Steve McQueen and Faye Dunaway Butt Heads on Set of ‘The Thomas Crown Affair’

For a movie so filled with twists and turns, it’s fitting that 1968’s The Thomas Crown Affair had its share of the same behind the scenes. Starring action hero Steve McQueen (The Great Escape) and Faye Dunaway, hot off her Oscar-nominated role in Bonnie and Clyde, the film proved pivotal for them both. Before stepping into the tailored duds and sleek Rolls-Royce of the titular millionaire businessman–bank thief, “Steve had never played, successfully, a romantic leading man,” Marc Eliot wrote in his book Steve McQueen. In fact, “he never wore a suit in a film in his life.” Meanwhile, Faye chose to play Vicki Anderson, the FBI agent hot on his trail following a $2.6 million Boston bank heist, “because she doesn’t swoon over the leading man,” added Eliot. The two “fought all the time” when the cameras weren’t rolling, but over the past 50 years, the film, with its unusual split-screen effects and famously sexy chess scene, has grown into a cult classic.

Norman Jewison (left, with Steve on set) had directed Steve in The Cincinnati Kid, but initially wanted Sean Connery for the role of Crown and Jane Fonda for Vicki. “Connery said no because it was too close to James Bond,” said Eliot.

In the film, shot on the streets of Boston, Crown retrieves the stolen money from a cemetery trash can. Later, in the hair-raising dune buggy scene, Steve “did all of the stunt driving,” marveled Eliot. “He wouldn’t let anyone else do his stunts, and the studio tore their hair out because one injury and … but that was his thing!”

After J. Edgar Hoover‘s FBI began spreading rumors about Steve being gay — Hoover thought his 1966 film, The Sand Pebbles, was anti-Vietnam — Steve, who married three times, “needed a film where he played a romantic hero,” said Eliot.

As proof of the original film’s staying power, it got a high-profile remake with Pierce Brosnan and Rene Russo in 1999, and now there’s another remake set to come out in 2027, starring Sinners‘ Michael B. Jordan as the suave swindler.