Right now, for reasons we can’t entirely explain, there are two separate biopics of the late, great Steve McQueen in development – and today, one of them got a serious headstart on the other by hiring a writer.
Jesse Wigutow has picked up a seven-figure deal (we hope for his sake that any decimal point comes after the seventh figure) to write an adaptation of Steve McQueen: Portrait Of An American Rebel, the Marshal Terrill biography to which producers Michael Cerenzie and Christine Peters bought the rights back in January.
Soon after that came news that producer David Foster, who worked with McQueen on The Getaway, was planning his own biopic of the legendary king of cool, based on the book, My Husband, My Friend, written by McQueen’s first wife, Neile McQueen Toffel.
But with Wigutow’s hiring, American Rebel (Empire’s working title; the movie itself is untitled at present) may have ensured that it goes before cameras first. And history has taught us that when competing movies about the same subject clash, more often than not the first one out of the blocks wins the race easily.
Wigutow will write a script that focuses on McQueen’s entire life, which was cut tragically short by cancer when he was just 50. But what a life it was – filled with classic movies, tempestuous relationships, drug addiction, a penchant for speed on two wheels and four, a stormy temper, and an innate, iconic sense of cool that lingers to this day.
"Between the motorcycles and the paparazzi and his highly publicized relationship with Ali MacGraw, he epitomized fame and intrigue,” Wigutow told the Hollywood Reporter. “When the opportunity comes along to really examine what makes a man like that tick, you say yes.”
Especially, he didn’t add, when that opportunity comes attached to a really, really big cheque.
So, what does this mean for Foster’s competing biopic, readers? Has it been kyboshed before it even got off the ground? Would you want to see even one Steve McQueen biopic, let alone two? Answers below. In the meantime, we’re off to complete our spec script for a biopic of the other Steve McQueen – the British director – which we’re flogging for a seven-figure sum. Sadly, in this case, the decimal point is six places to the left.