On This Day

RichardTheBruce

July 26th

1930: Mary Barbara Jefford OBE is born--Plymstock, Plymouth, Devon, England.
1939: The Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve appoints Ian Fleming as Lieutenant-Commander. Special Branch.

1967: Casino Royale released in Mexico.

1971: Diamonds Are Forever films the lift fight between Bond and Peter Franks.
1979: Moonraker released in Australia.

1987: The LA Times reports Timothy Dalton says he was first approached for the Bond role in the early 1970s.
1987: In The Washington Post Hal Hinson's "007" assesses Bond past and present and The Living Daylights.

007

See the complete article here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/style/1987/07/26/007/a5828b18-0150-422f-8aeb-18c68c38f19e/

By Hal Hinson | July 26, 1987

In the books, his favorite car is a 1933 4 1/2-liter Bentley. In the movies, though, his car is the specially equipped Aston Martin DB he was issued in "Goldfinger." (He's driven others, like the Lotus Espirit that converted into a submarine in "The Spy Who Loved Me," but none stick in the imagination like the Aston Martin does.) Regardless of the company, at night his gun, a .32-caliber Walther PPK 7.65, is always under his pillow. In the novels, he is sometimes fond of pajamas; in the movies, he sleeps in the nude.

His clothes are custom-made Saville Row cuts -- dapper but conservative. He abhors tea, which he calls mud and blames for the downfall of the Empire, and, in its place, prefers coffee. Black. His taste in wines runs to clarets and champagne, of which a 1953 Dom Perignon is his favorite, provided, of course, that it's served at the proper temperature of 38 degrees Fahrenheit. He drinks bourbon, doubles usually, on the rocks, and enjoys a good brandy, preferably a Hennessy Three Star (though in the movies he would never settle for anything below the order of an XO). His favorite drink, though, as everyone the whole world over seems to know, is a vodka martini. Medium dry. Shaken, not stirred.

His name is Bond. James Bond. And it comes at you like a karate chop. It was borrowed by Bond's creator, Ian Fleming, from the famed British ornithologist, author of Birds of the West Indies, one of the volumes he most liked to keep on his breakfast table. When Fleming first fashioned his spy hero, he saw him as an attractive but ordinary man, and he wanted for him "the simpliest, dullest, plainest-sounding name I could find."

Today, Fleming's lethal secret agent, born of Swiss and Scottish parents, both of whom died on a mountain-climbing accident in the Aiguilles Rouges above Chamonix when he was 11, has become one of pop culture's most resilient icons, and, after some 34 years, 12 novels, two collections of stories and 15 movies, anything but ordinary. This year, in fact, another milestone is reached in the Bond chronology as the movie hero celebrates his 25th birthday with the unveiling this Friday of a new 007, Timothy Dalton, in the latest in the series, "The Living Daylights."

Darkly, cruelly handsome, his gun held rakishly against his cheek, James Bond is the most enduring sexual hero of the postwar era. He's our top gun, the playboy of the western world, Mr. Infinite Potency.

There's no way Fleming could have predicted the longevity and significance of his spy hero when he sat down after breakfast at Goldeneye, his home in Jamaica, one Tuesday morning in 1952 and scribbled the first lines of Casino Royale. From the start, he had little expectation of the book's success. His stated claim for writing it was to ease the panic of an impending marriage, and to a friend he said the work was "roughly the equivalent of digging a very large hole in the garden for the sake of the exercise."

It took him only seven weeks to polish it off, and his evaluation of his efforts on it and his other work is self-deflating to the point of near-obliteration. "My books tremble on the brink of corn," he once said. "I have a rule of never looking back. Otherwise I'd wonder, 'How could I write such piffle.' " Instead of swaddling himself in the regal damask of literature, as many pulp writers have done, his goal was modesty itself: to get "intelligent, uninhibited adolescents of all ages, in trains, aeroplanes, and beds, to turn over the page."

Not everyone took him at his own estimation. The British novelist Kingsley Amis, in his book-length mash note, placed him foursquare in the company of Jules Verne, Rider Haggard and Conan Doyle. On the other hand, Malcolm Muggeridge tagged him an "Etonian Mickey Spillane," which was a nice way of saying he thought that as a writer, Fleming's knuckles dragged the ground. Check out this blast on Bond: "In so far as we can focus onto so shadowy and unreal a character, he is utterly despicable. . .Fleming's squalid aspirations and dream fantasies happened to coincide with a whole generation's. . . One wishes we had better dreams."

