- Born
- Died
- Birth nameBilly Frank Jones
- Nickname
- Chris
- Height5′ 8″ (1.73 m)
- Christopher Jones was a brief cult star of the late '60s counterculture era and a would-be rebel successor to James Dean had he wanted it. Born William Franklin Jones amid rather impoverished surroundings to a grocery clerk in Jackson, Tennessee, in 1941, his artist mother had to be institutionalized when Chris was 4. She died in a mental facility in 1960, and this was always to haunt him. He shifted back and forth between homes and orphanages and was placed in Boys Town at one point to straighten out his life.
Chris joined the service as a young adult but went AWOL just two days later. After serving out his time on Governor's Island for this infraction, he moved to New York and studied painting, meeting a motley crew of actors and artists. Friends were startled by his moody nature and uncanny resemblance to the troubled Dean and he was encouraged to audition for the Actors Studio. He was accepted and eventually won the Broadway role of Pancho in "The Night of the Iguana" in 1961. Chris wound up marrying acting coach Lee Strasberg's daughter, Susan Strasberg, in 1965, but his erratic behavior would send her packing after three years and two children.
Chris's brooding good looks and undeniable charisma led him straight to Hollywood and, following a few TV episodic parts, earned the title film role of Chubasco (1968) co-starring then-wife Susan. He then earned cult stardom in Wild in the Streets (1968) as Max Frost, a rock star who becomes president. This popular satire, in turn, led another movie satire as the college boy Lothario in the interracial sex triangle Three in the Attic (1968) and such distinguished international projects as The Looking Glass War (1970), Jardines de España (1957) and Ryan's Daughter (1970). But the trappings of success quickly got to him.
Numerous entanglements with the Hollywood "in crowd" eventually took their toll, including those with Pamela Courson (Jim Morrison's girlfriend at the time), the ill-fated Sharon Tate, one-time co-star Pia Degermark, and Olivia Hussey. Not only did his volatile relationships with directors also leave him depressed, but his personal life remained in constant turmoil. Morrison's early drug-related death and Tate's particularly brutal murder hit him particularly hard and led to a breakdown.
Chris split the Hollywood scene altogether to regain himself but instead ended up a victim of the Sunset Strip drug culture for a time. He eventually cleaned up his act and two subsequent relationships led to five more children. He also turned to painting and sculpting as creative outlets and lived the Southern California beach scene. Little was heard until decades later when Quentin Tarantino offered him a part in Pulp Fiction (1994). The now reclusive and eccentric Jones turned down a role in that, but later decided to take on a cameo part in friend Larry Bishop's crime comedy-drama Mad Dog Time (1996) a couple of years later. This proved to be his only return to acting. Chris died of gall bladder cancer in 2014 at age 72.- IMDb Mini Biography By: Gary Brumburgh / [email protected]
- SpouseSusan Strasberg(September 25, 1965 - March 1968) (divorced, 1 child)
- ChildrenChristopher Jones Jr.
- ParentsRobbie JonesJ.G. Jones
- Emotionally devastated by the August 9, 1969, murder of his friend Sharon Tate, he suffered what he described as a "nervous breakdown" and abandoned his acting career.
- Discussed in four actresses' autobiographies: "Serves Me Right" (1994) by Sarah Miles; "Shelley II: The Middle of My Century" (1989) by Shelley Winters; "Bittersweet" (1980) by Susan Strasberg; and "The Girl on the Balcony" (2018) by Olivia Hussey.
- Turned down the role of Zed in Pulp Fiction (1994).
- Visited James Dean's family in Indiana, while traveling to New York, and ended up staying with them a few days; they'd hit it off well.
- Made his Broadway debut on December 28, 1961, in the premiere of Tennessee Williams The Night of the Iguana (1964) playing the Mexican beach boy Pancho. The other beach boy, Pedro, was played by James Farentino. Both became good friends with Shelley Winters, who played a key role in introducing Jones to his future wife, Susan Strasberg. They married in 1965, after living together, when Strasberg became pregnant.
- [in 1996, on why he left the film industry] I'd had a nervous breakdown over Sharon Tate's death. I had done three pictures in a row in Europe, and had so many love affairs I was exhausted. I was tired, man.
- But you know, I loved David [David Lean], and he liked me and we got along great most of the time. Just a few times it was head-to-head. But I totally respected him. A brilliant director. The best there was.
- I never took the resemblance and comparisons to Dean [James Dean] too seriously, I felt that I had talent in my own right.
- [on visiting James Dean's family while AWOL from the army] The Winslows were very nice people and made me feel right at home. Marcus [Dean's cousin] was not home, I suppose he may have been in school. They took me up to Jimmy's room where his Levis were lying on the bed waiting for him to jump into them and there were several pairs of boots on the floor just where he had left them. His uncle showed me his motorcycle and took me to the barn to see Jimmy's handprint they had put in the cement when he was nine years old. He also told me Jimmy fell while he was playing and his father made him a plate which he wore for the rest of his life.
- [1966 magazine interview] I adored movies. Everything was so clean and uncomplicated in the movies. All those important people in their big houses. That was my ideal. I wanted to be a movie star. The movies kept me going for a long time. They kept me going until I learned in New York three years ago that there is no ideal, that there are very few people who aren't hypocrites.
- Ryan's Daughter (1970) - $500,000
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