Steve McQueen – Original United Artists Press Photograph – The Great Escape – Stamped 29th May 1963

Description

A striking original black-and-white press photograph of Steve McQueen, dating from 1963 and associated with the original publicity period for The Great Escape.

The photograph presents McQueen in an exceptionally strong close-up portrait, wearing a dark leather jacket and looking directly towards the camera. The tight composition, sharply modelled features and characteristically intense expression give the image considerable visual impact. It is exactly the kind of portrait that helped establish McQueen’s enduring screen image during the early 1960s: controlled, self-contained and unmistakably modern.

The reverse is particularly informative. It carries a Shields Gazette Library stamp and a contemporary date stamp of 29 May 1963, together with extensive newspaper crop lines, sizing instructions and manuscript editorial annotations. Faint manuscript wording identifies Steve McQueen and The Great Escape.

More significantly, the reverse bears the original United Artists Corporation Ltd. copyright and press-use notice, confirming its status as a genuine working publicity photograph rather than a later commercial reproduction. United Artists distributed The Great Escape, which was produced by the Mirisch Company and directed by John Sturges. The film received its London premiere on 20 June 1963, making the 29 May archive date particularly interesting: this photograph was already in British newspaper circulation several weeks before the film’s London premiere.

McQueen played Captain Virgil Hilts, the American prisoner-of-war famously nicknamed “The Cooler King”. His performance became one of the defining roles of his career and helped turn The Great Escape into one of the most celebrated war films of the period. The ensemble cast also included James Garner, Richard Attenborough, Charles Bronson, James Donald and Donald Pleasence.

Although this is a studio portrait rather than a scene still, its date and United Artists provenance place it directly within the publicity campaign surrounding one of McQueen’s most important films. Original United Artists photographs connected with The Great Escape are now actively collected, with specialist dealers offering original 1963 production and set photographs at substantial prices.

The reverse also retains a later newspaper cutting referring to McQueen in Junior Bonner. This represents subsequent reuse of the photograph by the Shields Gazette picture library and should not be confused with the original 1963 date or subject association. Such later annotations are part of the photograph’s working newspaper history.

A particularly charismatic and highly displayable original portrait of Steve McQueen from the year of The Great Escape, with strong contemporary press provenance.

Condition

Good to very good condition for an original working press photograph of this age.

The image remains strong, sharp and well contrasted, with excellent facial detail. There is general age-related toning, particularly towards the margins and pale background, together with minor surface marks, small scratches, handling wear and occasional light creasing. The edges and corners show modest wear consistent with repeated newspaper-library use.

The reverse carries extensive contemporary and later editorial material, including manuscript crop and sizing instructions, blue layout lines, adhesive residue, the Shields Gazette Library stamp, the date 29 May 1963, a United Artists copyright notice and a later Junior Bonner newspaper caption. These are original working features of the photograph and form an important part of its provenance.

Please study the photographs carefully, as they form an integral part of the description.

Subject: Steve McQueen
Film association: The Great Escape
Role: Captain Virgil Hilts, “The Cooler King”
Date: 1963
Archive date: 29 May 1963
Director: John Sturges
Production: The Mirisch Company
Distributor / copyright: United Artists Corporation Ltd.
Photographer: Uncredited
Provenance: Photographic archive of the Shields Gazette
Size: 25.3 × 26 cm
Format: Original black-and-white press photograph
Verso: United Artists press-use notice, Shields Gazette stamp, archive date and extensive editorial markings

Collector’s Note

The timing is an important feature of this particular photograph. The 29 May 1963 archive stamp predates the London premiere of The Great Escape on 20 June 1963, demonstrating that the image was already being circulated to the British press as part of the contemporary publicity process.

For collectors, it therefore has considerably more documentary interest than a later portrait print of McQueen. It survives not merely as an image of one of the defining actors of twentieth-century cinema, but as a physical artefact from the contemporary British promotion and newspaper handling of The Great Escape.

Authenticity

This photograph has been handled, inspected and catalogued in-house at Hornseys. Its period status is supported by the United Artists copyright notice, Shields Gazette archive markings and contemporary date stamp visible on the reverse.

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