Dreams indeed, for that's the stuff Bond is made of. For all his rumblings, though, Muggeridge has a point. That Agent 007 is an adolescent construct, the sludge of infantile longings and repressed fantasies, is undeniable. But, as Amis puts it, why should we let a little something like that spoil our fun?

When "Dr. No" premiered in 1962 and we caught our first cinematic glimpse of Sean Connery as 007, lighting up a custom-made Moreland at a baccarat table at Cercle's in London, the Bond era on screen began. Before his screen debut, Bond had been an immensely popular figure, his popularity boosted by the fact that he counted then-CIA director Allen Dulles and John F. Kennedy among his fans.

But the movies jacked him up into a higher orbit. More than any other figure, real or imagined, in American popular life -- more than Cary Grant or Bogart or Gable or Brando -- Bond represents the modern sexual ideal. Man at his best. The consummate Hefner male.

That he's British in no way diminishes his status as an American fantasy archetype. He transcends country. Self-possessed and confident, Bond is unalienated from his own sexuality. He's a man. Pure and simple. Sizing up a potential conquest, he's straightforward and unapologetic about his attraction -- and his attractiveness. Yet, for most women, there's nothing degrading about his attention. It's not strictly an esthetic appreciation that he indulges (he's not a museum-goer in wondrous awe before an Ingres or a Vela'zquez); there's desire mixed in with it, but the desire and the appreciation combine in such a way that saves it from being prurient or leering. On a daydream level, at least, his frankness is a turn-on.

To put it bluntly, Bond is a man who knows what he wants, and this quality alone -- the absence of ambiguity in his nature, the assurance about who and what he is -- is what makes him, in the confused modern age, a kind of superhero.

But how exactly does the modern audience feel about James Bond and how have those feelings changed? Amis presents it this way: "We don't want to have Bond to dinner or go golfing with Bond or talk to Bond. We want to be Bond." And for most of Bond's tenure as a cultural icon, this has been the assumption: that men want to be him, and women want to have him.

But as notions of masculinity, of sex, and the relations between men and women have changed, Bond has changed too. In some respects, his transmutations as an mythic figure over the years -- from Connery to Moore and now Dalton -- are as reliable a barometer of those changes as any in the culture. Political changes, too, linger in the background. (That a James Bond figure would take part in an actual war, as Dalton does when he goes to Afghanistan in "The Living Daylights," is unprecedented.) But although geopolitics provide texture and atmosphere in the Bond films, primarily they function (surreally) as part of the content; sex is an aspect of style. And in the world of Bond, style is everything.

Indisputably, Bond is more of a fantasy ideal for men than women. But even for men, there are limitations to the appeal of a figure like Bond. The code he lives by is the code of the professional, and there's a single-mindedness, an almost monastic rigor to his personality -- it's this part of Oliver North that kept prompting the Bond comparisons -- that makes us feel that his might be a tough standard to live up to.

The style that Connery created for Bond in the six 007 pictures he made was debonair but gritty -- it was a realistic style for an essentially imagined, highly improbable universe, and what he accomplished was to turn the fantastic into flesh and blood.

Connery's films in the series span a period from "Dr. No" in 1962 to "Diamonds Are Forever" in 1971. (In between "You Only Live Twice" in 1967 and "Diamonds Are Forever," George Lazenby -- who laid no stylistic claim to the character and, therefore, doesn't really count -- starred in "On Her Majesty's Secret Service.") Of those films only the first three -- "Dr. No," "From Russia With Love" and "Goldfinger" -- could be considered vintage.

Connery's virtue is that he carried over the rough edges of Fleming's Bond into the movies. Connery had the perfect mixture of musky sexuality and self-mockery to put across a character who, even at the time he was first brought to the screen, was a bit of anachronism. Connery gave the character gravity. But he gave him wit as well. (It was supposedly Connery's wife who initially urged her husband to turn down the part unless the script was rewritten to include more humor.) And sometimes the combination of brass-knuckled toughness and comedy would create unnerving gallowsy dissonances.

