James MacArthur

Early life

Born in Los Angeles, MacArthur was the adopted son of playwright Charles MacArthur, and his wife, actress Helen Hayes. He grew up in Nyack, New York, along with the MacArthurs' biological daughter, Mary. He was educated at Allen-Stevenson School in New York, and later at the Solebury School in New Hope, Pennsylvania, where he starred in basketball, football and baseball. In his final year at Solebury, MacArthur played guard on the football team; captained the basketball team; was president of his class, the student government, and the Drama Club; rewrote the school's constitution; edited the school paper, The Scribe; and played Scrooge in a local presentation of A Christmas Carol. He also started dating a fellow student, future actress Joyce Bulifant; they were married in November 1958 and divorced nine years later.

MacArthur grew up around the greatest literary and theatrical talent of the time. Lillian Gish was his godmother, and his family's guests included Ben Hecht, Harpo Marx, Robert Benchley, Beatrice Lillie, John Barrymore and John Steinbeck. His first radio role was on the Theatre Guild on the Air, in 1948. Theatre Guild on the Air was the premier radio program of its day, producing one-hour plays that were performed in front of a live audience of 800. Helen Hayes accepted a role in one of the plays, which also had a small role for a child. Her son was asked if he would like to do it, and he agreed.

Acting career

MacArthur made his stage debut at Olney, Maryland in 1949, with a two-week stint in The Corn Is Green. His sister Mary was in the play and telephoned their mother to request that James go to Olney to be in it with her. The following summer, he repeated the role at Dennis, Massachusetts, and his theatrical career was underway. In 1954, he played John Day in Life with Father with Howard Lindsay and Dorothy Stickney. He became involved in important Broadway productions only after receiving his training in summer stock theatre.

MacArthur also worked as a set painter, lighting director, and chief of the parking lot. During a Helen Hayes festival at the Falmouth Playhouse on Cape Cod, he had a few walk-on parts. He also helped the theatre electrician, and grew so interested that he was allowed to stay on after his mother's plays had ended. As a result, he lit the show for Barbara Bel Geddes in The Little Hut and for Gloria Vanderbilt in The Swan. When he visited Paris with his mother as a member of The Skin of Our Teeth company, he was in charge of making thunder backstage with a sheet of metal.

At the age of 18, he played Hal Ditmar in the television play, Deal a Blow, directed by John Frankenheimer and starring Macdonald Carey, Phyllis Thaxter, and Edward Arnold. In 1956, Frankenheimer directed the movie version of the play, which was renamed The Young Stranger, with MacArthur again in the starring role. Again, his performance was critically acclaimed, earning him a nomination for Most Promising Newcomer at the 1958 BAFTA awards. He made The Light in the Forest and Third Man on the Mountain, for Walt Disney, during summer breaks from Harvard University, where he was studying history.

Deciding to make acting his full-time career, he left Harvard in his second year to make two more Disney movies, Kidnapped and Swiss Family Robinson.

MacArthur made his Broadway debut in 1960, playing opposite Jane Fonda in Invitation to a March, for which he received a Theatre World Award. Although he never returned to Broadway, he remained active in theatre, appearing in such productions as Under the Yum Yum Tree, The Moon Is Blue, John Loves Mary (with his then wife, Joyce Bulifant), Barefoot in the Park, and Murder at the Howard Johnson's. He also released several records in the early 1960s, scoring two minor hits with "(The Story of) The In-Between Years" and "The Ten Commandments of Love", both of which peaked at number 94 in the Billboard Hot 100.

He then went on to roles in movies including The Interns, Spencer's Mountain, The Truth About Spring, and Cry of Battle, as well as The Love-Ins and The Angry Breed. On the set of The Angry Breed, in 1968, MacArthur met Melody Patterson, who was to become his second wife. They were married on the Hawaiian Island of Kauai in July 1970, and divorced five years later. In 1963, he was nominated for the "Top New Male Personality" category of the Golden Laurel Awards.

Between movie and theatre roles, MacArthur was also in demand for television guest appearances, which included roles in Studio One, GE Theatre, Bus Stop the play, Bus Stop the television series, Bonanza, Gunsmoke, Wagon Train, The Eleventh Hour, The Great Adventure, The Alfred Hitchcock Hour, Combat!, and The Virginian.

In 1966, he guest-starred as Lt. Harley Wilson in "The Outsider", episode 20 in the second season of Twelve O'Clock High (TV series). He co-starred with his mother Helen Hayes in the 1968 episode "The Pride of the Lioness" on the Tarzan television series. MacArthur also gave a particularly chilling performance as baby-faced opium dealer Johnny Lubin in The Untouchables episode, "Death For Sale".

Though many of his movie roles were not starring roles, and some were quite brief, they were usually pivotal to the plot. His role in The Bedford Incident was that of a young ensign who became so rattled by the needling of his captain (Richard Widmark), that he accidentally fired an ASROC at a Soviet submarine, thus creating a nuclear incident when the submarine returned fire, resulting in the destruction of both vessels.

