Barbara McQueen named guest of honor at Hamburg Film Festival

Barbara McQueen named guest of honor at Hamburg Film Festival

Barbara McQueen, widow of actor Steve McQueen, has been named as a special guest of honor at the Hamburg Film festival and will co-host a series of photo exhibits, book signings and a special screening of The Hunter with biographer Marshall Terrill in Germany.

“I’m continually amazed at the interest and longevity of Steve’s popularity and that the public finds my photos of interest,” said Barbara McQueen. “The people of Germany have been big McQueen fans for decades and I’m excited to meet them and hear what memories they have of Steve and his films.”

Her photos document their three-and-a-half year history when Steve McQueen lived most of the time away from the spotlight. It took almost 25 years before Barbara was able to review the hundreds of photos she took of her beloved husband. In 2007 she published “Steve McQueen: The Last Mile” and revised that edition this year, which includes several new photographs and passages. Now the photos will be available for the first time ever as an exhibition on display in Germany.

The week-long activity of events include:

·      Sept. 21 – “Biography Days”, kick-off ceremony in Nordwalde, Germany featuring McQueen and Terrill.

·      Sept. 22 – McQueen and Terrill will co-host “Steve McQueen: The Last Mile” and sign copies of “Steve McQueen: The Last Mile…revisited”, which was published in August. For more information visit http://www.biografische-kommunikation.de/steve-mcqueen-exhibition

·      Sept. 26 – Photo exhibition premiere of “Steve McQueen: The Last Mile” at the Prototype 

    Museum in Hamburg, Germany.  

·      Sept. 27 – Guest of honor at the Grand Opening of the Hamburg Film Festival.

·      Sept. 28 – “Steve McQueen Film Night” at the Hamburg Film Festival featuring a screening of “The Hunter” and "Papillon" followed by a Q & A with McQueen and Terrill.

A European-wide tour of the photo exhibit is planned for 2013 and 2014. For more information about
the German exhibitions and book signings, email Matthias Grenda at matthias@dialogbiografie.de

Santa Paula pays tribute to Steve McQueen

Santa Paula Airport hosts Steve McQueen events on December 6 & 7

Steve McQueen fueling his plane at Santa Paula Airport, May 1979.

Steve McQueen's last hometown is paying tribute to its most famous resident with a weekend of aviation and family-related activities.

The Aviation Museum of Santa Paula will welcome home Barbara McQueen with a VIP reception, dinner and booksigning on Saturday, December 6 at the Santa Paula Airport. The 5 p.m. reception will include a catered dinner, slide show and booksigning for Steve McQueen: The Last Mile.

“Santa Paula was the beginning and end of Steve McQueen's aviation roots, and realized the airport had never recognized him before. Steve used to say, 'Santa Paula Airport is my kinda country club,'” said Mike Dewey, a museum board member who has a long history with the privately owned airport. “We also felt this was a good opportunity to promote our new 3,000-square foot museum headquarters.”

This is Barbara McQueen's first trip back to Santa Paula since her late husband's 1980 death.
“Santa Paula was Steve's church and he really loved the city with all of his heart and soul. He was treated like a normal person there where he could relax and be himself, hang out with friends and fly his planes,” McQueen said. “I'm really looking forward to coming back because it was a big part of my life. It'll be good to renew some of those old ties and make new friendships.”

The tax-deductible (as allowed by law) dinner is $50 with proceeds benefiting the Aviation Museum of Santa Paula. Seating, however, is limited and attendees are asked to RSVP by December 1, 2008. Please call (805) 525-1109 or e-mail mcqueenevent@amszp.org to RSVP.

The Santa Paula Airport will salute the life of Steve McQueen on its “First Sunday Open House,” on December 7. Privately owned hangars open their doors to unveil a variety of vintage aircraft, cars, and memorabilia, which are on display for the public from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. Several other aircraft owners will put their antique aircraft on static display and many vintage aircraft also fly in each month. Car and motorcycle clubs will also display their machines on the airport's taxiways and the Museum Tram will provide travel between hangars. The Experimental Aircraft Association Chapter 723 offers free airplane rides to kids ages 7-17. Barbara McQueen will also sign, Steve McQueen: The Last Mile at the five-hour extravaganza.

