The Late Great Robert McGinnis

Robert McGinnis, who created iconic posters for Breakfast at Tiffany's (1961), The Odd Couple (1968),. Barbarella (1968), and several Bond movies, died on March 10 2025 at the age of 99.  In addition to movie posters, he also created art for paperback book covers and magazines from Good Housekeeping to The Saturday Evening Post.

Robert McGinnis was born on February 3 1926 in Cincinnati, Ohio. He grew up in Wyoming. He was only a teenager when he worked as an apprentice at Walt Disney Studios. He studied art at Ohio State University. During World War II he served in the Merchant Marine.

Following his service during the war, Robert McGinnis went to work in advertising. It was following a chance meeting with fellow illustrator Mitchell Hook that he began illustrating cover of paperback books for Dell Publishing. He drew covers for paperbacks written by such authors as Edward S. Aarons, Erle Stanley Gardner, Brett Halliday, Richard S. Prather, Donald Westlake (under his pen name Richard Stark), and Alan Geoffrey Yates (under his pen name Carter Brown). Later he did artwork for several magazines, including Argosy, Good Housekeeping, Guideposts, Ladies Home Journal, McCall's, National Geographic, Reader's Digest, and The Saturday Evening Post.

Robert McGinnis created the posters for several movies. His first was for Breakfast at Tiffany's in 1961. In the Sixties he did posters for the films Thunderball (1965), Arabesque (1966), How to Steal a Million (1966), You Only Live Twice (1967), The Biggest Bundle of Them All (1968), The Odd Couple (1968), Barbarella (1968), The Wrecking Crew (1968), and On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969). In the Seventies he did the posters for Giù la testa (1971), Diamonds Are Forever (1971), Live and Let Die (1973), Sleeper (1974), The Man with the Golden Gun (1974), Gator (1976), and International Velvet (1978). He created the titles for the Western The Hallelujah Trail (1965).

Over the years Robert McGinnis created many covers for romance novels. In 2004 he began creating covers for the Hard Case Crime paperback imprint. In 2016 he began providing covers for reprints of Neil Gaiman books.

Robert McGinnis was one of the greatest illustrators of all time, and he would be remembered even if he had not created several high profile movie posters. The covers he had made for paperbacks from historical fiction to mystery to romance to science fiction. Regardless of genre, his paperback covers and movie posters were remarkable. He had a gift for detail, whether it was a gun, a car, a boat, or chair. He even paid careful attention to the fashions of the day. His use of colour was incredible. Of course, he had a gift for portraying human beings, particularly beautiful women. The image many of us have of James Bond, grasping an automatic and surrounded by women, comes not so much from the movies themselves as from their posters. Robert McGinnis was a fantastic artist who was matched only by a few when it came to covers of paperbacks and movie posters.