Steve McQueen: The Lost Formula 1 Movie

Factual America

2 Feb

Written By

Steve McQueen, the Hollywood icon, had a passion for car racing. However, his long lost Formula 1 film project never saw the light of day – until now.

Joining us to talk about this incredible story are the filmmakers behind Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie (2021), director, writer and producer Alex Rodger, and archivist Richard Wiseman.

The film elegantly captures Steve McQueen's stardom and passion for car racing. It is set against the backdrop of the 1960s – glory days for both Formula 1 and Hollywood.

Narrated by David Letterman, the documentary chronicles a race between two identical films. As we watch iconic directors and film studios battle it out, we learn the story behind the story of Day of the Champion – McQueen's lost Formula 1 film.

Just as strikingly, the film brings to the big screen incredible, never-before-seen racing footage that captures the glamour, and the danger, of Formula 1 racing in the 1960s.

Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie is available on SKY Documentaries and NOW TV.

“Car racing in 1960s was unbelievably dangerous, and Steve McQueen saw this as a way into the drama of Formula 1.“ - Alex Rodger

Time Stamps:

00:15 - Clip 1: About Steve McQueen and his lost film.
01:30 - Introducing our guests, archivist Richard Wiseman and director Alex Rodger.
02:41 - Where people can watch Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie.
04:03 - The synopsis of the film.
05:14 - Steve McQueen’s connections with car racing.
08:25 - 1960s as the glory days of British car racing.
09:10 - The back story of The Day of Champion, McQueen's lost Formula 1 movie.
11:40 - What the screenplay was like for the lost film.
15:11 - Clip 2: Panavision and what screen ratio is best for a racing film.
18:00 - How Richard found the never-before-seen footage for this film.
22:50 - Alex's reactions to the quality of the footage.
25:18 - Clip 3: About the technology used to shoot Day of the Champion.
28:47 - When SKY got involved in the project, and how it was filmed under Covid-19.
33:00 - How Alex assembled the story with the elements they had.
38:38 - How David Letterman came on board to narrate the documentary.
44:36 - Britain as the centre of racing car engineering and Formula 1.
47:50 - Why it’s impossible to compare drivers from different eras of racing.
54:04 - What’s next for Alex and Richard.

Resources:

Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie (2021)
The Cruel Sport: Grand Prix Racing 1959-1967 by Robert Daley
Natalie Wood: Cinema Icon on Factual America
Alamo Pictures
18 Best Movies to Watch on Netflix in 2022

Transcript for Factual America Episode 46 - Steve McQueen: The Lost Formula 1 Movie

Alex Rodger 0:00
Hi, I'm Alex Rodger and I'm the writer, producer, director of Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie.

Richard Wiseman 0:05
My name is Richard Wiseman. I was the archive consultant to Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie. My Twitter handle is @archiveanorak. And there is a reason for that.

Speaker 1 0:14
The ingredients were all there, dangerous and dramatic source material would give the film legitimacy. The glamour and excitement of the swinging 60s would provide the perfect backdrop. Surely, this would be a guaranteed Hollywood hit. It was to be called Day of the Champion.

Speaker 2 0:31
Somehow rather, there was a magic about the 60s. Sex was safe. Motor Racing was dangerous. It was glamorous, it was colorful thing. And everybody would come to Monaco every year. It was a special time because princess Grace was like a magnet to Hollywood. So all the big stars would come as well. It's just a different culture altogether. I just feel so fortunate that I was living in that window.

Speaker 3 1:07
And Steve always had this concept that he wanted his racing movie that he would eventually make to be authentic. It had to be a film that his racing buddies would appreciate.

Intro 1:18
That is a clip from the Sky documentary, Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie, and this is Factual America. We're brought to you by Alamo pictures, a London based production company making documentaries about America for international audiences.

Matthew 1:32
Today we're in for a special treat as we talk about the Hollywood icon Steve McQueen, his passion for motor racing, and his long lost Formula One film project that never saw the light of day. Until now that is. Joining us to talk about this incredible story are the filmmakers behind Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie. Director, writer and producer Alex Rodger, and archivist Richard Wiseman. Alex and Richard, welcome to Factual America. How are you doing, Alex?

Alex Rodger 1:59
Very well, thanks. Thanks for having us on the show. It's a pleasure to be here.

Matthew 2:02
Well, it's pleasure to have you. Richard, how are things with you?

Richard Wiseman 2:06
Very good. Very, very good. Very pleased to share my very well organized library of books behind me with the world here.

Matthew 2:13
I think that, is that really your room or is that just one of those things they put on you behind like on a Zoom?

Richard Wiseman 2:18
I got the fortune to hide this set, yeah.

Matthew 2:21
So again, the film is Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie. So as Damien Smith at Motor Sport magazine put it: "for anyone with even a passing interest in motor racing, it should be judged unmissable." Released at the beginning of the year on Sky, and Now TV. Is it anywhere else? We've got listeners in the US and around the world. Do you know where it's showing elsewhere?

Alex Rodger 2:45
It's not currently anywhere else. Hopefully, it will be soon. Hopefully, it'll be out on NBC in America at some point, but at the minute, it's just in the UK.

Matthew 2:53
Okay. Well, we'll keep everyone posted on that. So thanks again, so much for coming on to the podcast. And just wanted to say it's, I had a lot of fun watching this. It's wonderful. Personally, it's one of my favorite time periods, which I think you've captured very elegantly with, certainly all that archival footage. And then, I don't usually struggle this, but where do we begin? I mean, there's so many storylines here. There's Steve McQueen, which is extremely cool. There's 1960s F1 racing, which is just about as cool, I think. The film chronicles a race between two identical films, you've got iconic directors and film studios battling out, never before seen racing footage, which hold tight for those of you who are on YouTube. And if you're listening, well check out the YouTube feed later. It's definitely worth a watch. And the story behind the story of this film, David Letterman even narrates, so I don't know. But maybe we can start, Alex, with give us a little background. What is, sort of, what is the synopsis of this film?