Steve McQueen: The Last Mile is a photo book that captures wonderful and unique images that the very private actor allowed to no one else. Barbara soon discovered that the screen legend she had idolized since a kid was a determined individualist who loved vintage planes, motorcycles and cars and admired the men who flew and drove them above all others.

For more information on both McQueen events, visit www.amszp.org.

2nd annual Steve McQueen Days March 28-29

2nd Annual Steve McQueen Days

Steve McQueen fans from around the world will gather in Slater, Missouri, the actor’s boyhood hometown, to celebrate the life and work of the legendary actor on Friday and Saturday, March 28th and 29th

The 2nd Annual Steve McQueen Days is timed around the actor’s birthday; McQueen would have been 78 years old on March 24th. McQueen was born in Beech Grove, Indiana but moved to Slater, when he was an infant and remained there for most of the next decade. Slater is located in central Missouri in Saline County and has approximately 2,100 residents.

Among those attending will be McQueen’s widow, Barbara McQueen, who will be signing copies of her book Steve McQueen: The Last Mile about her years with McQueen. Also attending will be McQueen’s friend from his early days in Greenwich Village and later, in Hollywood, Richard Martin. Martin has just produced a documentary on McQueen’s life titled An American Rebel. The film is based on the book Steve McQueen: Portrait of an American Rebel by noted biographer Marshall Terrill, who will be a key speaker during the festivities in Slater.

McQueen’s stuntman, Loren Janes, who worked with McQueen throughout his professional career from his television western series, Wanted: Dead or Alive to the last film he made, The Hunter will be presenting rare behind the scenes footage from Nevada Smith and The Sand Pebbles.



Highlights of the festival will include a Steve McQueen Lookalike Contest and a Classic Car and Motorcycle Show. McQueen was an accomplished and competitive semi-professional car and motorcycle racer who owned over 120 antique motorcycles. An auction of McQueen-related memorabilia to benefit the Boy’s Republic School in Chino, California will also be held during the weekend. McQueen attended the Boy’s Republic shortly after he left Slater and continued to visit and support the school throughout his life.

McQueen was a worldwide box-office champion in the ’60s and ’70s and starred in such blockbuster films as The Great Escape, Papillon and The Sand Pebbles, which garnered him an Academy Award nomination for Best Actor. This year also marks the 40th Anniversary of Bullitt and The Thomas Crown Affair, which are among McQueen’s most acclaimed films. At the time of his death in November of 1980 from asbestos-induced cancer, McQueen was the most-popular and highest-paid actor in the world.

For additional information about the 2nd Annual Steve McQueen Days visit www.cityofslater.com.

Terrill appears at Melvyn's on Feb. 13

Biographer set to appear at Melvyn's series
Judith Salkin • The Desert Sun • February 12, 2008

Since 1989, Marshall Terrill has spent a lot of time researching and chronicling the life of Steve McQueen.

On Wednesday, he'll be the guest speaker at Melvyn's "Dinner With..." speakers series in Palm Springs.

Terrill's first book, "Steve McQueen: Portrait of an American Rebel," was published in 1993. Since then, Terrill has published 10 books, including "Steve McQueen: The Last Mile" (2007).

Terrill is also an experienced reporter. His career began in 1989, shortly after going to work for Charles Keating, the banker at the center of the decade's savings and loan scandal.

"I was working my way through college," said Terrill. His plan was to earn his degree and go to work for one of Keating's companies.

But, "when the job went, so did my marriage." (Keating was convicted of fraud in 1999.)

In 2007, Merrill published three books, including his latest McQueen book, which took nine months.

"It's mostly a pictorial with a 500-word passage at each chapter," he said. "It's Barbara's (McQueen's third wife) recollections of their time together."