Connery's Bond could be brutally cynical, snapping off one-liners over the not even cool bodies of his victims. (Sample: "Do you mind if my friend sits here? She's just dead.") But he could be moved too. In "Goldfinger," the death of Jill Masterson, whom he discovers covered with gold paint, really rocks him, and the emotion of that moment carries throughout the rest of the film. There's not really another moment quite like it in the series, not even the death of Bond's wife (Diana Rigg) in the Lazenby film.

When Moore took over the character in 1973 in "Live and Let Die" -- he relinquished his claim to the character after "A View to a Kill" in 1986 -- those rough edges in Bond's personality were smoothed over and, on the pop-mythic level, at least, something essential was lost.

There was a loss in terms of entertainment, too. But perhaps that's the way it had to be. When Moore took over the role, the culture probably wouldn't have supported, or tolerated, a more realistic, full-service Bond. The Bond films, even those with Connery, had always danced along a campy, comic-book edge. With Moore, that line was crossed. He spent his days in Her Majesty's Secret Service sending up the figure that Connery had created, turning Bond into an action gigolo/clown. As Moore played it, the notion of Bond's potency was a smirky joke, as preposterous as Superman's ability to fly.

But Bond's sexual prowess -- his ability to wink and slay legions, to convert the wayward with a single bedding -- was always cause for behind-the-hand snickering. It was a laugh in "Casino Royale" (which featured Woody Allen as little Jimmy Bond begging not to be shot because he "has a low threshold of death"), and again in the Cyril Connolly spoof, "Bond Strikes Camp." So it's not really that Bond became a joke in the '70s; he had always been a joke. But with the Moore films, he became a vastly different kind of joke.

The difference is all in the contrast between Connery and Moore. And the comparison, essentially, is between the talents of a tragedian and a farceur. As Connery played him, Bond could be an impossible pedant in matters of taste -- and usually was -- without seeming foppish or affected. He allowed the situation to carry the comedy, and always worked to find the plausible thread in the material. On the other hand, Moore's Bond saw matters of style as a game, a way of putting people on. Moore took a commedia dell'arte approach to Bond, and it worked only once -- when he had a script to support him -- in "The Spy Who Loved Me."

The picture, which also in the partnership between Moore and the Soviet agent, played by Barbara Bach, marks the first sign of detente between the superpowers, is smartly directed and plays as a full-fledged satire. And as such, it's one of the best films of the series. But, in a sense, too, it was something of a dead end. As the comic Bond flourished, increasingly surrounding himself with gadgets and toys, the more grounded, realistic Bond revealed himself to be more and more out of step. By the time Connery reappeared in "Never Say Never Again," he was a kind of a Robinson Crusoe figure, stranded out of his time.

The most fascinating thing about the switch from Connery to Moore is that, though it was merely a practical matter -- Connery had lost interest in the character -- it seemed almost a cultural neccessity. As Agent 007, Connery defined a certain style of masculinity for the '60s. But perhaps it was a conception that couldn't outlive the decade.

As a pop culture myth, the Bond of the 60's, it seemed, had to die, or else undergo a transformation -- in this case, a sort of willful emasculation.

Surprisingly enough, the new Bond, Timothy Dalton, appears to be a return to the more substantial, back-to-the-basics approach Connery took. But context is everything, and there are substantial differences in the worlds they inhabit.

With "The Living Daylights," the days of promiscuity for 007 are over. The new Bond is the safe-sex Bond. (The British have tagged him "No No Seven.") Discreet. Responsible. And a little dull. And the circumstances seem to weigh on the new man as well.

"The Living Daylights," which is set in Gibraltar, Czechoslovakia, Tangier and Afghanistan, is fundamentally Bond's long courtship of a young cellist (Maryam d'Abo) with whom he fell in love at first sight. With the exception of the precredit sequence, in which Bond unexpectedly drops in on a frustrated young tourist and the scant possibility of contact is dangled, Bond keeps his mind on business.

One has a hard time imagining Connery's Bond fitting in with the new program. Unlike previous films, there are very few of those admiring, marvelously constructed, Bond girls, even in smaller parts on the sidelines -- no Plenty O'Tooles, Tiffany Case, Pussy Galores or Honey Ryders. Only the new Miss Moneypenny (the aptly named Caroline Bliss) brings reminders of the days when every receptionist and desk clerk presented an opportunity.

