Former fine arts dean remembered after drowning

At the audition for “Much Ado About Nothing” several years ago, Laura Wright found herself at the mercy of Dr. James Kriley, who was directing the show.
As she tore through her passage from “Taming of the Shrew,” her Shakespearian soliloquy began to fall apart.
“I just vomited my lines,” Wright said. “It was horrible. Horrible. Horrible.”
Still, Kriley pressed her to continue. He made sure she had her three minutes and gave her the same amount of respect he showed all of his students.
After she finished, he asked her to give her name and ID number like everyone else.
“If I was going to get a call back, people would know who I was,” Wright said.

Kriley died last week after falling out of his sailboat in Big Arm Bay on Flathead Lake. He left behind his wife, three daughters and a legacy of students and teachers he inspired, as well as the PAR/TV building he helped to build.
After he came to the University of Montana’s Drama and Dance Department as the new chair in 1976, Kriley was charged with helping a crippled department on the brink of disaster.
His miracle cure came in 1985 after the PAR/TV building was completed.
“He was the driving force to get this whole building built,” said long-time colleague Greg Johnson, director of the UM Drama department.
He called Kriley a great leader who tirelessly lobbied the state legislature for funding, and who challenged his students.
“When the going got tough, you could always count on Kriley,” Johnson said. “I learned so much about teaching from him.”
Appointed dean of UM Fine Arts in 1987, Kriley encouraged constant innovation and evolution in the drama department. One of his biggest ambitions was bringing the department up to speed with the “digital revolution” in the form of the Media Arts program, which he helped start with colleague and former student Michael Murphy.
Murphy remembers Kriley, the man he called his main mentor at UM who had initiative to get plans off the ground while refusing to let financial constraints scare him into inaction.
“He said, ‘Let’s build it. Let’s get it going, and we’ll find the funding,’” Murphy said, “which is the usual way he went about things.”
After the program gained enough support to stand on its own, Kriley stepped down from his dean’s position in 1998 to focus on teaching once again, despite the job security he left behind.
“I think it was the most courageous thing he did in his life,” Murphy said.
Kriley went on to impact hundreds of students after his departure from the dean’s office in his last years at UM, and was scheduled to teach two courses this fall.
Wright, who took Kriley’s dramatic literature class in 2006 and acted as a teacher’s assistant for his 2007 class, recalled Kriley’s ability to remember names and characteristics for all 60 graduate and undergraduate students in his class.
“He sees the power of the individual,” Wright said. “He knew everyone in the class.”
Tim Larson, a senior in acting, said Kriley taught him - sometimes line by line - how to really be in a moment.
“He was a very admirable man. I admired him a lot,” Larson said. “He was a very, very blunt teacher.”
Raker Wilson, also an acting senior, remembered his “blue collar” approach to acting and treating it like just another job.
“He offered a different view of theater from any of the other professors,” Wilson said. “I had my preconceived notions of theater and he helped change those.”
Sometimes Wilson had chances to talk to Kriley on the way out of class and discuss what they had learned that day.
In one of those moments, Kriley told him about why he stayed in the drama department for so long. Kriley spoke about his belief that an individual can shape people they come into contact with every day, eventually changing the world through those interactions.
“I really appreciated the time he took to spend with me out of class and in class,” Wilson said.
Wright, who earned her degree in Drama and English last year, said she hopes to carry on his legacy of relentless dedication to individuals in her work as an aide in the English department.
“I know I’m going to try a more Kriley approach to dealing with students,” she said.

michael.gerrity@umontana.edu