Terrill also published "Maravich," a biography of basketball legend "Pistol" Pete Maravich, and "Elvis: Still Taking Care of Business," co-authored with Sonny West, who was Presley's friend and bodyguard for 16 years.

"That book took four years to research and write," Terrill said. "There's so much information out there on Elvis, I had to make sure it was absolutely perfect before it was published."

Barbara McQueen Nashville photo exhibit

Barbara McQueen at Nashville’s Striped Door Gallery with “Steve McQueen: The Last Mile” Exhibit

Nashville, Tn. --- October 26, 2007 ---- The Striped Door and Take 121 Arts Galleries are proud to announce that on November 10th they will be hosting “Steve McQueen: The Last Mile” an exhibition of rare and private limited edition photographs taken by Steve McQueen’s widow, Barbara McQueen. The exhibition coincides with the publication of the book of the same name, written by Barbara and acclaimed McQueen biographer Marshall Terrill.

The Striped Door Gallery and Take 121 Arts will be offering a signed copy of the book with each exclusive limited edition photograph sold during this extraordinary event being held at The Striped Door Gallery at 530 3rd Ave. South in Nashville on Saturday, Nov. 10 from 6 to 10 p.m.

Barbara's photographs record a behind-the-scenes life of personal pleasures and enthusiasms. They include hitting the road in Steve's pickup trucks, visiting collectors' shows and swap-meets, driving 700 miles to view a rare World War I motorcycle, flying a vintage mail plane, and generally ducking out of Hollywood life. But when work did call, Barbara was also on hand to capture marvelous candid shots on the sets of McQueen's two last films, “Tom Horn” and “The Hunter.”

The life and career of Steve McQueen is a classic example of the American dream made real: of a small town boy from a broken home triumphing over adversity to become one of the richest and most sought-after superstars in the world. McQueen lived every day as if it were his last, and by doing so he lived an extraordinary life, both on screen and off.

Barbara McQueen’s “Steve McQueen: The Last Mile” exhibit tells the story of a simple love affair with life. Barbara, who had carved a very successful career for herself as a fashion model, met Steve McQueen in 1977. Together for less than four years, these rare and private photographs share Steve’s rugged, blue-eyed features in relaxed and uninhibited settings, doing the things he loved. Barbara’s photographs (all of which are for sale) show a tough guy at peace but who retained an inner strength. In one particularly striking shot his hair is wild, his beard thick, and unkempt, and he is looking over his shoulder with a troubled vulnerability. Barbara catches him unaware perhaps in a deeply pensive mood.

This rare treat on November 10th for collectors and fans will be an event to remember and includes additional never produced before, private photographs reproduced by Nancy Lee Andrews just for this Nashville exhibit. The Striped Door Gallery’s Director Peggy Cooper says, “Steve McQueen’s memorabilia has always been desirable: a pair of sunglasses he wore in ‘The Thomas Crown Affair’ went for over $70,000 at a recent auction in Los Angeles and one of his motorcycles, a 1937 Crocker, sold for a world record price of $276,500 at the same event. These photographs at The Striped Door Gallery will provide you an opportunity to buy and own your own collectible item from this legend.”

Barbara McQueen will be at the opening event on November 10th and available for signing your books. The exhibit will be at The Striped Door Gallery through December. For information or questions, please contact the gallery at (615) 244-4228 or go to www.stripeddoorgallery.com.

McQueen Royalty Invades England

Barbara McQueen is taking her exhibition of rare and private photographs of her late husband across the pond to England where she will appear for the first time since his 1980 death.

The Movie Poster Art Gallery will host the three-week exhibition, which kicks off with a June 13 VIP reception with Barbara McQueen. Following the reception, the exhibition of approximately 40 limited edition photographs will be on display and for sale June 16 through July 7. The photos can also be purchased online by visiting www.mpag.co.uk/stevemcqueen.htm

Barbara, who had carved a very successful career for herself as a fashion model, met Steve McQueen in July 1977. It was a time when she was stepping back from the modeling industry while the superstar was beginning to turn his back on the trappings of Hollywood.
The two spent the next three-and-a-half years together, marrying in 1980, the year of Steve McQueen’s death. During that time she captured wonderful and unique images of the very private McQueen allowed to no one else.

