Steve McQueen - Marc Eliot [40]
Separation Hill appealed to Steve because it was an action-oriented war film. As a Method actor, he could call upon his marine experiences much more easily than searching for his inner cowboy. Pirosh’s screenplay told the story of seven men (a lucky number for Steve) who must hold a strategic position while waiting for the rest of their company. Steve liked it well enough, but when he met with Pirosh he told him to make his part—that of the troubled Private Reese, a sullen loner who winds up paying the ultimate price in an act of unexpected bravery—even bigger and more dramatic.
Fine, Pirosh said, as long as not a single word of his script was changed. Steve then went to Marty Rackin, the newly appointed head of Paramount, and told him it was either him or Pirosh and there was no compromise possible. Pirosh was out as director, and Rackin called veteran Don Siegel to offer him the film. Siegel’s directing career had begun in 1945 with Star in the Night, a two-reeler intended to open the double-feature programs at neighborhood movie theaters. When it won an Oscar for Best Short Subject, Siegel moved up to features and became a solid B-movie director, with an occasional outstanding moment, such as 1956’s classic sleeper hit Invasion of the Body Snatchers, which he made as a one-off at Allied Artists. His taut 1958 The Lineup, shot on location on the streets of San Francisco, helped relaunch the film career of Eli Wallach, and Siegel’s direction caught the eye of Clint Eastwood. With Steve and Pirosh locking horns over Separation Hill, Rackin thought Siegel was the right director to save the project.
At first, Siegel said no, because Pirosh had been one of his best friends ever since they had worked on The Big Steal together in 1949. When Rackin persisted, Siegel called Pirosh to find out exactly what had gone down. When Pirosh said he couldn’t get along with anyone connected to the film, Siegel said, “What the hell’s the matter with you?”
“One word,” Pirosh said. “McQueen. Second word: Rackin.”
“You’re getting a royal screwing,” Siegel told him, “but at the same time, you’re stupid. So you don’t direct the picture—but at least produce it and write it. I can take some of the pressure off as the director. How about it?”
“I don’t want anything to do with [Separation Hill].”
“Bob, have you anything against my directing your picture?”
“On the contrary, good luck—you’ll need it.”
Only then did Siegel agree to do the film and meet Steve for the first time in Rackin’s office. As Siegel recalled in his memoir, “Others were there. Dick Carr, a writer brought in by Rackin specifically to develop and improve Steve’s role, Al Manuel, Rackin’s associate, and Hilly Elkins, who Steve was still angry at over having lost Pocketful of Miracles and the subsequent flop The Honeymoon Machine. With the exception of a very tight McQueen, everyone else was positively beaming.”
A still-furious-at-Pirosh McQueen spoke, and it wasn’t pretty. “I don’t understand all this happiness,” he said, referring to the cordiality among those in the room. “My name goes on the picture and I still don’t like the project.” He then chewed out Rackin for having bought an inferior and unfinished script from Pirosh. Next on his hit list was Carr, whom he dismissed in front of everybody as a hack. And Elkins came in for his share as well, according to Steve, for not properly looking after the McQueen franchise.