Steve McQueen - Marc Eliot [28]
That April, for a Sunday newspaper feature that would be syndicated nationally in June following the completion of principal shooting on Never So Few, Hopper invited Steve and Neile to the Fear Palace. Neile, too big now to fit into the Porsche Spyder, let Steve have it for the night and she drove to the house in a Ford Mustang convertible. She arrived before her husband. In a story that may be apocryphal, when he arrived, Steve flashed his great smile at Hopper, who personally went to the door to meet him, and asked her in a whisper—so that Neile, who was already inside, couldn’t hear him—if she wanted to screw. Supposedly Hopper, who was known to be quite vain, was utterly charmed by this.
During the interview, Steve told Hopper: “I could never find a level with society. I came from poor people who worked hard to stay alive. I got into situations I wasn’t bright about. I didn’t have any concept of what I was like, so I existed in it, so I got into trouble. It was never anything serious, really—just hassles. The guys I was living with were all goofing off. Now I have a beautiful wife. I’m putting money into stock and bonds, own my own home, and am carving myself a career. I’m going to toe the line from now on.”
Although almost none of it was true—the only stocks and bonds Steve had were his cars and motorcycles, and the home had been purchased by Neile—that day Hopper became an enthusiastic lifelong supporter of Steve and his career. When her piece on him came out, it read more like a gushing love letter than a comprehensive profile. Steve knew how to turn on the charm when it benefited him.
During filming, Sinatra became increasingly fond of Steve, and a bit envious of his seemingly effortless acting abilities. Sinatra huffed and puffed his way through his scenes, trying whenever he could to telegraph his feelings to the audiences—“indicating” his emotions, Method actors would say—rather than organically connecting to the character and letting the emotional results come from that connection. Sinatra’s idea of projecting toughness in the film was talking tough (which actually had the opposite effect, making his character seem a bit of an empty barrel) and in his jungle love scenes he acted like he was trying to pick up Lollobrigida at the bar at Jilly’s.
Sinatra always liked “real men” and expressed his affection for Steve in typical boys-will-be-boys fashion. Sometimes on set he would sneak up behind McQueen and set off a firecracker near Steve’s ass, or stick a dud in his gun belt, light it, and wait for the fun to begin. The first couple of times Sinatra did it, Steve jumped like a scared rabbit, which sent Sinatra into convulsions. Soon enough, though, Steve taught himself not to jump at the cracker sounds, and that made Sinatra even more envious of him. And to get even, one time Steve grabbed one of the prop machine guns, called out Sinatra’s name, and when he turned around, shot a round of blanks directly at him. Sinatra stared at Steve for several seconds, during which the entire set went quiet. Steve stared back, unblinking. “Everybody was watching Frank to see what he’d do. He had a real bad temper, and I guess they all figured we were gonna end in a punch-out. I wasn’t sure myself, as we stared at each other. Then he just started laughing and it was all over. After, we got along just fine … you back down to a guy like Sinatra, he never respects you.” According to Steve, it was the turning point of their relationship. After that, “Frank Sinatra kept saying, ‘Give the close-up