DUNNE, John Gregory 1932-2003

OBITUARY NOTICE—

See index for CA sketch: Born May 25, 1932, in Hartford, CT; died of a heart attack, December 30, 2003, in New York, NY. Journalist and author. Dunne, who sometimes took a back seat in prominence to his famous wife, Joan Didion, was an author of well-received novels, nonfiction books, and screenplays that often featured gritty characters and dialogue and drew on his own life's experiences in Hollywood and growing up in an Irish-American home. A 1954 graduate of Princeton University, he joined the U.S. Army right out of college. Unfortunately, he proved to be less than an adept soldier and was discharged two years later. Although his parents wanted their son to study business, Dunne decided to forego further schooling and found a job at a New York City advertising agency. This led to a position with Time magazine, where he discovered a love for journalism. It was also in New York that Dunne met and married Joan Didion. The couple moved to Los Angeles in the mid-1960s and together wrote a column for the Saturday Evening Post. They also collaborated on a screenplay, Panic in Needle Park (1971), a well-received adaptation of the James Mills book. By this time, Dunne's wife had already made a name for herself as an author, while he was still struggling, although Dunne did draw attention for his 1969 nonfiction book about Hollywood, The Studio. It was in Hollywood that Dunne earned his much of his bread and butter; he wrote the screenplay version of Didion's Play It As It Lays (1972) and was a collaborating scriptwriter for the 1976 blockbuster A Star Is Born. The mid-1970s also saw the release of Dunne's first novels, Vegas: A Memoir of a Dark Season (1974), which draws heavily on his Irish-American heritage, and the best-selling political novel True Confessions (1977), which he later adapted into a 1981 screenplay. Through the 1980s and 1990s, Dunne continued to prove his versatility as a writer, making it difficult to categorize him. His works included the novels The Red, White and Blue (1987) and Playland (1994), the screenplays Broken Trust (1995) and Up Close and Personal (1996), the semiautobiographical Harp (1989), and a collection of essays titled Crooning (1990). At the same time, Dunne continued to pursue a freelance journalism career, writing for such periodicals as the New York Review of Books. More recently, he returned to one of his favorite subjects, Hollywood, in his penultimate book, Monster: Living Off the Big Screen (1997). Before his death, Dunne had completed another novel, which is scheduled to be published in 2004.

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

BOOKS

Contemporary Novelists, 7th edition, St. James Press (Detroit, MI), 2001.

PERIODICALS

Los Angeles Times, December 31, 2003, pp. A1, A12.

New York Times, January 1, 2004, p. B9.

Times (London, England), January 3, 2004.

Washington Post, January 1, 2004, p. B7.