From the May 22nd, 2004 edition of the Boston Herald: The passing of James Dean last Friday marks the end of an era in American film history which transformed not only the movies but America itself. In an entertainment career spanning close to half a century, Dean evolved from a brooding teen method actor to a bona fide cultural and social icon; some say he broke the rules of being a star, others that he simply rewrote them. Movie buffs today can scarcely imagine a time when he wasn’t a fundamental part of the cinematic landscape, and he also left a lasting impression on millions of TV viewers who saw him either in one of his countless dramatic roles on the small screen or as an occasional guest host of The Tonight Show. As an auto safety activist Dean helped spur a number of fundamental changes in car design and the passage of the first-ever federal seat belt laws. And he was one of the driving forces behind the ongoing investigation into the 1981 death of his Rebel Without A Cause co-star Natalie Wood.

Besides being a major Hollywood star himself, Dean acted as a mentor to a number of other film greats. Even in the final few months of his life, when chronic heart problems largely kept him confined to a hospital bed, Dean was still offering career advice to up- and-coming actors. And his directorial stints on some twenty-five movies proved he was just as talented behind the camera as he was in front of it.

Born in Marion, Indiana in 1931, Dean broke into show business at the age of 20 testing stunts on the game show Beat the Clock; he made his movie debut two years later as Cal Trask in Elia Kazan’s adaptation of the John Steinbeck novel East of Eden, and from there it was readily apparent to anyone who watched him onscreen that here was a star in the making. But it was his star turn as troubled teen Jim Stark in 1955’s Rebel Without A Cause which ultimately cemented his place in the movie business as a bona fide leading man; drawing rave reviews from critics and wave after wave of fan letters from audiences, his performance in Rebel marked his coming of age as a leading man.

The course of Dean’s life would be altered forever in September of 1955 when a last- minute financial problem forced him to cancel his plans to purchase a certain Mercedes Benz sports car. That cancellation may have saved him from a tragic death; three days after he scrapped his plans to purchase the car, he learned that the man who did buy it had been killed in a collision with another vehicle on the California coast. The driver of the ill-fated car was thrown out of the vehicle and fatally injured his skull when he landed; a shocked Dean was motivated by the incident to begin investing his budding star power in the fight for improved auto safety in this country.

When Dean met consumer activist Ralph Nader in 1965 at a book signing for Nader’s landmark exposé Unsafe At Any Speed, his involvement with auto safety issues grew exponentially. Nader saw in Dean a kindred spirit; before long Dean was spending almost as much time helping Nader lobby for stricter car safety standards as he was making films. At the signing of the first federal auto safety law in 1968, Dean was the most prominent of the VIPs who stood beside Lyndon Johnson as the president put his signature on what the press would later dub “the Dean Law”.

It was in 1972 that Dean took his first turn in the director’s chair, filming the poignant science fiction cautionary tale Silent Running. It was a far cry from the gritty dramas which had been his hallmark for most of his early years as an actor, and the gamble paid off handsomely; Running won Oscars for Best Director, Best Original Score, and Best Visual Effects and is today ranked by critics and viewers alike as one of the best sci-fi films of all time. By the mid-1980s Dean had thirteen directorial credits on his resume, and he would go on to record twelve others before his health problems forced him out of the director’s chair for good. Nor were Dean’s talents behind the camera limited to just directing. One of the lesser-known accomplishments of his Hollywood career is his once-anonymous work co-writing the script of Steven Spielberg’s 1975 thriller Jaws; Spielberg and Dean had been introduced to one another by a mutual friend, American Graffiti and Star Wars creator George Lucas, and the rest, to coin a phrase, was history. Dean had always been modest about his writing skills, and it wasn’t until about two weeks after the 1976 Academy Awards that he finally acknowledged his collaboration with Peter Benchley, author of the original novel, on Jaws’ screenplay.

In the mid-1980s Dean returned to the medium that had launched his career, television; his recurring role on Dynasty as a Wall Street power player gave the show some of its best ratings during its run on ABC. Dean also drew considerable praise for his non-fiction work as host of a three-part PBS documentary on the history of the automobile. He even showed some talent for sketch comedy with his 1988 cameo on Saturday Night Live spoofing his tragic character in East Of Eden; that performance prompted the show’s producers to invite him back to Studio 8H the following season for the first of five stints as SNL’s host. In between those hosting gigs, Dean worked on the screenplay for a film comedy inspired by some of his early experiences working in daytime TV; he’d just finished editing the final draft of it less than a month before his death.

Not until the late 1990s did Dean finally start to slow down his famously brisk pace. When he put his treasured world-famous collection of race cars up for auction of Sotheby’s in 1998, it was considered by much of Hollywood as a clear sign his health was beginning to fade for good; he’d spent years building that collection, and normally would have sooner cut his own arm off than part with so much as a front tire from one of those racers. Dean only kept a handful of the money from the auction, choosing to donate the rest to MADD and other organizations combating drunk driving.

Dean’s last theatrical film appearance was in the 2002 NASCAR-set romantic drama Daytona, portraying a veteran racer who served as both professional and personal mentor to a struggling newcomer played by Bradley Cooper. At the time he made Daytona, Dean was suffering not only from physical illness but also from deep emotional depression over the 9/11 attacks; the fact he was able to hold up long enough to finish his work on the movie is nothing short of miraculous. His performance in Daytona made an eloquent farewell to the audiences that had been admiring his work for nearly a half-century.

Perhaps Dean’s most important legacy other than his film work is the James Dean Auto Safety Foundation, the organization he created in 1985 to promote the construction and sale of safer cars and push for stricter laws against drunk driving. Second only to MADD in terms of influence on drunk driving legislation in this country, the Dean Foundation is today one of the largest auto safety-related political lobbies in America. As Dean himself changed the face of Hollywood, the Dean Foundation would reshape the crusade to eliminate drunk driving in America; many anti- drunk driving activists today cite Dean’s organization as the template for their own work.

Dean was one of a kind; it’s difficult to imagine anyone like him appearing on our cultural landscape again in the foreseeable future. What isn’t difficult to imagine is that Dean will continue to have a huge influence on pop culture as a whole and filmmaking in particular for generations to come. Even as you read this, a new generation of Dean fans has already started turning to social media to help keep his memory alive...