Encore: James Dunn by / Laura Brueckner

Award-winning director James Dunn is the current artistic director of the Mountain Play, where he has directed for 30 years. He also served as artistic director of the California Actors’ Theatre in the 1970s and founded the College of Marin Drama Department, serving as its chair from 1964 to 2003. This year will be his last season with the Mountain Play—though, as you will see, he’s far from “retiring.”

How did you get started in theatre?

Oh boy. [Laughs.] Let’s see. I joined the Marine Reserve when I was a senior in high school, with a lot of my friends. I graduated in June of 1950; that summer the Korean War broke out and we got called to active service. While I was in the Marine Corps, a friend of mine gave me a novel to read: "Mister Roberts" by Thomas Heggen. I really enjoyed it because it wasn’t your typical war novel. It was something really different. It was about World War II, but it wasn’t a war “shoot-’em-up” novel.

So I was stationed in Camp Pendleton down in Oceanside, Southern California. I was looking at a Los Angeles paper and saw the play "Mister Roberts" had come to Los Angeles, starring Henry Fonda. I had never been in a professional theatre in my life, but I had a weekend pass and I hitchhiked to Los Angeles from Oceanside, and bought a ticket to see this play. I went to this matinee and I sat there and this marvelous thing happened on the stage. I said, “This is what I want to do with my life.” So when I got out of the military I went to college, and started majoring in theatre, and that’s what I’ve been doing ever since.

When you started with Mountain Play, how did you pick your first show?

[Laughs.] It was pretty funny, actually. The Mountain Play for many years [since 1913] had been a community project that was done just for one or two weekends [with plays such as Dan Totheroh’s "Tamalpa"]. Tamalpa supposedly is the princess of the Miwok tribe. It was sort of like an outdoor historical pageant.

Then a woman became the executive director of the Mountain Play, named Marilyn Smith. She wanted to start doing Broadway musicals on the mountain. I had been working for a new theatre in Marin called Theater Artists of Marin, with Charles Brousse, who is a writer. Somehow he got together with Marilyn Smith, and they decided to do not only a musical, but a play up there. So the first show I did on Mt. Tamalpais was Shakespeare—"Henry V," of all things. The Shakespeare was a wonderful project that nobody came to see. [Laughs.] So I thought, “Well, that’s my time with Mountain Play.” But they liked what I did, evidently, and asked me to come back and do a musical the next year. I’ve been doing musicals up there ever since. And this is my 30th and last year of Mountain Play.

Do you have a proudest directing moment, or something you couldn’t believe you pulled off?

Oh gosh. There’s always challenges. It’s a big outdoor theatre. I’ve always enjoyed doing the Mountain Play, because I get to do things in an outdoor theatre that I can’t do inside. With the musicals I’ve been able to bring in things like animals. Like in "Oklahoma," I had horses, stagecoaches, and all that. In "South Pacific" I had jeeps. World War II jeeps, trucks, and I had a flyover of World War II planes in the show.

What do you think you’d be doing today if you hadn’t hitchhiked to that play in L.A.?

God. I have no idea. I really don’t. Because at that time I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life except I wanted to get out of the military, and I wanted to go to college. I really don’t know what I would have done. I started out as an actor, of course, but as an actor I was just one of thousands, and I wasn’t particularly good. It wasn’t until late in college that I tried my hand at directing.

How did that happen?

I was in college and a friend of mine was a writer. At San Jose State every year they did a musical that the students wrote, produced and directed themselves. My friend had an idea for the show but didn’t have anybody to do it with him. He asked, “Why don’t you direct it?” I said, “I’ve never directed anything before.” He said, “This is a student thing. We can pull it off.”

What are you looking forward to now that you won’t be full time with the Mountain Play?

I’m just going to keep working in the theatre as much as I can, directing. I’ll stay at the college because the college is kind of my big love. I’ll work part-time there and direct wherever I can. I do a lot of freelance work. Whoever will have me, if they want me to direct a show, I’m ready to go.

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Laura Brueckner is associate editor for Theatre Bay Area. She is also the director of new work for Crowded Fire Theater. Email her your proudest moment at laura@theatrebayarea.org.