McQueen An American Icon
Terence Stephen McQueen was born on March 24th in
1930 in Indianapolis USA. Steve had a turbulent childhood until he turned 17 and joined the marine corps. He was first seen on a theater stage in 1952 He was an American actor who was nicknamed,, The King of cool“. His filmography includes movies like,, The Cincinnati Kid“, ,, Love with the Proper Stranger“,,The Thomas Crown Affaire, ,,Bullit“ and much more. After playing a role in more and more b movies he made his way to Hollywood in the early 1960s. At that time no one could have thought of the influence Steve would have at the whole industry as well as on the picture of a man. Steve had two children Chad and his sister Terry. ,,He did has beautiful blue eyes, they were sad eyes“ Barbara Leigh the model and actress had an affair with McQueen while she was dating Elvis Presley. Steve also said in one of his last interviews in 1980 that he was never sure whether he did everything in a good way since his parents were never happy with him. He believed that the love a child gets when it is young is mandatory for its life. Steve never felt at home, he was always searching for the luck in his life. Realizing in his last years that he was quite a macho and threw away a big part of his life through drugs and alcohol made quite an impact on him. Nevertheless, he never stopped fighting and always open for new things like the ability to fly a plane.As the cancer was growing and growing doctors can pretty much say that the cancer is an outcome from the asbestos he was inhaling all the time while he was in the marine and changing pipes in the machinery room from a ship. Steve died at the age of 50 in Mexico from a heart attack after surgery.
Steve and his daughter Terry
Steve was nicknamed ,, the king of cool“
Steve the icon ,,I live for myself and I answer to nobody“ Steve McQueen. With that being said McQueen personified the “anti-hero” in Hollywood at a time when the emerging counterculture in America was challenging the very definition of what a true “hero” is. Steve started for what some would calll a ,,thrown away life“ and became one of the most influencal actors ever. To live an idealistic, heroic life without fault is ultimately impossible. We all struggle with aligning our beliefs and goals in life with what is truly right. The fact is there are grey areas that we have to be honest about. We saw the good and bad in McQueen, and loved him anyway– in fact, we loved him for it. He was honest about who he was. We all know McQueen raced cars and motorcycles, but his story goes a lot deeper than that. His father abandoned him and his alcoholic mother when he was just six-months-old. Steve locked horns with his new stepfather, whom he called “a prime son of a bitch”. He struggled with dyslexia in school and was partially deaf. The young McQueen soon fell in with a street gang, and ran away from home at 14, joining the circus for a short time, and was eventually turned over to the California Junior Boys Republic in Chino Hills, California.Steve once said that if he wouldnt have joined the boys club he would have become a criminal. The fact that McQueen never gave up although his childhood was more than turbulent brought him where he belonged. At the top. Always fighting, never giving up are just a few things that make steve an icon for me. Producers who have worked with him confirmed his possession about wanting to know everything about cameras, angles, light and where you would see a shadow through the camera etc. That obsession from steve shows one more time that he ,, fought like hell“ for everything he did.
,,When I believe in something, I fight like hell for it “ Steve McQueen
His passion for cars and everything that had an engine started in his early life when he became a small toy truck when he was four years old from his uncle Claude. Racing motorcycles at the weekend, while he was in acting school in New York, made his living. Knowing to ride a bike had several benefits for Steve, the scene in ,,The Gateway“ where he jumps over a fence in Germany made him iconic and played a big role to its personality as an actor. Steve even produced his own race movie in Le Mans, the 24hour race in France.Le Mans is one of the if not the most difficult race in the world. The fact that the race drivers have to drive for 24hours at their maximum capability of driving. Every four or five hours they change the driver, it is only allowed to drive with two drivers. He wanted to display the rush a race driver gets while driving over small french roads in the middle of the night with more than 350 kilometers an hour. A few of Steve friends said that he would often take a bike or car and just drove away, drive, to drive the stress away. Steve produced the movie LeMans with his own production company which sadly didn‘t pay off. The movie didn‘t make as much profit as he thought which made him pay a lot from his private money. After a short drought, Steve got back up again and played in huge productions the main role and got paid higher than every actor before. Nevertheless, Steve was still searching for something in his life he couldn‘t really figure out himself. He wanted to leave Hollywood and start something new, a real life. He started to take flying lessons which lead to a real friendship with his flight instructor who introduced him to Christ. After Steve went to church you could tell that he had changed, his search had an end. He was happier than he ever was before. At the age of 49, he married his wife Barbara Minty. Furthermore, the married couple bought a ranch in Idaho to start a new life, sadly Steve never got to see that new, happy life
Steve and his wife Barbara on a family trip