Barbara soon discovered that the screen legend she had idolized from afar was a determined individualist who loved vintage planes, motorcycles and cars and admired the men who flew and drove them above all others.

“I knew the man, not the movie star,” says Barbara McQueen.

Her photographs record a behind-the-scenes life of personal pleasures and enthusiasms – hitting the road in Steve’s many pickup trucks, visiting collectors’ shows and swap meets, driving 700 miles for a rare World War I motorcycle, flying a vintage mail plane, and generally ducking out on the movie industry.

But when work did call, Barbara was also on hand to capture marvelous candid shots on the sets of McQueen’s last two films – Tom Horn and The Hunter.

The show offers a privileged insight into a previously unseen side of one of the 20th century’s most charismatic and admired stars, and a rare treat for collectors and fans.

The Movie Poster Art Gallery is located at 1 Colville Place, London, W1T 2 BG. Exhibition opening times are Monday through Friday 11 a.m. to 6 p.m.; Saturday 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.

For more information, call 020 7637 7441 or visit www.mpag.co.uk/stevemcqueen.htm

San Francisco Sentinel on McQueen exhibit

By PJ Johnston
Sentinel Film Critic
Copyright © 2007 San Francisco Sentinel

I’m not one to use this space to regurgitate press releases. After all, I write press releases in my day job, among other things, and by the time I sit down to work on Moving Pictures, I’m sick of the sight of them. This column is about movies, and life, and how much juice I can squeeze out of the two.

On the other hand, it would be ungracious, vile and arrogant of me to blow off press releases altogether in my capacity as film critic for Your San Francisco Sentinel – all the while expecting editors and writers at other publications to take note of mine all week long. What comes around goes around, after all.

So when an announcement of some kind catches my fancy, I feel obliged to share it with you, dear reader. And just such a press release crossed my desk this week.

Seems Steve McQueen – that’s right, Lieutenant Frank Bullitt, San Francisco detective, all-time badass of all-time badasses – is returning to the city where he made his most famous movie … but it won’t be in a second-run movie theater or a San Francisco State film class.

Instead, McQueen will be brought back to life on the walls of one of San Francisco’s finest art galleries.

According to my source, intrepid biographer Marshall Terrill, Barbara McQueen’s photos of her superstar husband will make its world premiere on May 5 at the San Francisco Art Exchange, 458 Geary Street.

“The idea of having a photo exhibit has been a longtime dream of mine,” said Barbara McQueen. “And the perfect place to host such an exhibit is in the city where Steve filmed ‘Bullitt.’”

I’d love to report to you that the lovely Ms. McQueen actually told me this – but alas, I got it from Senor Terrill’s press release. I intend to actually speak to her, art-reception wine and hunks of cheese in hand, on Cinco de Mayo.

Terrill’s first book, “Steve McQueen: Portrait of an American Rebel,” was a big hit in 1993. This year he collaborated with Barbara McQueen on “Steve McQueen: The Last Mile,” a 250-page photo book that, I have a hunch, just might be available at the Art Exchange show.

Terrill, interestingly enough, is noted for his biographies on McQueen, Elvis Presley and Pistol Pete Maravich, the basketball great. Even more interestingly, Terrill worked for financier Charles Keating back in the 80s. By 1989 Keating’s company, Lincoln Savings & Loan, was the poster child of the savings and loan scandal that brought down the industry and cost you, dear taxpayer, billions in bailout dough. Keating, a rich, ultraconservative anti-porn crusader who put the “critter” in hippocrit, was sent sentenced to jail and Terrill suddenly found himself unemployed. At age 26, he moved back into his parents’ home in Virginia and began his second career, as a biographer. His first subject was McQueen.

