Kate Sanchez
Dr. Jim Lee: A Quest to Always Improve
Roosevelt County is an area filled with talented and interesting people. Portales itself has several skillful folks who have experienced some unique things throughout their life. So, if you haven’t had the privilege to speak with Dr. Jim Lee, you’re missing an opportunity to gain insight on one of the area’s experts on all things writing, performance, and theater. And the best part is, he’s not done yet!
From a young age, Lee was an avid reader. In fact, he tried to teach himself to read as a preschooler so he could better understand the excitement surrounding the newspaper articles about Truman defeating Dewey. As Lee began school, he sought every opportunity to write that he could, resulting in stories being composed in an old notebook he happened to find. Although influenced by popular names such as Edgar Allan Poe, Hugh Lofton, and Robert Luis Stevenson, Lee says very few people were interested in reading his attempts at writing, but he forged on. “It was a solitary activity, and I was a solitary kid,” he shares.
Lee’s playwriting introduction was also one of humble beginnings and happened in the sixth grade when his teacher decided the class was going to perform a talent show. The problem, however, was that Lee felt he had little talent. His grandmother offered a simple solution: rounding up other kids who didn’t have a talent and put together a play. So, he did just that! “The bewildered group I put together expected me to tell everyone what to do,” he says, “I figured a play was just acting out a story instead of getting anybody to read it.” So, young Lee made up characters and a story line, and instructed his classmates on what to say and do, thus thrusting him into the world of theater. In the seventh grade his school had tryouts for a production called The Indian Captive and Lee was cast as Falling Leaves, something he recalls as “fun”, because his grandmother who had originally proposed his idea for a play was half Native American.
From that point on, Lee was hooked on theater. “I acted in play after play for years,” he shares, “All along I’d try writing plays here and there. In college my plays improved enough to see some produced.” At that time in his life, Lee began working in Hollywood doing small movie roles. Some of those included Milton Berle’s stand-in for a stint, and stunt doubling for Tony Curtis. He also produced some, including the first West Coast production of The Trial of the Catonsville Nine, by Daniel Berrigan after it spent time on Broadway. Lee also co-founded the Metropolitan Theatre Guild Inc. in Los Angeles, in which he wrote the plays for the group, and his friend, David Rodich directed. In 2017, Lee wrote and directed a play to help promote awareness and prevention for teen suicide, and the script is now available for free to high school and colleges for us. The talented playwright has written over 15 produced stage plays overall, and is published by Samuel French, Inc. in New York City. Additionally, Lee has written three nationally syndicated radio dramas for MacGreggor Studios in Hollywood, as well as ENMU’s radio drama program Theater of the Mind. Even with all of his achievements in playwriting, Lee does not think of it as a career. “I think of it as part of who I am,” he says, “I do what I am driven to do.”
In addition to playwriting, Lee taught for several years, beginning with theatre at the University of Utah in the 1980’s. He ran a consulting business for post-secondary proprietary schools and taught American Literature at the southern Nevada campus of National University. Lee also taught writing at UNLV. More locally, he taught English at Clovis Community College in the 1990’s and then taught English and communication at ENMU from 1999 to 2015. Lee retired as adjunct professor of communication. He was also the FM news Director for KENW (PBS and NPR affiliate) at ENMU.
Although Lee misses teaching, he says he’s busier now that he’s retired. “I don’t see retirement as quitting; I see it as moving on to something else,” he adds. These days, he enjoys writing novels. Within the next few months, his novel, Loup-Garou: The Shape Changer Chronicles, will be released. After that, it will be Brotherhood of the Streets. He has also completed the first draft of a novel with the working title of A Gathering of Evil, as well as working on the first draft of a novel with the working title of The Fear Machine. And, when he’s done with those, the writer says he has a list of concepts just waiting to be written. Meanwhile, a large part of his mindset is still in the arts. “…I haven’t stopped thinking about writing plays- or screenplays. Sheridan Gibney, who taught me how to write screenplays, had two academy awards doing that, so I might as well give that a shot, too,” he says.
Born and raised in Lansing Michigan, Lee has lived in several places as an adult, including Detroit, St. Louis, Minneapolis, Les Vegas, NV, Los Angeles, and Salt Lake City. He has lived in Portales since 2000, and prior to that, Clovis. Lee and his wife, Rica, often visit Los Angeles, as she has family and business interests there. “I enjoy going there (West Hollywood or Beverly Hills) because of the cultural activities, and it’s kind of like going home because I lived there for 13 years,” he adds, “I miss working in movies and doing plays in those little theaters.”
Lee enjoys life with family and refers to Rica as his “treasure”. Additionally, he has a son who lives in Arizona, one granddaughter, and two great-granddaughters. He and Rica have two cats, two dogs, and one wolf, most of which are rescues. “They fill up the empty nest very nicely,” Lee says.
In achieving so much in life, Lee says he cannot pinpoint his biggest accomplishment because he’s still working on it. It’s easy to see however, just how much energy, enthusiasm, and passion goes into everything he does. As far as Lee is concerned, he just wants to make the world a better place. “I want to leave something of value behind when my journey ends,” he shares, “I hope the world will be a tiny bit better because I was in it for a while.”
