Okay, so this isn’t the Porsche 911 that Steve McQueen drives in the opening sequence of the classic 1971 movie Le Mans. Just one very much like it—that was probably in the vicinity of McQueen’s 911 during filming—set to go to auction in Paris next month.
The press release certainly got our attention, using phrases like “the Le Mans Porsche 911” and “this car was used in the famous film Le Mans”—the sort of language to make you think this is indeed the car that McQueen’s character drives through rural France on his way to the famous circuit, where he stops to experience a vivid flashback to his crash in the previous year’s race.
But this car’s metallic brown color rang set an alarm jangling: Wasn’t McQueen’s 911 gray? Then there was the description of it in Christie’s online catalog as being a 911T. The T was the entry-level version, introduced to replace the four-cylinder Porsche 912. Surely a man like McQueen would have insisted on the more powerful 911S?
Indeed, yes, he had—and that the actual 911S featured in the movie was sold four years ago by Sotheby’s for a very solid $1,375,000. The car we’re looking at here is one of several 911s that were bought by the production company from Swiss racing driver Jo Siffert and used during shooting of the film. This 911T was apparently the personal car of German actress Elga Andersen, who played the widow of McQueen’s former Ferrari rival in the film. As was often the case with actresses playing opposite him, Andersen went onto have an affair with McQueen; Wikipedia also says that her real name was Helga Hymen, a fact too good to be left out. Being a T, it only has 123 horsepower, but it does have pretty much a full complement of factory options including leather trim and an electric sunroof. It’s also displaying the same stickers in windshield and rear window as the S used in the film, and looks to be in near-original condition.
Andersen owned the car until her death in 1994, and it has only had two keepers since. It has reportedly covered just 46,350 km since from new—about 28,800 miles. The estimate of $250,000 to $350,000 might look steep considering how peripheral the McQueen connection is, but it’s not far off the increasingly silly prices that some low-mileage 911s of similar vintage have been fetching recently. It’s not Steve McQueen’s 911, but it might be the second-best thing.
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