Hollywood Then & Now

Kevin Costner:

Is He The New Steve McQueen?

Bv LAURIE JACQBSON

"The first time I met Kevin Costner, said one Hollywood producer, "he walked into my office wearing a three-day stubble, a white tee-shirt, blue jeans and an old leather jacket. He looked like Steve McQueen.'

It's not the first time the tough-talking, super self-assured Costner has been compared to the lean, mean McQueen. The sandy-haired, blue-eyed actors rarely dressed to impress, but there laid-back charisma comes on gangbusters. Still, these macho men have more in common than their rugged good looks.

Costner was born January 18, 1955 in the Los Angeles suburb of Lynwood. His father, who is part Cherokee, was promoted annually, so Kevin changed schools every year. "I was always on the outside,” he said later. “I probably had one date all through high school, I was always the observer.”

being the new kid every year is a rough road. Couple that with the fact that at sixteen Costner was only 5’2” (he’s now 6’1”) and you’ve got a guy who was very insecure with the opposite sex. “I still don’t think of myself as classically handsome. I know when I walk into a room full of guys, I’ll come in fifth…maybe fourth,” he adds with a smile.

ABANDONED

McQueen' father abandoned him as an infant. Steve's mother and a series of stepfathers uprooted the boy over and over before dumping him in reform school. He was always very much a loner, and like Costner, he never considered himself particularly good looking. Nor did he have much early experience with women-though McQueen later made up for lost time in a big way, earning the nickname McQueen the Machine.

But both men project a very, very cool screen presence with the promise that sex will not only be exciting, but fun as well. Just think back to Steve nibbling on Faye Dunaway’s lips in "The Thomas Crown Affair.” And who can forget Kevin and Sean young in the back of that limo in 'No Way Out." Believe it or not, Costner feels there was certain clumsiness to his style in that scene, though few of his fans, men or women would agree.
Both actors married fairly young Costner in 1978 to his college sweetheart, Cindy, who gave up her career as Snow White at Disneyland when they tied the knot. They have three children: Annie, 4, Lily, 2, and Joe, 1. Fatherhood and family life was as important to McQueen as it is to Costner. Each loved the screen but hated “the scene”, living as far from the Hollywood nightlife as possible.
The McQueens settled in the isolated beach of Malibu while the Costners live on the other side of Tinseltown in Pasadena. Costner, like Steve, retreats to the wilderness whenever possible. He has a second home in the California Sierras where he fishes hunts and tears around in his Bronco. I don' t have to remind any McQueen fans of Steve's love of fast, high-powered vehicles and of the great outdoors. He campaigned heavily to protect the environment. Costner's political leanings are a little different. A committed Republican, he introduced George Bush at the inaugural ball.

Another area where the maverick heroes differ is musically. "Music is very private to me,” Costner who recorded a solo vocal album of ten songs called "The Simple Truth." It’s so private it's only been released in Japan, last year. McQueen's singing was confined strictly to the shower.

ACTING

The main muse for both men was acting. If you blink, you’ll miss Steve in “Somebody Up There Likes Me,” and Costner in "Frances." A Western was the vehicle that brought them to public attention. Steve on the small screen in "Wanted -Dead or Alive” and Kevin in the film "Silverado. And both were drawn toward directing. McQueen made valuable contributions to much of his work, but directing was not a strength. Costner's expertise in his first outing, “Dances With Wolves”, a 19th-Century adventure between a white man and woman in the South West. ‘I go for roles that I think are real people, characters that have flaws and stories that have points." he flatly states. “I like to do movies about men and women.” McQueen had more success as a producer, a hat Costner will most likely don in the future.
By the end of McQueen's twenty-plus career, his muse had begun to fade. A compelling, volatile, but limited performer, Steve rarely felt challenged by the roles offered to him-like “Towering Inferno,” in which he basically took the money and ran. Shortly after, he and his third wife planned to leave Los Angeles behind for a simpler, more rustic life, but cancer cut short their dreams.
MONEY

Money was very important to McQueen, who was one of the highest paid actors of his day. Costner could be, but recently he turned down $5 million - more than double his usual salary - because he didn't like the role. "You can't settle for anything less than your own voice. Right now, if you're asking me, you're going to get total involvement.' That is apparent from Costner's much-acclaimed roles in "Bull Durham, “The Untouchables," and this year's “Field of Dreams.” His physical grace and mental agility are making people sit up and take notice and his relaxe , stealy gaze can be seen on the cover of everything from Vanity Fair to Time.
"Once I decided to be an actor, I never looked back," he told a class of young hopefuls at UCLA. “'If acting ever stopped satisfying me, I'd walk away," he added unhesitatingly. "I would probably end up in the Pacific Northwest. I'm at peace up there." Lucky for his many fans, that day is still far away if ever. Kevin Costner's star is very much on the rise. It's too early to predict whether his similarities to Steve McQueen will take him in the same direction. But, if it does, it will be because he wanted to go that way. Just like McQueen, Kevin Costner is his own man.