherings--I just wonder how often that might have been, given their reclusive natures. I know in New York Dean spent a lot of time buddying around with Martin Landau, and I've always thought it was unusual at least that one of Brando's best buds was Wally Cox. Wouldn't you have liked to see those two together?

One of Lee Marvin's best pals in Hollywood in the early years was Keenan Wynn--they used to participate in an annual desert motorcycle race down in Baja. Wonder if Brando or Dean ever got into that?
Cox was the only person who was abstract enough and really understood Brando. So the idea of the two doesn't surpirise me now: it did when I first heard about it though.

I really don't remember where Brando these parties took place, and I really don't want to have to drag out the book, but I suspect that your scenario is right. The idea that Dean and Landau hung out isn't surprising either: Landau is anything but the serious face he plays on screen: he's an energetic conversationalist and a very nice guy.

I thnk that Dean and Wynn would have been joined by Newman and MacQueen as well.



I've been reviewing Dean's three films on a personal blog. For me, the teenage rebel thing is the most annoying part of his legacy and that in Eden and Rebel, there's a brattish quality to his performance. I thought he was brilliant in Giant though; he had a similar quality to Marilyn Monroe I think- the "little boy lost" instead of the "little girl lost" quality that she had. It worked better in Giant because it felt that he was regressing to childhood rather than simply acting childishly.


I think he's only superficially like Brando; of course the mumbling and the 'coolness' and something of a cross-gender sex appeal (i.e. men crushing on him as well as girls), but I don't think he had the control as an actor that Brando had, or the range.
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Do you think, if he had lived, Dean would have retained his popularity as much or more than Brando? Somehow, I can't see him playing some of the older roles that Brando took on later in his career. Dean played high school students in East of Eden and Rebel Without A Cause and a man/child who never grows up in Giant. Brando was playing older roles right from the start in The Men and The Wild One. I suspect that, had Dean not died young, he likely would have self-destructed in some other way before growing old.
As amazing an actor that he was, I would have to agree that if he had lived, he would not have sustained the kind of career that Brando did. The man clearly had a lot of demons and I also agree that if he had not died in that car accident, I still think he would have died prematurely...I'm pretty sure drugs and alcohol would have become a part of his life at some point, if they weren't at the time he died, I think they would have and probably would have resulted in an early death for him anyway. I think he was a doomed soul from the start.



As amazing an actor that he was, I would have to agree that if he had lived, he would not have sustained the kind of career that Brando did. The man clearly had a lot of demons and I also agree that if he had not died in that car accident, I still think he would have died prematurely...I'm pretty sure drugs and alcohol would have become a part of his life at some point, if they weren't at the time he died, I think they would have and probably would have resulted in an early death for him anyway. I think he was a doomed soul from the start.


He did give the impression of not being able to handle responsibility and adulthood, a kind of Peter Pan figure. I also think that he would have been pigeon-holed into either teenage rebel roles or as a second rate Brando had his career continued.