Alex Rodger 4:02
Well, you've captured quite a lot of it. And the synopsis is, after The Great Escape in '63, McQueen had, his star power was just out of control. He basically had the power to do anything he wanted in Hollywood. And what he really wants to do is make a movie about Formula One racing. Everyone knows that he was a huge motor racing fan and his passion was cars and bikes. But he wanted to make a film about authentic European style single seater car racing. So he went about trying to do that with John Sturges, who of course he'd worked with on The Great Escape. And our documentary is the story of him trying to get that film made, alongside the rivalry that he had with James Garner, and John Frankenheimer, who were trying to make the same film based on the same book. And they were making it for MGM, whereas McQueen and Sturges was trying to make it for Warner Brothers. And we chronicle the trials and tribulations of how that all came about and the ups and downs of that storyline really.

Matthew 5:07
Okay. And Richard, maybe could tell us a little more about McQueen's connections to motor racing. I know you were the archive producer on the Steve McQueen: The Man &Le Mans doc in 2016. He wasn't just a playboy or wanna be, was he?

Richard Wiseman 5:24
No, absolutely not. In actual facts, one of the themes that's quite key to the sort of first part of our documentary, is the fact that McQueen was such a massive petrolheads and was aware of the fact that the sport was far more well developed in Europe and had much more of a European history than it did in America. And so he actually agreed to make this war film, in England called The War Lover, purely because he discovered that the location work was being done in a county here called Norfolk. And he recognized Norfolk as being the location of the Jim Russell race driving school at Snetterton. And so he realized that, you know, not only can I have a nice payday and a long trip to England, but also in all my time off set, I can learn how to be a professional European racing driver.

Matthew 6:19
And you've got some great footage of that, of that racing school in Norfolk. And even I think there's some great stories, too, about his time in England skiving off from the film trying to, you know, to get some driving in. Alex, tell us about Formula One racing in the 1960s. You sort of alluded to it already with that book, but maybe you can tell us, you know, certainly in contrast to what it's like now.

Alex Rodger 6:46
In the 60s, it was unbelievably dangerous. I mean, way more than you can fathom now. I mean, we've had a couple of, you know, tragic deaths, obviously, in the last few years, but in those days, it was five, six drivers a season would lose their lives. It was unbelievably, unbelievably dangerous. And he saw that as, as a way in to the drama and the story of Formula One and how he could bring that to the screen. That was definitely an element that he felt needed to be told. And these guys, these guys were proper gladiators in the 60s. I mean, they were basically sitting, sitting in a fuel tank, the fuel was all around them in these cars, as they were driving around these circuits. They had no runoff areas, no proper barriers, no real safety equipment, like you see today. I mean, it was an unbelievably different world. But that was, that was an element that he thought he really needed to capture. And this book that they both tried to make the film from, The Cruel Sport by Robert Daley, really brought that danger and that deathly aspect to the masses in a way that the press hadn't really done so far. Especially the English press were quite, they sanitize the sport quite a lot. They'd mentioned the drivers death, but maybe only a couple of lines. It wasn't really a big headline. But he saw that that was a feature that should be brought to the general public.

Matthew 8:15
And at the same time, it's sort of the glory days of British racing from the standpoint of the number of British racers that were on the podium, wasn't it?

Alex Rodger 8:22
Oh, yeah, there was Jim Clark, there was Stirling Moss, there was Jackie Stewart and Graham Hill. There was a whole list of great, great drivers that emerged from that period, that we still talk about today. And tragically, most of them aren't around anymore. We lost Stirling Moss in 2020. But thankfully, Jackie Stewart is still with us. And so we were very lucky to be able to interview him for our documentary.

Matthew 8:49
And Richard, listeners will know about, well, this rival film Grand Prix. And then eventually, Steve McQueen did make a racing film, Le Mans, but what about The Day of the Champion? I think you've, I think Alex already mentioned it, talked about it a little bit, but what's the backstory here? If you could provide a little bit more of that?

Richard Wiseman 9:11
The backstory is that McQueen wanted to make a film on motor racing. And as Alex said, after The Great Escape, he had the muscle, the starpower, the juice, as he called it, basically to get anything that he wanted made. He wants to make a motor racing movie, he want it to be directed by John Sturges. Because John Sturges, in addition to being a terrific filmmaker, was also famous, whether it was in westerns or in war movies, like The Great Escape, for being able to put together really convincing looking action scenes.

Matthew 9:44
And he was sort of a pioneer in terms of action movies, wasn't he?

Richard Wiseman 9:50
Well, it's unusual, if you think of The Great Escape - it's a war movie. It's an escape movie, but it's an action movie as well. And one of the things that I think really bonded Sturges and McQueen together, was the originally, the motorbike chase sequence and the jumping over the barbed wire and everything, wasn't in the script. And McQueen felt that his character in that movie really didn't have an identity. And so it really was a case of them making it up as they went along. But you know, as with things like Casablanca, sometimes that can happen on set with the script being changed every day and scenes changing, and the end result ends up really well. That was the opposite of what happened with Le Mans. They were changing the script and making up new scenes every day and it didn't work arguably in the end.

Matthew 10:35
I think you, even in this this doc, you even make reference to the fact that there was more... There's this debate, this battle between even Sturges and McQueen, wasn't there? In terms of, Sturges wanted the story with racing as the backdrop and McQueen wanted the racing with story, maybe, as a backdrop.

Richard Wiseman 10:53
Well, that's certainly the case on Le Mans. I think, on The Day of the Champion it being 65/66. It predates Bullitt and the Thomas Crown Affair. So, McQueen is a massive bankable star, male lead off the back of The Great Escape. But he hasn't yet got to the point where he's the biggest Hollywood movie star in the world by a mile. And so I think, The Day of the Champion, had it been made, would have been more of a conventional movie. But you know, as Alex will tell you, because Alex has read the script. It might be that it wasn't made, actually, because the script isn't brilliant.

Matthew 11:29
Yeah, that's a good point. I mean, Alex, I didn't even think the title sounded that good. But you've read the script. What would you say about it?

