‘Rebel Without a Cause’ (1955) airs on PBS tonight, 9PM ET

Jim Backus is great in this, too.

R1 his parents were both great. His awful mother, his dad and grandma who clearly is condescending to her daughter in law.

I’ve also found it odd how James Dean, Natalie Wood and Sal Mineo all died very tragically.

I miss NY PBS, channel 13. My cable only has Delaware/Philadelphia...channel 12. It sucks. It's always showing promotional donation drives. I know PBS has to do this, but NY didn't have it as much. It had better content, too....the movies on Saturday night, that 12 doesn't have. Good movie....enjoy.

R4 they show movies on that affiliate also. You just have to check.

R4 they’re showing the Les Mis 25th Anniversary concert on the Delaware channel

Thank you, R5 and R6. I do like Doc Martin at 8 pm.

R4 don’t feel bad. Most of NY/NJ based DLers didn’t even know PBS shows movies most Saturday nights until a few months ago when I posted about Thelma & Louise airing and most of them had no idea. They asked if this was a one time thing or weekly, truly not knowing PBS has been showing classic films on Saturday nights for at least 12 years, maybe longer.

There are some Saturdays they don’t show a movie because they are doing those donation things or are showing a concert or something else instead, but most Saturday nights they show a classic at 9pm, followed by a small Indie and then a short film to close it off.

I used to watch the Saturday night movies at 9 pm on the NY/NJ channel, R8. They had good movies. Almost as good as TCM. I don't know his name, but a professor from Columbia U, who taught film, would comment in the beginning and the end of each movie. Yes...good indies afterward, too. If you missed the movie and Indie the first time, it was shown again immediately after. I like to watch the NYC interest tidbits that were shown. For me, it was a better and more interesting station.

R9 yes they used to show it again right after but lately they stopped that. Now it’s

Classic Film

Indie Film

Short Film

And that’s it. They don’t show it again anymore, well, most times.

Oh...it's been a while for me, haven't watched in years.^^

But they are repeating it tonight r11

They’re airing

Rebel

Ten Thousand Saints

Then repeating both

Then airing the short at like 5am lol

Last week they didn’t repeat.

About to start!

I always hated the end of this film. Not the shooting, but how afterwards it almost transitions into a happy ending

My PBS used to play classic movies on Saturday nights. Now its all cheap documentaries about how old people can still be vital.

R15 which PBS? 😂😂😂

Some of their documentaries are good

James Dean was lovely in this, despite all the overacting. He was great at moments, not that it mattered. He was a star, the real deal. Your eyes gravitate toward him whenever he’s on screen. A true star, like Marilyn, Liz, Marlon etc.

Todays “stars” can’t compare.

This was the first TV special starring him I ever watched, a few years ago. He was good in this one.

He was good in most of them. The only one he was truly bad in was the one with Ronald Reagan.

With the Elvis and Marilyn movies this year, I’ve been thinking we’re due for a proper James Dean biopic. He lived a lot in just 24 years and was very ahead of his time.

Marilyn’s movie is fiction.

Surprised people haven’t tried to cancel this movie for the age gaps between James Dean and the teenage Natalie Wood and Sal Mineo.

Natalie and James Dean worked together in a television episode before Rebel Without a Cause.

Loved the chemistry between all 3, but especially Jimmy and Sal.

They were just acting r21

44 YO Nicholas Ray was fucking 16YO Natalie Wood.

R24 I know, which is fucked up. But if a 15 and 16 year old was cast opposite a 24 year old today people would try to cancel the actors.

Natalie was also fucking Dennis Hopper when they were making this movie.

Yes r26. It caused drama behind the scenes.

Wasn’t Ray also married?

Dean loathed Hopper and was upset when he was cast in Giant. He recommended Mineo for it though.

R27 I’ve never heard anything about Dean loathing Hopper. He acted as a mentor to him.

I believe Lew Bracker is one of James Dean’s last surviving friends.

I believe his cousin Marcus Winslow Jr. is also still alive.

R28 it’s in one of the books about Dean. He didn’t like Hopper but Hopper always spoke about him like they were close after he died. PS that isn’t Hopper in that photo.

I don’t think they were close but I’ve read a few books and they seemed friendly at the very least. It seems Dean was more of a mentor to Hopper. I don’t really trust anything John Gilmore says about Dean.

They had a “complicated” relationship

R29 R30 They both spoke about Jimmy in 2020.

How James Dean created Dennis Hopper

Dennis Hopper had to force Dean to help him with his acting

Dennis Hopper’s story changed numerous times over the years.

