Robyn L. Coburn - Dervish Dust - The Life and Words of James Coburn

I spent a good portion of thirty years of Jamess life with him. Dervish Dust is a must-read for anyone interested in Hollywood or the entertainment industry. A true life account of this superstarhis ups and downs, and great lessons for us to learn.

John Paul DeJoria, billionaire philanthropist

Finally, a book that is worthy of its subject. Robyn Coburns up-close and personal look at the life and career of the great James Coburn is a fascinating read that exhaustively covers not only the many memorable movies he starred in but also the fascinating characters and colleagues he met along the way.... [This is] a true gift for everyone who wants to know everything Coburn, from the pen of a daughter-in-law whose dedicated detective work over the past few years has led to a most welcome and definitive biography.

Pete Hammond, chief film critic of Deadline.com and host of KCET s Must See Movies

There never was, there isnt now, and there never will be another Jim Coburn! An original! Edgy, unpredictable, funny, generous, sexy, and extraordinarily sweetall at the same time. Thats impossible to do. My friend and coworker: I miss you, Buddy. It aint the same without you.

Dyan Cannon, actress, writer, and director

Dervish Dust is a loving tribute to my friend Jim Coburn. Among the books many pleasures is a look at the career of a real movie star.... Jim felt acting was just like jazz. Thats why playing opposite him in The Last of Sheila was so enjoyable. He made sure we kept it loose, going down uncharted roadslike when he drove me in his Dino Ferrari on the Cote dAzur at 120 miles per hourthrilling!

Richard Benjamin, film director and Golden Globewinning actor

Reading Dervish Dust transported me back to the evenings we used to share with James and Paula in their comfy upstairs den, when James would regale us with the splendid tales of his travels and war stories about his movie adventures. But of course this book is so much morehis upbringing in Nebraska until the Depression forced his familys move to California, his days as a young actor who would become a star, and his spiritual quest for enlightenment, always accompanied by his love of jazz and how it informed him as an actor and a person.

Susan Blakely, Golden Globewinning actress

Robyn L. Coburn

Foreword by James H. Coburn IV

Potomac Books

An imprint of the University of Nebraska Press

2021 by Panpiper, Inc.

Cover designed by University of Nebraska Press; cover image Bill Reitzel.

All rights reserved. Potomac Books is an imprint of the University of Nebraska Press.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Names: Coburn, Robyn L., author. | Coburn, James H. IV, writer of foreword.

Title: Dervish dust: the life and words of James Coburn / Robyn L. Coburn; foreword by James H. Coburn IV.

Description: [Lincoln]: Potomac Books, an imprint of the University of Nebraska Press, [2021] | Includes bibliographical references and index.

Identifiers: LCCN 2021021843

ISBN 9781640124059 (hardback)

ISBN 9781640125001 (epub)

ISBN 9781640125018 (pdf)

Subjects: LCSH : Coburn, James. | ActorsUnited StatesBiography. | BISAC : BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Entertainment & Performing Arts

Classification: LCC PN 2287. C 553 C 63 2021 | DDC 791.4302/8092 [B]dc23

LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2021021843

The publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

For Jayn Holly Coburn, that she might know her grandfather

James Coburn wanted to call his memoir Dervish Dust. In an interview with Nancy Mehagian in 2002, he explained his choice:

A dervish is a special name for a wandering mendicant, or someone who just goes off and wanders around the world, taking in and giving off impressions. The word dervish means doorwaya door to another dimension.

The whirling dervishes came out of the Rumi school. They do their thingtheres a main guy in the middle, and the others whirl around him like the solar system. Their left hands are lowered and their right hands are raised, to symbolize the connection between heaven and earth. Its a meditation in motion. Ecstasy was what they went for and what they gotwhirling in ecstasy.

A dust dervish, or dust devil, is like a little cyclone. They spin in the desert. The dervish dust is what is left behind after the dervish finishes spinning.

My life would be the spinning of the dervish, and the dust would be my memoirs.

James H. Coburn IV

What is it like to be James Coburns son?

I dont really remember how old I was when I first heard that question. Its happened thousands of times, and it has never stopped. As recently as this week, somebody worked out who I was and asked me that very question.

My basic answer is that its hard for me to know what it was like compared to someone elses experience growing up. It was all normal for me, going to movie sets, hanging out, and having a father who was the center of attention when we walked into a room, so I didnt really have a different perspective.

My earliest memory of Dad comes from when I look at the picture of him dressing me, while holding his cigarette in a long cigarette holder. I have fleeting memories of our time in Paris when I was a baby, images of being in the park in Paris: trees, walkway, maybe snow, freezing temperatures. I remember arriving at Tower Road. Im not sure Dad was around that day. Maybe he was. I remember the first night there. I was initially given a room next to my parents room. It was uncomfortably hot.

Later I moved from my room to what had been Lisas room. And eventually I moved from that room to the house behind the garage. I had Don DeLews Freeway painting hanging in that house. My friends and I would often trip our asses off. It was a good life. But it was just normal life back then. We ran wild. We ran around the streets like we owned them. We did what we did, which wasnt much, with reckless abandon.

I will never forget the sound of Dad driving his California Ferrari home, up Tower Road, how he would roar up the street. It was unmistakable. You could hear it echoing through the canyon. Theres Mom and Dad, or Theres Dad coming home. And I would do the appropriate thing, like rush around to turn off the TV because I wasnt supposed to be up so late. Id have to have the TV off before they got to the driveway or theyd see the light and theyd bust me.

One way my childhood was different from others was when I was going to El Rodeo Elementary School. Most kids got dropped off by their parents or rode their bikes from nearby houses. Neither of my parents had a job to go to every day, so they were not interested in waking up at the ass crack of dawn to drive me to school. My mother had a very, very serious rule that you did not call or communicate or come to the house before ten oclock in the morning. If you called before ten, it had better be fucking important, or my mother would rip you a new asshole. Seriously.

My mother and father were not interested in driving their kids to school. That was an outrageous idea. Either youre going to get yourself to school on your bicyclewhich was perfectly valid, but a long way, and I did that for a long timeor if the weathers really bad, Andreas (the gardener) is going to take you down there, if hes not too hungover.

But my best memories of Dad were those carefree days of driving around with himnot the long drives to Desert Hot Springs to visit his parents, but times like going to Dolores and having double-decker Jumbo Jims in the car. Dolores was a drive-in place down at La Cienega and Wilshire. We would pull up in his California Ferrari, which had no top, and wed have malts and burgers and fries in the car.