Steve McQueen

Marge: (reading from a magazine) Question 2: Who is your son's hero?
Homer: Steve McQueen.
Marge: That's your hero!

—The Simpsons, "Saturdays of Thunder"

Like Steve McQueen
All I need's a fast machine
And I'm gonna make it all right

—Sheryl Crow, "Steve McQueen"

The King of Cool.

Steve McQueen (March 24, 1930 – November 7, 1980) was a American movie actor and star of films like The Magnificent Seven, The Great Escape, The Thomas Crown Affair, Bullitt, Papillon, The Towering Inferno, and Le Mans. His "anti-hero" persona, which he developed at the height of the Vietnam counterculture, made him one of the top box-office draws of the 1960s and 1970s. McQueen received an Academy Award nomination for his role in The Sand Pebbles. 1974, he became the highest-paid movie star in the world. Although McQueen was combative with directors and producers, his popularity put him in high demand and enabled him to command large salaries.

Began a Romance on the Set with Ali McGraw, his co-star in The Getaway, causing her to divorce her husband, legendary Paramount Studio head Robert Evans.

He died of cancer in 1980 shortly after the release of his final film The Hunter. His son Chad played one of the "Kobra Kais" in The Karate Kid (1984) and his grandson, Steven R. McQueen, is a regular on the series The Vampire Diaries.

Not to be confused with the British artist/film director of Hunger and Shame fame.