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Atheist Tuesday: The Steve McQueen Story

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Atheists! Read this one! This is an incredible story!

Remember Steve McQueen? If you’re under thirty, probably not. But you can get any of his films on Netflix. Here are some of the films he is famous for: The Magnificent Seven, The Blob, The Great Escape, The Thomas Crown Affair, BullittPapillon, and The Towering Inferno. Two of my favorites were directed by a man named Sam Peckinpah: The Getaway, and Junior Bonner.

Here’s an excerpt from a great article linked at the bottom:

They said he could act with the back of his head. No dialogue or frills required—his mere presence loomed larger than life in every shot. Put him next to some of the finest actors in the business, and he would undercut every one of them simply by being in the frame. His piercingly distinctive blue eyes were set in a rough-hewn, unconventionally handsome face that rarely betrayed strong emotion. His smallest physical gesture was precisely calculated and gracefully executed. You couldn’t best him, you couldn’t buy him, you couldn’t touch him. He was the King of Cool. He was Steve McQueen.

Everyone had a Steve McQueen story.  His superior officers in the Marines could have told you how he spent 41 days in the brig for resisting arrest when caught AWOL. The young men at the Boys’ Republic where Steve had spent some of his teenage years could tell you how he regularly came back and visited the school after becoming famous, personally responding to every boy’s letters and financially supporting the school until his death. Magnificent Seven co-star Yul Brynner could tell you how McQueen stole scene after scene by deliberately throwing in extra, distracting bits of business. Bruce Lee could have told you about a hair-raising ride in Steve’s Porsche that had Lee cowering in the foot-well (and threatening to kill Steve when they stopped, causing a fearful McQueen to hit the gas again and refuse to slow down until Lee promised not to hurt him).

He was known to say that he lived for himself and answered to no one. Asked once if he believed in God, the actor brazenly replied, “I believe in me. God will be number one as long as I’m number one.” That philosophy informed much of his life. Read the rest by clicking here.

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