Steve McQueen and Paul Newman saved as many lives and as much of the day as they could. Bill Holden played a corrupt contractor in a terrible maroon tuxedo jacket, but…I can’t actually recall if he survived the water tank explosion. (Update: He did.) O.J. Simpson played a cool security guard, but did he survive? (Update: Yes.) I know for sure that Faye Dunaway survived — at the very end she was sitting on those marble steps outside the half-destroyed skyscraper, chatting with Newman and McQueen. And the heartbroken Fred Astaire made it out okay.
But weep anew for poor Robert Wagner (seared and blackened like a marshmallow) and his poor screaming blonde girlfriend, played by Susan Flannery (burned and splattered). And don’t forget Jennifer Jones (fell out of glass elevator, became a ruptured guts balloon when she hit the ground), Robert Vaughn (fell 135 stories, exploded into raw hamburger) and Richard Chamberlain (screamed the loudest as he fell alongside Vaughn).