Alex Rodger 11:39
I would agree. Yeah, it's pretty soap-opery. I mean, a bit like Grand Prix. It's, I think it would have been spectacular to look at. I don't think it would have been much of a movie. It's, yeah, it's quite cliched. It's swinging 60s. It's pretty girls. It's kind of all the stuff that you'd expect. But I think Sturges would have brought a real visual flair to it, as we saw with the footage that we've managed to, that Richard managed to find and get in our documentary. It would have looked amazing, but I don't think it would have been at any good have enhanced his career as a movie star like Thomas Crown Affair or Bullitt or Sand Pebbles did.

Matthew 12:21
Right. And further on that. We'll get talking about this footage shortly, actually. But the film also documents 1960s Hollywood, I think, quite well. It's very interesting. You've got, as you've already said, Warner Brothers versus MGM. You've got John Sturges versus John Frankenheimer, it's the battle of the Johns. You've got, Sturges already had Gunfight at the O.K. Corral, The Magnificent Seven, The Great Escape under his belt. I mean, amazing. Frankenheimer, Birdman of Alcatraz, The Manchurian Candidate, Seven Days in May and others. I mean, this is absolutely incredible, you know, these directors we're talking about. So what I found interesting is, maybe you can set this up too, Alex, is that, you've just said, and I know you have experience with F1 filming and stuff. I mean, you know, they're stepping on each other's toes at Monaco. I mean, this just sounds crazy, what was going on?

Alex Rodger 13:22
Yeah, it would have been total chaos. I mean, as we allude to in the film, Monaco is tiny anyway. There's not many places to stand even if you're meant to be there, let alone if you're doing a record or you're kind of just walking around seeing where positions might be good to shoot from. And especially when Frankenheimer got there in '66 to shoot Grand Prix, to shoot the actual race, and to stage his own race. I mean, it would have been carnage, and there's no chance that would happen today. It wouldn't happen in a million years. But it was way less regulated back in '66. And they could kind of just come in and do what they want. They paid for access so they just went in and did their business. But yeah, it would have been total chaos.

Matthew 14:08
So I think that takes us to a point here, where we would take a little early break, if you don't mind. And we'll watch one of the other clips that you've shared with us, about this incredible making of this film that never got seen basically. Alex, maybe you can introduce this clip. It's about them sort of filming at Nurburgring, in the old course and in panavision.

Alex Rodger 14:36
Yes, I think in this clip we talked about the aspect ratio that they wanted to shoot the film in and how shooting it in really widescreen brings you much more into the kind of the frame and the visor of how a racing driver would see the track. And I think, in this clip, Peter Winds is discussing the ins and outs of how they put the cameras on the cars. And think he alludes back to an accident Graham Hill had there in 1962.

Matthew 15:03
Okay, well, let's listen, or for those of you on YouTube, let's watch and we'll be right back with Alex and Richard.

Unknown Speaker 15:12
Explicitly used panavision, not just any old panavision, but we shot it in a 2.35 ratio, meaning the screen, the shape of the frame is 2.35 times as wide as it is tall. It's called panavision anamorphic. And that gives you the shape you want for a motor racing film. Because you are certainly, you know, wider than a regular 1.85 television kind of shape or frame.

Speaker 2 15:42
It's interesting to remember that they then stayed at the Nurburgring and filmed the week after that race, ostensibly to test the camera mounts they were going to put on the cars. And that's where La Mans came in, obviously, the design of the camera mounts was going to be part of his brief. And this has to be seen against the '62 accident at the Nurburgring. In practice, Graham Hill had a camera on the BRM and it came off and he had a big shot. Very big shot, very lucky to get away with his life in that accident. So here we are, long before onboard cameras even became a phrase. We have Warner Brothers with Alan Mann, with John Whitmore and Stirling Moss, hiring the Nurburgring. The 14 mile circuit, some of the footage we see is an indication of how good that was and how good it would have been.

Factual America midroll 16:34
You're listening to Factual America. Subscribe to our mailing list or follow us on Facebook, Instagram or Twitter at Alamo pictures to keep up to date with new releases or upcoming shows. Check out the show notes to learn more about the program, our guests and the team behind the production. Now back to Factual America.

Matthew 16:53
Welcome back to Factual America. I'm here with Alex Rodger and Richard Wiseman. The film we're talking about is Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie. It's on Sky and Now TV in the UK and it will be available elsewhere in the not too distant future. Adam Sweeting at theartsdesk.com says "director Alex Rodger has assembled a fascinating and frequently thrilling documentary bristling with treasurable archive footage and resonant with famous names". Now, we've just seen this incredible footage. I have to say, I mean, when I saw this, it is just wow. I mean, you know, it takes a lot to impress children these days, I showed it to mine. And they were pretty blown away themselves. And then when I started telling them, and started showing them how they've made these films, even more so. Richard, I mean, we'll talk about all these things. But Richard, maybe you can tell us a little bit more about the background between some of this never before seen footage, I should say. There's a few stories about how you found this and came across it.

Richard Wiseman 18:01
You know, I'd love to say that this was all down to my deeply brilliant expertise. But I actually tripped over it whilst I was looking for something else. I was working on a documentary, a year or so ago about Max Mosley, who used to be president of the International Motor Racing Federation. And in a previous life, he'd been a racing driver of the late 60s. And he'd given a particular interview answer talking about driving at the Nurburgring. And so I was asked, in fact, I was sent some stock footage to look at from a commercial library of a 1960s racing driver on the Nurburgring. And I looked at it and I thought, I think I know where that is. And I think I know where that's from. I didn't know that that existed. It shouldn't really exist. And the next thing I did was, I won't tell you the name of the library, but it's a large commercial library. I rang up my contact there and said, can you license this? And he said, what, yeah, it's on our system, so you know, it's in full public view. I could write you a license now for global, you know, distribution, if you like. I said, okay, hold that thought. I might come back to you on that. And then I basically had to go away. It was very useful when we met offside sports photography, who has the Jerry Cranon still photography collection. Because as you'll see, as Alex did in those sequences, when he was pass and bowling the footage with the black and white onset photos, that confirms that what I thought it was, it was. Because when you've got a black and white photo with the clapperboard saying Day of the Champion, and immediately you've got that scene in color on color film. Yeah, it was. And then we had the whole business of, okay, well, we found this and we think it's interesting and exciting. Is there a TV channel that would like to make a documentary out of this? And that was made trickier by the fact that obviously the first question that they asked was, is Steve McQueen in this? Is he driving any of the cars? To which the answers were no and no.

