Born Terence Steven McQueen in Slater, MO. One of the most popular and highest-paid screen personalities of the 1960s and 70s, an appealing combination of a heroic antihero, gregarious loner, and exuberant introvert. Abandoned as a baby by his father, a Navy flyer, he spent part of his childhood at Boys' Republic, a reform school in Chino, CA, then drifted about as a sailor, lumberjack, oil field worker, carnival barker, and beachcomber. He joined the Marines in 1947, did 41 days in the brig on AWOL charges, and after leaving the service in 1950 returned to itinerant jobs -- dockworker, bartender, salesman, and TV repairman. In 1952 he joined New York's Neighborhood Playhouse and studied acting under Uta Hagen and Herbert Berghof and made his debut as a walk-on in a Second Avenue Yiddish theater, of all places. After gaining experience in stock, and a stint at the Actors Studio, he replaced Ben Gazzara in the Broadway production of Hatful of Rain in 1955 and made his film debut the following year, playing a bit in SOMEBODY UP THERE LIKES ME. He got the lead in the science-fiction cult classic, THE BLOB, in 1958, and that same year landed the starring role in the TV series "Wanted: Dead or Alive." His popularity as a screen actor ascended gradually in the early 60s and he became an established star after THE GREAT ESCAPE (1963), in which he played a supercool POW who attempts an escape in a memorable motorbike chase scene. Despite reports to the contrary, McQueen did not perform the stunts himself; a stuntman named Bud Ekins doubled for him on the motorcycle jumping the barbed wire. Other notable screen credits include NEVER SO FEW (1959), THE MAGNIFICENT SEVEN (1960), HELL IS FOR HEROES (1962), SOLDIER IN THE RAIN and LOVE WITH THE PROPER STRANGER (both 1963), BABY THE RAIN MUST FALL and THE CINCINNATI KID (both 1965), NEVADA SMITH and THE SAND PEBBLES (both 1966), THE THOMAS CROWN AFFAIR and BULLITT (both 1968), THE REIVERS (1969), LE MANS (1971), JUNIOR BONNER and THE GETAWAY (both 1972), PAPILLON (1973), THE TOWERING INFERNO (1974), AN ENEMY OF THE PEOPLE (1978), and TOM HORN and THE HUNTER (both 1980). McQueen was one of a rare breed of film stars who didn't have to act or do anything in particular to mesmerize a screen audience. He dominated the screen and filled the box-office coffers on the strength of his personality alone. But the flip side of that personality was revealed after the star's sudden death at 50 of a heart attack, in Juarez, Mexico, where he had gone for surgery for chest cancer. In My Hustand, My Friend (1986), a frank and bitter memoir, McQueen's first wife (1956-71) and mother of his two children, actress Neile Adams (Toffel), depicted him as an insecure, self-destructive man prone to physical cruelty and near-homicidal rage. McQueen's second wife (1973-78) was actress Ali MacGraw; his third, during the nine final months of his life, was model Barbara Minty.  Nominated for Actor 1966: THE SAND PEBBLES 1 nomination