James Coburn

James Harrison Coburn III^[1] (August 31, 1928 – November 18, 2002)^[2] was an American film and television actor. Coburn appeared in nearly 70 films and made over 100 television appearances during his 45-year career,^[3][4] and played a wide range of roles and won an Academy Award for his supporting role as Glen Whitehouse in Affliction.^[5]

A capable, rough-hewn leading man, his toothy grin and lanky body made him a perfect tough-guy in numerous leading and supporting roles in Westerns and action films, ^[6] such as The Magnificent Seven, Hell Is for Heroes, The Great Escape, Major Dundee, Our Man Flint, Duck, You Sucker, Pat Garrett and Billy the Kid, and Cross of Iron.

During the late 1960s and early 1970s, he would cultivate an image synonymous with "Cool",^[7] and along with contemporaries such as Lee Marvin, Steve McQueen, and Charles Bronson, became one of the prominent "tough-guy" actors of his day.

Early life

Coburn was born in Laurel, Nebraska, the son of Mylet S. (née Johnson) and James Harrison Coburn, Jr., who had a garage business that was wiped out by the Great Depression.^[8] Coburn was of Scots-Irish and Swedish descent.^[1] He was raised in Compton, California, attended Compton Junior College, and enlisted in the United States Army in 1950, serving as an Army truck driver and also was an occasional disc jockey on an Army radio station in Texas. Coburn also narrated Army training films in Mainz, Germany.^[9] He attended Los Angeles City College, where he studied acting alongside Jeff Corey and Stella Adler, then made his stage debut at the La Jolla Playhouse in Billy Budd.^[10] Coburn was selected for a Remington Products razor commercial when he was able to shave off eleven days of beard growth in less than 60 seconds,^[11] while joking that he had more teeth to show on camera than the other 12 candidates for the part.^[12]

Career

Coburn's film debut came in 1959 as the sidekick to bad guy Pernell Roberts in the Randolph Scott western Ride Lonesome.^[13] Coburn also appeared in dozens of television roles including, with Roberts, several episodes of Bonanza. He appeared at least twice on John Payne's NBC western The Restless Gun in episodes entitled "The Pawn" and "The Way Back", the latter with Bonanza's Dan Blocker.^[14] Coburn and Ralph Taeger co-starred with Joi Lansing in Klondike on NBC in the 1960–1961 season. When Klondike, set in the Alaskan gold rush town of Skagway, was cancelled, Taeger and Coburn were regrouped as detectives in Mexico in NBC's equally short-lived Acapulco.

Coburn became well known in the 1960s and the 1970s for his roles in several action and western films, first primarily with Steve McQueen and Charles Bronson in two John Sturges films: The Magnificent Seven and The Great Escape. A villainous Texan in the hugely successful Charade (1963), a glib naval officer in The Americanization of Emily (1964) and a character role as a one-armed Indian tracker in Major Dundee (1965) gained him much notice. In 1966, Coburn became a bona fide star with the release of Our Man Flint, a James Bond spoof released by 20th Century Fox. In 1971, he starred in the western film Duck, You Sucker!, directed by Sergio Leone, as an Irish explosives expert and revolutionary who has fled to Mexico during the time of the Mexican Revolution in the early 20th Century. He teamed with director Sam Peckinpah for the 1973 film Pat Garrett & Billy the Kid (they had worked together in 1965 on Major Dundee). An MGM producer tried to sabotage the production, causing the film to be drastically edited when it opened. Peckinpah and Coburn were greatly disappointed and turned next to Cross of Iron, a critically acclaimed war epic which performed poorly in the U.S. but was a huge hit in Europe. They remained close friends until Peckinpah's death on December 28, 1984. In 1973, Coburn was one of the featured celebrities, dressed in prison gear on the cover of the album Band On The Run made by Paul McCartney and his band Wings.

Coburn returned to television in 1978 to star in a three-part mini-series version of a Dashiell Hammett detective novel, The Dain Curse, tailoring his character to bear a physical resemblance to the author. Due to severe rheumatoid arthritis, Coburn appeared in very few films in the 1980s. Although his hands were visibly gnarled in film appearances within the final two decades of his career, Coburn continued working. He spent much of his time writing songs with British singer-songwriter Lynsey De Paul and doing television such as his work on Darkroom. He claimed to have healed himself with pills containing a sulfur-based compound. Coburn returned to film in the 1990s, and appeared in supporting roles in Young Guns II, Hudson Hawk, Sister Act 2, Maverick, Eraser, The Nutty Professor, Affliction, and Payback. Coburn's performance in Affliction earned him an Academy Award, and also nominated for the Screen Actors Guild and the Independent Spirit Awards.

Cars

Coburn’s interest in fast cars began with his father’s garage business and continued throughout his personal life, as he exported rare cars to Japan. ^[15] He's credited with turning Steve McQueen on to Ferraris, and in the early 1960s, owned them two at a time. One was a Ferrari 250 GT Lusso, the other the Ferrari 250 GT Spyder California SWB. His was the thirteenth of just fifty-six built. Coburn imported the pre owned car in 1964, shortly after completing his film The Great Escape. ^[16] The car was restored and sold for $10,894,400.00 to English broadcaster Chris Evans, setting a new world record for the highest price ever paid for an automobile at auction.^[17]

Cal Spyder #2377 was repainted several times during Coburn's ownership; it has been black, silver, and possibly burgundy. He kept the car at his Beverly Hills area home, and was often serviced by Max Balchowsky, who also did the suspension and frame modifications on those Mustang GT’s used in the filming of McQueen’s "Bullitt." Coburn sold the Spyder in 1987 after 24 years of ownership. Over time, he also owned the above-noted Lusso, a Ferrari Daytona, at least one Ferrari 308, and a 1967 Ferrari 412P sports racer. ^[18]

Death

Coburn died of a heart attack on November 18, 2002 while listening to music in his Beverly Hills, California home. He was survived by his widow Paula (née Murad), son James IV, and a stepdaughter. His ashes were interred in Westwood Village Memorial Park Cemetery, and was marked by a stone bench inscribed with his name. By the time of his death, Coburn was the voice of the "Like a Rock" Chevrolet television ad campaign. James Garner succeeded Coburn for the remainder of the campaign.

Critical analysis

In his New Biographical Dictionary Of Film, American-based British Film critic David Thomson stated that "Coburn is a modern rarity: an actor who projects lazy, humorous sexuality. It is the lack of neurosis, an impression of an amiable monkey, that makes him seem rather dated: a more perceptive Gable, perhaps, or even a loping Midwest Grant. He has made a variety of flawed, pleasurable films, the merits of which invariably depend on his laconic presence. Increasingly, he was the best thing in his movies, smiling privately, seeming to suggest that he was in contact with some profound source of amusement". ^[19]

Legendary film critic Pauline Kael remarked on Coburn's unusual characteristics, stating that "he looked like the child of the liaison between Lt Pinkerton and Madame Butterfly". ^[20] George Hickenlooper, who directed Coburn in The Man From Elysian Fields called him "the masculine male".^[21] Andy Garcia called him "the personification of class, the hippest of the hip", and Paul Schrader noted "he was of that 50's generation. He had that part hipster, part cool-cat aura about him. He was one of those kind of men who were formed by the Rat Pack kind of style." ^[22]

Filmography

Films

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Television

References

External links

• James Coburn at the Internet Movie Database

• James Coburn at AllRovi
• James Coburn at the TCM Movie Database