James Dean mini-bio: Born in Marion, Indiana to Winton and Mildred Wilson Dean, James Dean and his family moved to Santa Monica, California six years after his father had left farming to become a dental technician. Dean was enrolled in Brentwood Public School until his mother died of cancer in 1940. At age nine, Dean was sent by his father to live with his aunt Ortense and uncle Marcus Winslow on a farm in Fairmount, Indiana, where he was brought up with a Quaker influence. In high school Dean played on the school basketball team and studied forensics and drama. After graduating from Fairmount High School in 1949, Dean moved back to California to live with his father and stepmother. He enrolled in Santa Monica College (SMCC), pledged to the Sigma Nu fraternity and majored in pre-law. Dean transferred to the University of California, Los Angeles and changed his major to drama, resulting in estrangement from his father.
Dean began his acting career with a Pepsi-Cola commercial followed by a stint as a stunt tester in the Beat the Clock game show. He quit college to focus on his budding career, but struggled to get jobs in Hollywood and paid his bills only by working as a parking lot attendant at CBS Studios. Following friends' advice, Dean moved to New York City to pursue live stage acting, where he was accepted to study under Lee Strasberg in the storied Actors Studio. His career picked up, and he did several episodes on early-1950s TV shows such as Kraft Television Theater, Studio One, Lux Video Theatre, Robert Montgomery Presents, Danger and General Electric Theater. One early role, for the CBS series, Omnibus (Glory in the Flower) saw Dean portraying the same type of disaffected youth he would later immortalize in Rebel Without a Cause (this summer 1953 program was also notable for featuring the song "Crazy Man, Crazy", one of the first dramatic TV programs to feature rock and roll). Positive reviews for his role in André Gide's The Immoralist led to calls from Hollywood and paved the way to film stardom.
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