James McLure, playwright

[Jim Beaver]

My friend Jim McLure died this morning after a long illness. He was one of
the best playwrights and wittiest men I've ever known. I'm not sure I've
ever had more fun in a theatre than watching and then, years later,
performing in his hysterical play "Lone Star," about two near-idiot Texans
drinking out back of a West Texas bar in the middle of the night. I saw the
very first production of it, at Actors Theatre of Louisville, in 1979. It
played on Broadway a year later, with Powers Boothe and Leo Burmester.
Although I met Jim briefly at ATL during that production (when I had a play
of my own running there), I didn't get to know him until a party for what we
called the Texas Mafia in L.A. a few years later. Jim had gone to Southern
Methodist University with Powers and Stephen Tobolowsky and Beth Henley, and
there was a huge crowd from that school that hung out and worked together in
L.A. Jim was Sigourney Weaver's boyfriend for a long time.

I'm not sure what his illness was. I'd been out of touch with him for a
long time. I'd contact him every so often about doing a production of "Lone
Star" in L.A., but it couldn't ever happen (still can't) because of a stupid
clause in the film-rights contract when he sold the play to Paramount (the
play can't be produced in L.A. until after the film has been released a
certain amount of time--but the film was never made, so "Lone Star" has
never been [legally] produced onstage in Los Angeles). Too bad. It's an
incredibly funny play.

I haven't seen any news reports yet, but friends have told me of his death.
Still a young man, he's somebody I will miss a lot, despite the infrequency
of our contact--an infrequency I regret even more now.

Jim Beaver

[Royana Black]

Jim -

Jim was also a fiend of mine. I, like you, have regrets about how
infrequently I kept in touch. i spent many summers with him in Healing
Springs, NC -- he worked on new stuff and all of us actors got to read
it as it came streaming out of him. He is someone who had a huge
impact on me and whose words are a treasure and you have my
sympathies. We have lost one of the greats.

Royana Black