James Dean was unique. I do wonder how his career would have faired had he not died.

He did sign a $900k movie contract with WB before he died, originally $1 million but they lowered it because they didn’t want him to be their first $1 million contract. He also was signed onto a few films, each going to Paul Newman.

Many have said Paul Newman owed his career to James Dean dying.

ITA, r38. Paul Newman was up for the same roles that JD was, and he was finally cast in the career-making lead in "Somebody Up There Likes Me," which had been ear-marked for Dean before he died.

I see Dean's unfulfilled career path as paralelling Paul Newman's... He would have been great in the 60s, Hud, Cool Hand Luke and the like....

Or maybe his career would have been like Marlon Brando's, totally off the deep-end in his personal life, totally hating the Hollywood machine, but still amazing in later roles like The Godfather... Its' interesting to imagine.

Can’t we watch the James Franco art homage instead?

R39 how would Dean’s career have been like Newman? If Dean lived, Newman wouldn’t have even been the star he was. Him and Dean were always up for the same parts, and the parts ALWAYS went to Dean.

James Franco is gross. He should have left James Dean alone.

Franco’s movie was alright until they decided to create fiction for shock value.

Can you picture a fiftyish James Dean as a guest star on The Love Boat?

He would probably be out of acting by then. Dean was ahead of his time and always wanted to use acting as a tool to eventually break into directing and producing.

"how would Dean’s career have been like Newman?,,, the parts ALWAYS went to Dean."

Had Dean lived, he would have likely gotten many of the parts that ultimately went to Newman because Dean was gone. It's easy to imagine Dean's career might have looked a lot like Newman's. Not sure what's hard to understand there, but maybe the way I phrased it was weird.

R46 sorry. I did misread it. I understand and agree.

Dean was supposed to star in the TV adaptation to “The Battler”. He died, and Newman was cast. It aired live on October 18, 1955. That performance led to his breakthrough role as Rocky Graziano in the film Somebody Up There Likes Me in 1956, which was originally going to star James Dean.

Has done nothing to shore up Dean's rep. Laughable performance.

When I was in high school (mid/late 90s) I somehow discovered James Dean. I have no recollection of how or why, But I was obsessed. I did my hair like his. Read everything I could about him.

I remember thinking the big stars at that time (Pitt, Keanu, Depp, etc) were all just weak facsimiles.

I still think that. Something about his is so alluring. I don't even care whether he's a great actor or a hack.

He had It.

R50 hmmmm

R50 Dean was huge in the 70’s, 80’s, 90’s, and 2000’s. He was still pretty big in the early 2010’s. I feel like he’s faded in recent years tho. Someone needs to make a good biopic about him.

Actors are still inspired by him tho. Steven Yeun said he was inspired by Dean’s performance in Rebel when he was filming Minari.

Jacob Elordi has a Japanese poster of James Dean (and his ass) from Rebel Without a Cause in his living room.

He is most actors inspiration, or one of their inspirations. Even Gen Z. He hasn’t lost popularity, I think his estate doesn’t allow his likeness used as much as they used to.

However, a few years ago a filmmaker announced he was putting CGI hologram James Dean in a movie, which made global headlines and a lot of pushback from fans who were against it.

Michael B Jordan also listed James Dean as one of the actors who made him want to get into acting

This thread takes me back to Marfa...

I took a class about the history of film last year. For the 1950’s, my professor screened Gentlemen Prefer Blondes that week and talked about Marilyn Monroe and her life. He also played a scene of James Dean in East of Eden during class. I think those two are synonymous with the 1950’s.

Dean is more relevant than Brando imo.

Great comment from another thread about Dean earlier this year:

“For me, I don’t think of him in terms of coolness, but rather have a kind of identification with him based on his own vulnerability/turmoil/paradoxi - cal inner life. His humanity, not his image, is what fascinates me. I think he’s so relevant and compelling even more so today because his modern-feeling acting style (and lifestyle off screen) feels fresh because it foreshadowed our present inchoate, mercurial modes of identity today, more than even Brando (who I actually think is overrated).“

*

“In this photo, Marilyn Monroe is studying her script on the set of her film Bus Stop in 1956. If you look closely above her head, there’s a photo of James Dean. Emily, who runs jamesdeandaily, once told me that James had wanted to audition for Bus Stop (which I never knew!) I don’t know for sure, but knowing Marilyn’s sweet heart, I think she purposely put that photo of him on set as a tribute to him. RIP James Dean (February 8, 1931-September 30, 1955)”

R18 His television work is so good.

I would rather ship Dean and Newman because Newman always spoke respectfully of Dean and even said he believed Dean would’ve surpassed him and Brando had he lived longer. Brando was an asshole towards Dean.

