Steve McQueen - Marc Eliot [48]
The Washington Post was even less impressed: “The War Lover goes to remarkable trouble to avoid what it is talking about. One would have thought Steve McQueen ideal for the title role, and he might have been so, had he been imaginatively used.”
None of the critics really liked the film, their reviews did nothing to stir the public’s interest, and it failed at the box office. A growing antiwar sentiment in America didn’t help. With civil rights issues hanging in the air and the aftermath of the Korean War still quite pungent in the hearts and minds of Americans, World War II films seemed slightly dated and out of touch.
The film’s disappointing box office left Steve dangling from a career tightrope. One more false step now and he would undoubtedly fall into the chasm of failed stardom, while one smart move toward safety would ensure his place in the pantheon of name-above-the-title performers. Few TV stars to date had successfully made the transition to the movies. It usually happened in reverse: Lucille Ball, Phil Silvers, Perry Como, Jackie Gleason, and dozens of others who had worked steadily in films but never made it to the top of that world had become genuine television sensations, as the small screen made their small-scale talents seem that much bigger.
Back in L.A., Steve did nothing very hard as he buried himself in auto racing. He was so much better at it after having been with Moss in England, that he was invited by John Cooper to become an active member of the British Motor Corporation (BMC), which meant he would always be able to race professionally in Europe. He had one weekend to decide. According to Steve, “It was a very tough decision for me to reach, because [at this point] I didn’t know if I was an actor who raced or a racer who acted. But I had Neile and our two children to consider, and that made a difference. I turned down the BMC offer but I came very close to chucking my film career. I [knew] I hadn’t done anything really important or outstanding on the screen, and I was tired of waiting for the ‘big picture,’ the one that hopefully would break me through.”
However, plans were already being made for him to star in yet another war picture, but this one would be very different; this one would finally make him a superstar.
HE HAD been given the script to read before he’d left England by Hilly Elkins, who himself was growing weary of the Hollywood scene. The studio system was crumbling, leaving the film business in something of a shambles, and Elkins was eager to return to New York and Broadway. He already had a project for Sammy Davis Jr.: a musical version of The Golden Boy, the Clifford Odets play that had been turned into a movie in 1939, making William Holden a star, and was now, under Elkins, being reconceived into a song-and-dance stage drama for Davis.
As a final gesture of goodwill to Steve, with whom he would remain friends for the rest of his life, Elkins encouraged Stan Kamen at the William Morris Agency to continue to rep him, despite Steve’s string of unimpressive box office returns, which normally would be the kiss of death in Hollywood. As a parting gesture, Elkins had sent Steve the script for The Great Escape, which already had John Sturges attached—something that made the decision to be in it very easy. That, and the fact he was being offered top billing, something he had never had before.
However, as always, Steve held his cards close to his vest and tried to hedge his bets. Steve had been considering several other projects. He had tried but failed to buy the TV rights to “Beauty and the Beast” (that would one day become a Disney animated feature and Broadway stage musical), and he had been turned down by director George Roy Hill for the leading role of Ralph Baitz in Hill’s screen adaptation of Tennessee Williams’s Period of Adjustment, a minor neurotic war-between-the-sexes drama, the type of play that Williams could