Matthew 20:07
But this, I mean, correct me if I'm wrong, this isn't the first time you've sort of stumbled over rushes or dailies that people didn't know exist. Is that correct? I mean, wasn't that true with some of the other motor racing docs you've worked on?

Richard Wiseman 20:24
It's more true in the other McQueen documentary that I worked on Steve McQueen, The man and Le Mans. So I've made two McQueen discoveries. And to a certain extent, they've both been flukes. The first one The men and Le Mans, I sort of tracked down the last place that I knew the film had been edited, or I thought I knew where the film reels were, which is a place called Culver City. I think if you've ever heard of that,

Matthew 20:46
Yeah, it's outside of LA, isn't it?

Richard Wiseman 20:47
Yeah. And so this was one of the few sort of editing facilities or sort of movie production pieces of property that hadn't been bulldozed in the last 50 years. So I rang them up, and I kind of got hold of the storekeeper. And I said, can you have a look, and this most ridiculous question ever, can you have a look and see if there are any boxes on the shelves that have Le Mans written on them? And then three or four days later, I thought, What have I done? What have I done? That's the dumbest question you could possibly ask. They're probably laughing at me, you know. And then I got an email saying, under a soundstage, we found 400 boxes with Le Mans written on them, and they're all covered in dust. So this one wasn't quite as sexy. This was seeing something on a publicly available website, but you had to know where to look. And then you had to be able to recognize the importance of what you were seeing. Because it was filed as being stock library stuff.

Matthew 21:40
And, I mean, is it also correct, because you do some googling and stuff, supposedly Frankenheimer also filmed at Nurburgring and then had to turn the reels, is any of that available? I'm sure you looked.

Richard Wiseman 21:58
Well, this was on The Man and Le Mans about five years ago, we managed to make contact with John Frankenheimer's daughter, who's now a production manager in Hollywood. And she said, No, we haven't got anything. So, as far as we know there's nothing. And in actual facts, what's one of the things that's interesting is that the circuits that The Day of the Champion filmed at, Nurburgring being obviously the biggest and most visible example, those circuits aren't in Grand Prix. So, I think there was an exclusive location agreement with Day of the Champion and Sturges. And yeah, it is possible that Frankenheimer had to hand his reels over. But you know, that's a further documentary altogether.

Matthew 22:37
Okay. And Alex, I mean, when you came, when you were first shown this, how amazing is that footage, and being put into context, what they were able to achieve with 1960s technology?

Alex Rodger 22:52
Oh, it's absolutely astonishing. I mean, this is before the phrase onboard cameras have even been invented, right? What I can get it was how steady it is. It doesn't, it doesn't move at all. And even now it's kind of, you know, a little bit wobbly and shaky when you watch modern Formula One. It's absolutely astonishing how stable it all is and how well secured the cameras are to the chassis of these cars. And yeah, I had, when we first kind of started doing this, I had this grand idea about trying to recreate it. And going to the Nurburgring and taking an old 60s car out and trying to sort of recreate some of this stuff. Covid got in the way.

Matthew 23:29
Insurance wouldn't let you, I think.

Alex Rodger 23:30
Well, insurance wouldn't let us, money wouldn't let us, Covid wouldn't let us. So, you know, the non starter, it is a non starter right from the get go. But it would have been fascinating to try to recreate what they did all those years ago. And I don't think, probably we would have got anywhere near it. I mean, the engineering was absolutely top class. And luckily we were able to talk to the race team that we're going prep the cars for the film, Alan Mann racing, they're still going and they're run by his son Henry Mann. So we were able to get in there and understand what they were trying to do, before it all got pulled.

Matthew 24:08
Well why don't we see one more clip, because I think that that clip, and listen to it because the audio is also really good on this, that talks a little bit more about some of this. I think you get a picture. There's some more footage in there showing amazing things. You got guys strapped in a chair essentially on the front of a racing car, you know, going full speed. Even on the Grand Prix, Frankenheimer's film, they've got like these massive cameras just right off, you know, right there at James Gardner's head, and he's going around the streets of Monte Carlo. So we've got this one more clip, Richard why don't you help set that up for us?

Richard Wiseman 24:45
Okay, so I believe that this is, actually the guy that you were talking about, strapped in the chair, was David Samuelson, one of the Samuelson brothers who effectively invented panavision. And it was panavision technology that was used on both The Day of the Champion and Le Mans. And I believe that the voice you're going to hear is Peter Samuelson. I think from memory would have been his nephew, who's been a film producer in LA for the past 30 or 40 years. So it's plainly in the blood for the Samuelson family.

Matthew 25:13
Okay. Well, let's watch and listen to that clip now.

Speaker 1 25:19
That's still in the camera.

Speaker 2 25:24
You had a 400 foot roll of film, so you had about four minutes in each go, and then you had to reload. Because this is obviously, you know, decades before there was digital. So we were on 35 millimeter Eastman color. Samuelson film service was run by four brothers, three of whom were my uncles, and one was my dad. And David was the technical partner. And he was responsible for all manner of extraordinary bits of brand new, never been thought of before technology. And a number of his things are still used. He built some of it for The Day of the Champion.

Speaker 3 26:14
There's a racing car, flat out, nobody can see around that it is green, nothing else.

Speaker 4 26:21
Carousel. I mean, it was a wonderful race track. It was a terrific race track, but cruising, you know, 14.7 miles, 187 corners per lap.

Speaker 2 26:37
You know, it was a great race in so many ways. This is the race in which Jim Clark clinched the '65 World Championship. It's just amazing footage to have seen it after all this time. There's Jimmy, after the race, and the mechanics running.

Speaker 4 26:51
It's real film. It's just amazing.

Speaker 2 26:56
And what a trio on the podium. Jim Clark in the middle, Dan Gurney, Graham Hill doesn't get much better than that in terms of the drivers it had to be. And then for Jimmy Clark, at that moment, he's driving off in the murk and he's just won the second World Championship. And the same year, he's won the Indy 500. No driver will ever do that.

Matthew 27:17
So I mean, that's just some more incredible footage there. And as I said, even, you know, even my children were so impressed by by this. And what these, you know, people their grandfather's age, were doing back in the 60s. And to bring this to life.

