Hutton Playtime in Hollywood

Steve McQueen 1

Steve McQueen. Where to start?

McQueen was clearly the main proponent of the Hutton Playtime from around 1958 until the early 70s when he first began to be seen wearing footwear other than Playtime.

The earliest photographs of McQueen wearing Hutton Playtime come from the 1958 movie The Blob. It’s unclear whether McQueen had already been to England at this point, but there were already stores in Hollywood that catered to the British style as well as legendary stores in San Francisco like the still-extant Cable Car Clothiers.

Certainly, there are photos of McQueen in England making The War Lover (1962) in which he can be seen wearing Playtime shoes, a similar model to those he wore a year later in Love With The Proper Stranger. There’s also a famous shot of McQueen riding a Triumph in what looks like Chelsea wearing a Type 01 style desert boot.

McQueen would literally wear his Hutton Playtime on screen and off and from the wear and tear we see in the close ups these were his own shoes. After all, which Hollywood costume department would have been cool enough to make just one actor wear them all the time?

Some of the best off screen shots of him wearing Playtime can be seen in the contact sheets of photographer and McQueen buddy Barry Feinstein with McQueen playing basketball in between takes.

The contact with McQueen clearly had other actors wearing the style. Jason Robards Jr can be seen wearing a tobacco suede pair in a promo shot from 1965 featured in Hollywood & The Ivy Look as well as A Thousand Clowns where he wore them throughout the movie. Robert Webber, almost certainly the next most prolific wearer of Huttons in movies is briefly seen wearing his ubiquitous Playtime

Not commonly available online here are some of the contacts showing McQueen wearing his Huttons

Stills from the making of Bullitt 1968 by Barry Feinstein