James Dean and Joanne Woodward screen test for East of Eden

[quote]Brando was an asshole towards Dean

Who *wasn't* he an asshole to, r64?

Stumbled into this thread late and days after OP, but did see that "Rebel" is currently streaming on HBOMax. I know what I'm doing this weekend.

Dean was so photogenic. He just radiates, and elevates everyone around him. Without him it would have been a b+w B-movie.

I do think Sal Mineo is great in this movie, but it’s mostly because of Dean. Mineo was so clearly in love with Dean and it shows throughout the movie, it’s beautiful to watch but also sad knowing how they died.

Look at him blushing.

Rebel Without a Cause is Dean’s most iconic role, and I do think he’s great if uneven in it, but I personally prefer his performances in East of Eden and Giant.

R64 Newman wouldn’t have had much of a career had Dean lived. Of course he spoke highly of him. Deep down he knew it.

R68 it was literally a B&W B-movie and was shot in B&W at first, before they realized this movie had potential because of Dean‘s natural massive screen presence and unique talent. Warner Brothers then upped the budget and reshot the few scenes they filmed, but now in color and then filmed the rest of the movie.

R61 that photo is fan created.

Paul Newman looks like he was born to be a movie star. I definitely think he benefited from Dean’s death but I disagree think he wouldn’t have had a career at all if Dean lived.

I don’t think he wouldn’t have had a career, he wouldn’t have had the career he had though.

As stated upthread, he landed the TV role Dean was cast in after he died, which then got him tons of positive attention. After seeing that performance, Robert Wise cast him in Somebody Up There Likes Me, which was his star making performance. That role was originally Dean’s role.

If Dean didn’t die, Newman doesn’t star in “The Battler” on TV which caught the attention of Robert Wise, and he never stars in that film that made him a star, which already had Dean cast in it.

Dean’s death was his meal ticket.

“At the time of his untimely death, Dean was signed to appear in Somebody Up There Likes Me (1956) at MGM and The Left Handed Gun (1958) at Warner Brothers. Both roles subsequently were taken by Paul Newman and helped make him a star. Newman's career may very well have been retarded if Dean had lived as, while still alive, they competed for the same roles (East of Eden (1955)).”

George Roy Hill said that his perfect casting choice for The Sundance Kid would have been James Dean if he were alive, albeit he would have been too old by then. But he envisioned James Dean in that role when casting it in the 60s. He cast Robert Redford.

Giant made $32,855,818 in 1956, which is equivalent to $357,755,164 today.

It was a blockbuster back then.

"how they died"

Some say it's the curse of Rebel. All three leads died suddenly, unexpectedly, somewhat violently (if that's the right word), and relatively young.

R80 None of them made it to 50.

Dean always said he would be dead by 30.

R82 He does feel like one of those people that was destined to die young.

He even posed in a coffin several months before he died.

I believe Natalie either predicted she would drown to death or had a fear she would drown. And Sal Mineo was known as The Switchblade Kid and he died of stab wounds. It’s very eerie.

“Dean said on numerous occasions that he did not expect to live past age 30.”

So interesting how he sort of knew he would die young. As r83 said, he is someone who had that aura of someone destined to die young. Some people just have that energy. It’s strange.

[post redacted because linking to dailymail.co.uk clearly indicates that the poster is either a troll or an idiot (probably both, honestly.) Our advice is that you just ignore this poster but whatever you do, don't click on any link to this putrid rag.]

Even some of the people who knew Jimmy said they knew he would die young. Martin Landau said in an interview that when he called Barbara Glenn to inform her that Jimmy died, she said “Jimmy died.” before he even said anything. It’s like she knew he would be gone one day.

Elvis was a big fan of this movie and James Dean and befriended several of his friends.

Elvis always said James Dean was one of his idols and inspirations.

James Dean’s legend inspired parts of Grease, and the T-Birds worship him in the OG Broadway show in Chicago and NYC. The movie omitted that.

^^ The backdrop of the original Broadway show was a giant, blown-up photo of James Dean.

Airing on TCM right now

Okay, this is Datalounge. I wonder if James Dean and Sal Mineo ever fucked?

I think Sal always maintained that they didn't

They didn’t. This being DL doesn’t make fucking minors ok.

Mineo was always very honest about filming this movie. He was also 15 when cast. A kid.

[quote] They didn’t. This being DL doesn’t make fucking minors ok.

r95 Wut? Are you for real?

Spare me the faux moralistic bullshit. No one's advocating anything.

If it happened it happened it.