Nice choice. Who didn’t love the King of Cool? Star of countless great, half-great and okay-not-so great movies, most notably “The Magnificent Seven” (1960), “The Great Escape” (1963), “The Thomas Crown Affair” (1968), “Papillon” (1973) and, of course, “Bullitt,” the 1968 thriller that made the world fall in love with San Francisco, Ford Mustangs and Jacqueline Bisset. We San Franciscans still love to marvel at the way that green GT flew off the ground on Potrero Hill and landed in Russian Hill! Yeah, baby!

McQueen was the quintessential Hollywood bad boy and one damn fine actor. (He died of complications from liver cancer in 1980.) He lived larged, burned rubber as a motorcyclist and race car driver, and burned through a marriage with “The Getaway” (1972) co-star Ali MacGraw … and really, if you’re going to burn through a marriage, wouldn’t we all like it to be with Ali MacGraw, the Scarlett Johanson of her era?

(Incidentally, MacGraw wrote a 1991 autobiography, “Moving Pictures” – no relation to this column.)

McQueen later married the beautiful Barbara Minty, a model with a talent for photography, and spent his final years with her.

This exhibition is a personal collection of about 40 photographs taken by Minty nee McQueen, who has remained silent about her relationship with her husband for more than 25 years. Now she’s ready to talk about their life together and her photographs, which offer an extremely personal insight into the final years of Steve McQueen.

The photos offer candid shots from 1977 to 1980 – the actor’s years in a fading spotlight. It also chronicles her times with McQueen at Trancas Beach; Ketchum, Idaho; and Santa Paula; as well as behind-the-scenes shots from the sets of his final films, “Tom Horn” and the underappreciated “The Hunter,” (both 1980)

“It will be a fun gathering of family and friends and an eclectic mix of people,” said Terrill, who is organizing the exhibit. “I’m sure there will be people from all walks of life including bikers, artists, poets, actors, accountants, writers and McQueen fans. Everyone is welcome.”

Both Barbara McQueen and Terrill will give short presentations on the photos (some of which have never been seen before) and take questions afterward.

And if I gulp enough of that gallery wine, I’m gonna ask Terrill about Charles Keating’s jowls, and how Pistol Pete might’ve fared against Kobe. No matter how much wine I put down, however, I promise to leave Ali MacGraw out of it.

The cost to attend the Barbara McQueen photo exhibit at the San Francisco Art Exchange on May 5t is free, but an RSVP is required to guarantee admittance. Contact Theron Kabrich at (800) 344-9633 or e-mail at theron@sfae.com.

McQueen media blast to reach millions

A Barbara McQueen New York media blast planned for the week of March 13-17 will reach an estimated 20 million people worldwide.
By the end of this week, millions of television viewers, radio listeners, newspaper readers and online browsers will find out whatever happened Barbara McQueen and will be introduced to her new book, “Steve McQueen: The Last Mile.” (Dalton Watson Fine Books, $49.95)
Steve McQueen's widow will kick off her press junket with an appearance on “The Late Show With David Letterman” on Tuesday, March 13. The show has an estimated viewing audience of five million people nationwide.
The number will double when Barbara McQueen appears on the FOX Network's “Fox & Friends,” on Wednesday, March 14. McQueen's 10-minute interview will be syndicated nationally on FOX stations throughout the country and the world and will reach an estimated 10 million people.
Also planned for the week are a series of satellite radio interviews with Premiere Radio Network, as well as interviews with CNN radio, News Fox Radio and Flash News, all nationally syndicated radio shows. On Thursday, March 15, McQueen will also give print interviews with several New York publications, including “The New York Times.”
All of these efforts will go toward promoting “Steve McQueen: The Last Mile,” a new 240-page photo book which will go wide release on March 13. The book contains approximately 150 pictures documenting Barbara McQueen's three-and-a-half year relationship with the movie icon, which includes candid shots from 1977 to 1980 McQueen's years out of the spotlight. It also chronicles Barbara's early history and modeling career; her years with Steve McQueen at Trancas Beach and Santa Paula as well as behind-the-scene photos on the sets of Tom Horn and The Hunter.
Books can easily be obtained by going to www.daltonwatson.com or www.amazon.com.