Richard Wiseman 27:36
Well, I think we should make the point, if we could that, you know, plainly, you only have to look at the calendar to see that this is 40-50 years before CGI. So if you wanted to film racing cars driving 150 miles an hour, you had to film racing cars driving 150 miles an hour. And think of a way of putting cameras in and on them that wouldn't break and fall off. You know, using just the technology that was available at the time.

Matthew 28:02
Yeah, I think that's a very good point to make. And I actually have a follow up on that, that I want to go to later because I think it speaks to something, it also speaks to that era. But you, kind of, before probably I rudely interrupted you, but I think even before the break, but Richard talking about how, finding this footage and trying to get a TV, a commissioner to run with this, yet you don't have any, unfortunately, you don't have any footage of McQueen behind the wheel. So what happened next? And, you know, how do you get Sky on board and Alex involved?

Richard Wiseman 28:44
Well, I've known Alex for about eight or nine years now, because we both worked on the launch of Sky Sports F1. I've worked in in documentaries, outside motor racing or even sport. I've worked on things like the undiscovered Peter Cook, and the undiscovered Peter Sellers. And in those kind of entertainment or film themed docs, I've worked for an executive producer called Victor Lewis Smith, who is a very well known writer and satirist over here. And he called me about this time last year and said, I've got this opportunity of a meeting with Sky documentaries. Because Victor had made three very successful documentaries for Sky Arts the year before. And he said, have you got anything? You know, it's always good to discuss three or four options with them, because if we discuss three or four, they might like one. And I said, well, I'm aware of where this unseen, unmade Steve McQueen footage is, but it doesn't have Steve McQueen in it. And he said, is there enough of a story for us to make something around it? And I said, Yeah, I think there is. And then he later asked me, he said, I can't think of a director for this. Do you know anyone? It needs to be someone that's good on sport and knows how to put a story together. I said, Yeah, I'll introduce you to Alex.

Matthew 30:07
Well, and great that you did. Alex, well, this all, correct me, because I'm not the sharpest knife in the drawer, but putting two and two together and I'm gathering this all was done under COVID. Is that right?

Alex Rodger 30:24
Yeah, it was. Absolutely. I owe Richard many crates of red wine for introducing me to Victor and getting me on this project. So yeah, he introduced us last April maybe, so just as the lockdown was really starting to kick in. And we were all kind of sitting in our living rooms waiting for the phone to ring sort of thing. But we started making it in middle of June, once we got the commission and we knew what we were trying to do with it. And yeah, it was basically all made under COVID. I mean, I was sitting here at my desk in my living room, writing the script. And we did manage to, as the restrictions ease, we managed to get out and interview people. And I was able to meet up with my editor. But socially distanced, of course. But it was tough. You know, obviously, you would have liked to have gone to more places and spoken to more people, got access to more things and more footage and more places and traveled a bit more and shot a bit more actuality. It would have been great to have gone to the Nurburgring or to Monaco or even come to America and talk to people from the Boys Republic or people that knew him, more in America. But that just wasn't, just wasn't possible last year.

Matthew 31:40
Well, can I give you, my congratulations, because I do some work with Alamo pictures and getting a little introduced to this world. And I know about the time you're talking about, April, everyone was saying the exact same thing. You know, let's concentrate on archival. That's the, you know, you guys actually did it! Because I mean, everyone was talking about it. But no one, I mean, you are the first film that we've had on, that did all its filming under COVID. In fact, I will say, I don't know if we had one. There were some that obviously did post production under COVID. But everything before post production was done pre-COVID. So this is absolutely amazing. You showed us what you can do.

Alex Rodger 32:26
Yeah. Well, thank you very much for that, those kind words. Yeah, it was start to finish in 2020. It was June to end of November last year. So it was. yeah, right in the middle of when all the restrictions were at their highest, really.

Matthew 32:38
And then with all that in mind, as Richard is already saying, you know, need a director with some writing background and you can craft a story. How did you go about crafting the story? Because you know, I don't know how much the sum total of the rushes or dailies are that we see in the film, but that's not necessarily enough to hang your hat on. You need to...

Alex Rodger 33:00
All of them were up there. We didn't, we didn't waste a frame. Well, we knew we had about four or five elements. We had the lost footage. We had the black and white kratom photos. We had the script and we had the Warner Brothers memos. So we knew we had those elements to package the story around. And as I mentioned earlier, we got very lucky with the Alan Mann racing company. They had kept everything they'd ever received every correspondence, from Solar pictures and Brookwood pictures and Sturges and Stirling Moss, every telegram, every bill, every invoice they'd ever got, they still had. So we were able to piece together the timeline of this project and know how all the other bits fitted in around the Sand Pebbles and Sturges going off to do Ice Station Zebra. And where their meetings with Frankenheimer and Eddie Louis happen. so we were able to piece it all together like that. And then kind of shot the interviews to fit in, fill in the blanks maybe and fit in the gaps. But that's where Richard's involvement was priceless. Again, of course, because he found the interview with Frankenheimer, which was shot in '98. Is that right, Richard? Yeah, '98. And that's what gave us the story about him meeting Enzo Ferrari, and all that kind of stuff. So there are a lot of blanks that got filled in by archive interviews, as well as talking to our modern day contributors.

Matthew 34:32
You know that, and you mentioned Peter Sellers already, Richard, now I'm reminded what those memos reminded me of. Because you've got the Warner Brothers memos. There's this doc that came out about this, another movie that never got or didn't see the light of day for many decades, was this Peter Sellers movie that he made. I forget the name of it, but it came out about a year ago, I think.

Richard Wiseman 34:56
That was the pirate movie that he was making with Spike Milligan, right?

Matthew 34:58
Yeah, exactly.

Richard Wiseman 35:00
Directed by Peter Medak. He never quite recovered from it.