In Battle of the Bulge, he again played the role of a young and inexperienced officer. However, this time, the officer found courage and a sense of responsibility. His brief but memorable appearance in the Clint Eastwood movie, Hang 'Em High eventually led to his role as Dan Williams in Hawaii Five-O, popularizing the catchphrase "Book 'em, Danno".

Hawaii Five-O

In 1967, Leonard Freeman, the producer and co-writer of Hang 'Em High, made the pilot for a new television police series, Hawaii Five-O. Before it went to air, the pilot was well received by test audiences, except for some dislike of the actor playing Dan Williams.

Freeman remembered MacArthur's portrayal of the traveling preacher in Hang 'Em High – MacArthur had come on the set and done the scene in one take. He called MacArthur and offered him the role of Dan Williams.

The show was popularized by its opening sequence and theme music and location filming in Hawaii. It was not in the top 30 in ratings until its second season, when it was rated number 19. For the next five seasons, the show's ratings were always in the top 10, topped by its number-three rating and 25.2 share in 1972–73.

Many episodes ended with Hawaii Five-O chief Steve McGarrett (Jack Lord) instructing Williams (MacArthur) to "Book 'em, Danno!" (sometimes followed by stating a charge such as "murder one"), which became a well-known catch phrase in popular culture. Hawaii Five-O was the longest-running TV crime drama until it was finally surpassed by Law & Order in 2003.

MacArthur has said that one of his favorite episodes was "Retire in Sunny Hawaii Forever" (1975), which starred his mother, Helen Hayes. She played Danno's Aunt Clara, who visits Hawaii and helps the detectives solve a murder.

Hawaii Five-O ran for 12 years – 11 with MacArthur. Leaving the show at the end of its 11th season, MacArthur returned to the theatre, appearing in The Lunch Hour with Cybill Shepherd.

After Hawaii Five-O

He appeared in A Bedfull of Foreigners in Chicago in 1984, and in Michigan in 1985. He followed this with The Hasty Heart, before taking a year out of show business. In 1987, he returned to the stage in The Foreigner, then played Mortimer in the national tour of Arsenic and Old Lace with Jean Stapleton, Marion Ross, and Larry Storch. In 1989, he followed another stint in The Foreigner with Love Letters, and in 1990–1991, A Bedfull of Foreigners, this time in Las Vegas.

After leaving Hawaii Five-O, McArthur guest-starred on such television shows as Murder, She Wrote, The Love Boat, Fantasy Island, and Vega$, as well as in the miniseries Alcatraz: The Whole Shocking Story and The Night the Bridge Fell Down, and in the television movie Stormchasers: Revenge of the Twister (1998), with Kelly McGillis.

Semiretirement

Throughout his career, MacArthur had also found time for various other ventures. From 1959 to 1960, he partnered with actors James Franciscus and Alan Ladd, Jr. in a Beverly Hills telephone answering service. In June 1972, he directed the Honolulu Community Theatre in a production of his father's play The Front Page. For a period in the 1990s, he was part owner of Senior World publication, as well as writing the occasional celebrity interview. He continued to appear at conventions, collectors' shows, and celebrity sporting events. A keen golfer, he was the winner of the 2002 Frank Sinatra Invitational Charity Golf Tournament.

He also appeared in television and radio specials and interview programs. His latest appearances included spots on Entertainment Tonight, Christopher's Closeup, and the BBC Radio 5 Live obituary program Brief Lives, in which he paid tribute to his Hawaii Five-O castmate, the late Kam Fong. In 1997, MacArthur returned without Jack Lord (who was in declining health) to reprise his character, who had become Hawaii's governor in the plot, in the 1997 unaired pilot of Hawaii Five-O which starred actor Gary Busey.

In April 2003, he traveled to Honolulu's historic Hawaii Theatre for a cameo role in Joe Moore's play Dirty Laundry. Negotiations were underway in summer 2010 for MacArthur to make a cameo appearance in the new CBS primetime remake of Hawaii Five-O at the time of his death, a role that eventually was given to Al Harrington. On the November 1, 2010, episode, MacArthur's death was mentioned in a short tribute that played before the start of that episode.

In 2001, a Golden Palm Star on the Palm Springs Walk of Stars was dedicated to him.

Death

MacArthur died of cancer on October 28, 2010, at the age of 72, at the Mayo Clinic in Jacksonville, Florida. At the time of death, he was a resident of Palm Desert, California. He was survived by his third wife, former LPGA golfer Helen Beth Duntz, of 25 years, and his four children: Charles P. MacArthur, Mary McClure, Juliette Rappaport, and James D. MacArthur; and seven grandchildren. His daughter Juliette was married to Beverly Hills real estate broker Kurt Rappaport. He is interred in Nyack, New York's Oak Hill Cemetery.

The episode "Ho'apono" from the 2010 version of Hawaii Five-0 was dedicated to MacArthur.