Matthew 35:03
Yeah, exactly. And they do the same thing. They've got all the, they've got all these memos. Or sort of budget notes, you know, the producers back in London saying you're spending this too much money in it. They kind of do something similar, you know, you see the memos go up on screen and they kind of, voiceover or whatever. But you get a feel for the sort of the some of the tensions and things that were going on. So that yeah, that's very, it's very interesting. And speaking of never recovering, Richard, is it, it's kind of alluded to, or maybe more than alluded to in your film. But I was gonna ask you, is there anything new about Steve McQueen that you learned in this whole process? But it strikes me not getting this film made really haunted him. Seems like for the rest of his life?

Richard Wiseman 35:57
Well, it's interesting that when he had the star power coming off the back of Bullitt and Thomas Crown Affair, I think it was said, you know, previously, that on the back of those two, if Hollywood had wanted him to make a movie about the telephone directory, that have said, how much money do you want? And where can we sign? The precise moment when he had that almost insane level of star power, he wanted to make another motor racing movie. The definitive motor racing movie, to put Grand Prix and James Garner in its place. And in actual fact, in the final part of the documentary, I think we sort of try and explain that in some detail. And how he almost defeated himself trying to outdo Frankenheimer and Garner and actually to an extent what was going to be his first motor racing movie. And also have some of the script lines, like the line that everyone remembers from them all. You know, everything else is just waiting - was originally a line, a script line that was in The Day of the Champion.

Matthew 37:02
And so he just, just almost couldn't let go. I think he was so, I mean, that's the amazing thing, is you documentary, we don't try to discuss the films too much in detail, because, you know, spoiler alerts, and all that stuff, and people should definitely watch it. But, you know, these incredible decisions about whether to go ahead and continue with the film or not, and, you know, all that they've invested in it. And then to be told, no, that's it. Shut down production.

Alex Rodger 37:32
Yeah, I mean, they'd already spent like four and a half million dollars on going around and shooting various races. And that's $20 million today. I mean, I don't know how many recent movies have got pulled having already spent $20 million, but I can't imagine it's too many. But yeah, it was a huge labor of love for him. And I think we tried to put a slightly new context on Le Mans, by referencing what came from The Day of the Champion and went into Le Mans. As Richard said, there's that line of racing is life, everything else is just waiting, which comes from the original The Day of the Champion script. And also his name, he's called Mike Pierce in The Day of the Champion and Mike Delaney, of course, in Le Mans. Even his name was very, very similar. So he was still really hung up on the failure of The Day of the Champion. And that drove him, I think, to really want to make Le Mans to the best of his ability.

Matthew 38:30
And Alex, so you get David Letterman to narrate, do voiceover certainly. How did you manage that?

Alex Rodger 38:38
Well, that came about through Victor, who was our executive producer. He, as Richard mentioned, he is a satirist and writer here in the UK. And he'd done, Richard might be able to correct me if I'm wrong on this, but he'd done some writing for the Howard Stern radio show. Many, many years ago. And so he had an in, through how it's done to Letterman in some way. And we just kind of, we thought it was a bit of a pie in the sky email, just trying to think, yeah, he'd be amazing to do the narration first, because we knew he is a motorsport fan. Anyway, because he owns a motorsport team, we knew he was a big fan of Jim Clark, who features heavily in our movie, and a big fan of Formula One. So we thought, this would be great. And we sent him about eight or nine minute clip of the films, it was then, with some of the lost footage in it. And some of the journalists we thought he would know, he knew of Nigel Robach and Peter Windsor. And after seeing that, he jumped at it. And it was a great, it was a great day when we got that email saying, I'm in. Because we knew, because we knew it would elevate the documentary just by having his name attached to it. And also, it gave us kind of an air of authenticity that we felt we needed. We didn't want a big grandiose, dramatic voice, it wouldn't have felt right. So having someone like him, who's from Indianapolis, loves motorsport, loves McQueen. And he's kind of involved in that world. We just felt it gave us a an air of authenticity that sits really well in the film.

Matthew 40:15
Yeah, I think it's excellent. Are there any challenges in trying to do that all remotely? Or is that kind of the way it would have been done anyway?

Alex Rodger 40:22
I think it probably would have been done remotely anyway. But it was weird. I couldn't even see him. So I'm trying to direct him. I'm just basically just doing it over zoom. And I can't see him at all, like even now, we can play off each other. We can see each other a little bit. So you get body language and stuff, but I couldn't even see him. So that was, that was a challenge. But he was great. I mean, he gave us everything we wanted. He didn't mind doing things again and again, if you know, we needed to take half a second out or something to make it fit a gap. He was very happy to do it. Yeah, he was a joy to work with. He was great.

Matthew 40:51
And it should help you raise the profile when it does finally release in the US.

Alex Rodger 40:55
Hopefully, hopefully, yes.

Richard Wiseman 40:57
I should possibly add something here, which is that, and you'll know this better than me having grown up in America, that when he was doing Late Night with Letterman on NBC after Johnny Carson, Letterman didn't used to have an opening monologue. And then when he moved to CBS and had his own show there, the first five or six minutes of his show were his opening monologue and topical gags. And I've known Victor for nearly 20 years. And it was only after I've known him for about 15 years, he casually let me know that he used to write some of the topical gags for Dave's opening monologues. And that obviously helped to strengthen the connection. Knowing the fact that Letterman is a massive motor racing fan as well.

Alex Rodger 41:42
Okay, there you go, use that bit in the edit because I got it wrong.

Matthew 41:45
It doesn't matter. We may even leave. I mean, it's a podcast. It's a little rough and ready, as these things go. But, I mean, I grew up a huge Letterman fan, growing up in the US. But yeah, you knew he liked his racing. Well, he also made it in the news every now and then when he goes a little bit faster than he should. And get caught by the Connecticut Highway Patrol or whoever it was.

Richard Wiseman 42:14
I remember Hillary Clinton accusing him of possessing a heavy right foot.

Alex Rodger 42:20
Have you seen that episode of Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee that he's done with Jerry Seinfeld, where he's got this brilliant big Volvo station wagon, but it was built for him by Paul Newman. And it's got like a V 12 racing engine in it. And it's just ridiculous, his family car could go like 200 miles an hour. (laughing)

Richard Wiseman 42:45
And there's also a weird circle of life there, because Jerry Seinfeld owns the Porsche that Steve McQueen drove on the Porsche 917. The Gulf colored one. Jerry Seinfeld bought it.

Matthew 42:55
He bought it. That is a circle of life. Because even during, you know, not to get too much, you know, getting prepped for this. And my teenage daughter comes in, what are you doing Dad? And I'm showing her and I do a quick Google search. And that came up. That's like one of the first images that came up. And she's like, wow, that's amazing. You know, even these kids these days are impressed. The other thing, one thing that strikes me about this film, is obviously you've got Steve McQueen. You've got David Letterman, we got 60s Hollywood and all this stuff going on. But if you don't mind me saying so, as someone who's lived here a while, in some ways this is a quintessential British movie. And I mean that in the best way possible. I really do. Because what we were talking about, this is what I was alluding to, when I said I'll follow up, you were talking about this engineering and what they did with the cameras and the cars, that is a testimony to British engineering in that era. You know, it's absolutely amazing. And for people who don't live here, I mean, this place is full of, the landscape's dotted with like steam railway places, and I used to live in Hertfordshire. And there's the Havilland aircraft museum and you go visit these places. And there's these guys, they're dying breed, but of that generation, who would be there having their cups of tea, all retired, but banging metal and restoring all these cars and airplanes and locomotives, quite amazing generation that was.

Richard Wiseman 44:36
There's a theory as to kind of wider national psyche. Because Britain's still the center of Formula One. The majority of the teams are from here. And it is said that British engineers in particular are good at long periods of concentration and specialist manufacturer and everything else. What we're not very good at in this country is mass production.

Alex Rodger 44:59
I think it harks back to the war as well, isn't it? When you had to build stuff that wasn't going to break. Because if it brakes, you're dead, basically. So, you know, the Spitfires and hurricanes and all that kind of amazing engineering then bled through to when they didn't have war planes to build, what were they going to build next? Well, we might, let's build some great racing cars. And I think that passion for speed and engineering and getting stuff done that was going to work was very much bled through into motor racing of that era. And as Richard said, it's continued to this day, you know, motor racing, Britain is the home, still, of Formula One and motor racing. So it has never really gone away, I don't think,

Matthew 45:47
And I was gonna say, it was also the, I have to care for how to phrase this, but in some ways, that was the peak of British racing dominance, as we've already alluded to, with all these amazing names that were were, you know, flying Britain.

Alex Rodger 46:00
I think Lewis Hamilton may have something to say about that.

Matthew 46:02
We are going to talk about Lewis Hamilton in a second here.

Alex Rodger 46:05
So, it's sir Lewis Hamilton, these days.

Matthew 46:07
Yeah. Well, actually, we have to say, I have to say, sir Louis, now. I guess it's a part of the same idea. I mean, like you said, you know, Jimmy Clarks, Jackie Stewart, Graham Hill, I used to live nearby where he used to live way back. What was it that, was there something in the water? They had so many of these guys at the top of the game back in the 60s?

Alex Rodger 46:40
Do you want to tie that one, Richard?

Richard Wiseman 46:41
I think it's probably got something to do with the fact that our domestic racing was probably the sort of best organized and most competitive in the world. There were great drivers from France and Italy and the USA. But there was a specific kind of ladder into Formula One in this country where you could do more or less all your driving in this country. And because all the teams were based here, quite quickly end up in Formula One. You know, if you're an Italian and Ferrari didn't want to take you on, that's obviously a lot trickier.

Matthew 47:15
And I was being charitable to sir Lewis by calling that the peak of British racing dominance. But, you know, he's tied with Schumacher, for most world drivers' championships, holds other records outright in terms of wins, polls and podiums. And, you know, some would say, I guess that's that ongoing discussion, is he the greatest of all time? But how do you think he would have fared in the 1960s going up against that lot? Would've held his own? I'm sure you're gonna say yes, but maybe you can, maybe both of you, if you have an opinion on that.

Alex Rodger 47:57
I think it's an impossible question, isn't it? I mean, you can't really compare eras with eras. I mean, you can't. It's a fun game, but I don't think you can compare Schumacher with Fangio or Lewis with Jackie Stewart or Stirling Moss, because that is different cars, different eras, different levels of risk. I mean, he's a genius driver, there's no denying that, but it's almost impossible to compare and contrast with previous eras, I think.

Richard Wiseman 48:26
I've got a thought on this, which is, I think, Lewis will be a bit like Jackie Stewart, in that his legacy will go above and beyond motor racing. Because in addition to being a brilliant driver, it's Jackie who is responsible for introducing proper safety measures into the sport, and he's probably saved dozens of racing drivers lives through insisting on seat belts and crash barriers and everything else. And I think Lewis's legacy will obviously be part of Black Lives Matter. So I think he's already looking towards his legacy, his name beyond motor racing. Because to a certain extent, he's already conquered that.

Matthew 49:06
I think that's a very good point. And then the parallels, I don't know how well it's known or people are aware of it in this country. But for me, Jackie Stewart is as much a broadcaster, as he is a car racer. Because I grew up watching every Memorial Day weekend, you watch the Indianapolis 500, who's there? It's Jackie Stewart. He also did, he did the Olympics. I think he did equestrian, he did, you know, all kinds of winter sports, stuff way beyond racecar driving. And I think it comes across you've got some great interview footage with him in the movie, and he's definitely, I hate to put it this way, but he's more than just a racing car driver.

Alex Rodger 49:46
Definitely. Yeah. I guess from your point of view, he was on ABC Sports, wasn't he? When you were growing up?

Matthew 49:51
Always wearing a yellow jacket. Yeah.

Alex Rodger 49:55
Yeah, he's fantastic. And he's still incredibly knowledgeable about the sport and gracious with his time. And he was really, really good to us. When we asked to interview him, he let us come to his house here in England. And we went to his barn and interviewed him there. And he was great. He remembers everything like it was yesterday. He's quite extraordinary for someone who's in early 80s, really.

Matthew 50:21
For those who haven't seen the film yet, I think what was also amazing was just him talking about these, like the old course at Nurburgring. I mean, the number of curves in a 14.7 mile lap, you know. The turns I should say, not curves. Also, what he says about Monaco, and number of gear changes you had to go through in a lap.

Richard Wiseman 50:45
We should maybe make the point, Matthew, that the number of turns and the length of the course and everything was kind of seared into Jackie's brain, because he memorized the Nurburgring knowing that one tiny mistake would leave you coming out of there in a wooden overcoat, quite honestly. Because as you'll see from the footage, have a look for crash barriers or spin off zones. There aren't any. If you get anything wrong, you're going to go into a tree, 160 miles an hour.

Matthew 51:14
He called it a green hell, didn't he? You're right. It's like you're going for a country drive, except you're going whatever, 160 miles an hour or something in these ridiculous helmets, like how would that have ever done anyone any good? You know, it's almost, I don't know, for appearances sake.

Richard Wiseman 51:31
Stirling Moss's crash helmet was literally a polo helmet.

Matthew 51:35
Yeah. So I guess, what we were saying earlier, I mean, can you even compare errors? And does your film say anything about the current state of racing or anything? Are you just, given the jumps in technology and everything, it's almost impossible to compare.

Alex Rodger 51:56
Yeah, we didn't feel there was any point in trying to bring in modern racing into this film. It's very much a story of that era and of McQueen. It would have felt, rather incongruent, I think, to bring modern Formula One into it. And as you say, it's almost impossible to compare and contrast. There was really no point. And we felt we had to stick to, stay true to the story we were trying to tell of McQueen and the failure of The Day of the Champion. And to bring modern Formula One into it, there wasn't a lot of points to do that.

Richard Wiseman 52:28
I think the one point that I'd like to make is that, and I hope that this may prove more possible now with Liberty, an American media company, owning Formula One, I'm sure that there are loads of movie studios and script writers and Alex is just one of the directors who could do it, who would love to make a Formula One themed movie about Formula One today.

Matthew 52:28
Oh, yeah.

Alex Rodger 52:32
I think there's gonna be one, isn't it? I think John Boyega and Robert DeNiro are planning to do a film around Formula One, I think Formula One as the backdrop. I think it's going to be like a mafia movie with John Boyega as a driver, but, contemporary F1 movie would be fascinating these days, I think.

Matthew 53:12
That's a very good point. Because everything is backward looking, isn't it? It's all, you know, whether it's docs, or whoever, or Ford versus Ferrari, right. That was like...

Alex Rodger 53:23
That was good fun. I thought that was brilliantly shot. That was fantastically made. That was great fun.

Matthew 53:27
But you could take that, that ability to make that movie and yeah, like you said, it's great fun. And then put it in a contemporary context. That's very interesting idea.

Richard Wiseman 53:37
One of the things that's being discussed previously and I'd love to see it happen is kind of a heist movie involving the casino at Monaco during Monaco Grand Prix weekend.

Matthew 53:49
You guys, you've already got all your, your portfolio, you got your list of films you're pitching. I can see it already. Speaking of which, what is next for both of you? Alex, what's next on the cards?

Alex Rodger 54:04
Ah, it's good question. I'm not too sure. I've got a few projects that I'm trying to get off the ground and a couple of things that I'm trying to write, to which I won't give you too much detail about now. But hopefully, there'll be something coming up in the not too distant future. But I still do live sports production as well. So I think I'll work on a few F1 races this year, hopefully and for Channel Four and maybe Sky here in UK. And so yeah, I'm still very much involved with modern day sports production as well.

Matthew 54:33
Okay. And Richard, as an archivist, I guess you're not hindered too much by COVID. What's next for you?

Richard Wiseman 54:41
It's been an incredibly busy 10 months. I'm sure there are a lot of people listening to this that will want to punch my lights out hearing that, but, yeah it's been non stop work. I'm presently working on the next series of Drive to Survive for Netflix, the Formula One theme Netflix series, which is going to have a slightly stronger archive element to it. So if you watch it and think what's that nonsense from the 50s or 60s doing in here? That would probably be my fault.

Matthew 55:08
Well, I think, it's hard to believe. But I think we're coming to the end of our time and just wanted to thank the both of you so much for coming on. Alex and Richard, I mean, I've had a lot of fun watching this film. And so if, for our listeners and viewers here in the UK, if you haven't had a chance, do check out Steve McQueen: The Lost Movie. It is on, well catch it while it's still on Sky and Now TV. So again, thank you so much for coming on, really enjoyed having you. And when you get your next film made, we'd love to have you on again, if we haven't scared you off.

Alex Rodger 55:50
Not at all, thanks for having us. It's been a real pleasure.

Matthew 55:52
All right. I also want to give a shout out to This Is Distorted studios, here in Leeds, England. Also to our podcast manager, Nevena Paunovic, who ensures we continue getting such great guests as Alex and Richard, to come on to the show. And a big thanks to our listeners. We've built up quite an audience in a relatively short period of time and we are quite thankful for your loyalty, as well as your feedback, whether it is on YouTube, social media, or directly by email. So keep the comments and episode ideas coming. It is very much appreciated. And as always, please remember to like us and share us with your friends and family, wherever you happen to listen or watch podcasts. This is Factual America signing off.

Factual America Outro 56:38
You've been listening to Factual America. This podcast is produced by Alamo pictures specializing in documentaries, television and shorts about the USA for international audiences. Head on down to the shownotes for more information about today's episode, our guests and the team behind the podcast. Subscribe to our mailing list or follow us on Facebook, Instagram and Twitter at Alamo pictures. Be the first to hear about new productions, festivals showing our films and to connect with our team. Our homepage is alamopictures.co.uk

racing

Steve McQueen: The Lost Formula 1 Movie

Time Stamps:

Resources:

Connect with Alex Rodger:

Connect with Richard Wiseman:

More from Factual America:

Transcript for Factual America Episode 46 - Steve McQueen: The Lost Formula 1 Movie

Factual America Podcast

Popular

Connect

In Depth

Steve McQueen: The Lost Formula 1 Movie

Time Stamps:

Resources:

Connect with Alex Rodger:

Connect with Richard Wiseman:

More from Factual America:

Transcript for Factual America Episode 46 - Steve McQueen: The Lost Formula 1 Movie

McMillion$: McDonald's Monopoly Fraud Revisited

Miles Davis: The Coolest Music Innovator of the 20th Century

Factual America Podcast

Popular

Connect

In Depth