The heroine herself has a strikingly different look. A cross between Nastassja Kinski and Lauren Hutton, she's built less according to the Hefner blueprint than usual. She's less of sexpot and more of a serious artist -- she plays the cello -- and, unlike past Bond women, she takes her own sweet time falling for our hero.

What all this signifies is hard to pin down, but the background forces seem pretty clear. Dalton's Bond is undeniably an attempt to give the character relevance and keep him in step with the times. But, in a sense, it's one step forward and two steps back.

"The Living Daylights" is like "From Russia With Love," but without sex. And a Bond film without sex seems something of an absurdity. If in taking over the role, Moore took flight from reality and lost something essential in the character, to lose Bond's sexuality is certainly a loss of equal weight.

Bond defined himself by his pleasures, by sex, and in the films, his interaction with women provided an outlet for his personality, a chance to put his wit and style on display.

Without sex, Bond becomes just another secret agent -- another bland action hero. Also, deemphasizing Bond's sexual athletics strips him of one of his most important roles. Seen from a Bond's-eye view, the currency of nations is sex. And Bond is the ultimate weapon.

If Secord and Hakim represent the privatization of foreign policy, Bond stands for its sexualization. And between East and West, James Bond is a living symbol of the "style gap." As a result, his sexual prowess is not merely a matter of show. At the end of "The Spy Who Loved Me," Bond -- Moore -- is discovered in midembrace with Barbara Bach by his superiors, who demand to know what he thinks he's doing. "Keeping the British end up, sir," he answers wryly, turning back to his work. And nobody does it better.

In "From Russia With Love," the plot turns on the fact that a pretty young Red has fallen in love with a file photo of 007 and is ready to defect, sell state secrets even, just for the chance to meet him. Underlying all this is the half-facetious assumption that if James Bond could sleep with every woman in the Soviet Union the war would be won. In other words, keep your ICBMs, your Hawks and your TOWs, bring down the nuclear curtain, somewhere tonight James Bond is making the world safe for democracy.

If we look at the Bond pictures in Cold War terms, as allegorical East-West confrontations, we see that the western style -- which, try as they might, the Russians cannot manufacture in their laboratories -- is the difference.

The Bond films are all about the sexual style of the West, with Bond as its purest expression. What the films suggest is that matters of style -- in clothes, in cars, in food and in women -- are a guide to character. That's why all that Bond stuff -- the cars, the watches, the clothes, the girls -- was so important.

Underlying the innumerable scenes in which either Blofeld or Goldfinger or Stromberg tries to show off to Bond the extensiveness of his wine cellar or gloatingly presents him with a properly prepared martini is the notion that the enemy is hopelessly square. Don't worry, the movies tell us, these schlubs can't take over the world, no matter how many missiles they have. Look at those slacks. How can the baddies prevail if they don't know how outre' their little Mao suit jackets are?

Admittedly, the notion of style in the Bond films is itself laughable. The Bond '60s aren't the truly stylish '60s of Jean Shrimpton or or Warhol or the Beatles; they're the Nancy Sinatra '60s. The beanbag chair, white go-go boots '60s. The faux-hip '60s. And since then we've continued to see the faux-hip designs applied to each subsequent decade. But what the style of the Bond films stands for, however gauche, is wit and sensual pleasures -- to sum it up crassly, the rewards of capitalism. Bond's enemies at SPECTRE were sexless ascetics: To have 007 join them -- even in the name of responsibility -- seems like a betrayal. Responsibility is for mortals. And who wants a mortal Bond.

2004: Peugot cease and desist their contentious pronunciation of the 1007 mini-MPV.

The name's not Bond

See the complete article here:

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/names-not-bond

Autocar News | 26 July 2004

Peugeot has been forced to change the pronunciation of its new 1007 mini-MPV (above) at the last minute. The owners of the James Bond trademark disputed Peugeot's 'one-double-oh-seven' pronunciation, claiming it was too close to the secret agent's codename.

It's embarrassing for Peugeot, which had to explain the pronunciation in numerous press releases. Now it will be called 'one thousand and seven' instead.

2006: Producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson announce Chris Cornell to perform the title song "You Know My Name", written by Cornell and David Arnold.

2012: Madonna performs her "Die Another Day"/"Beautiful Killer" mashup during the MDNA Tour, Paris, France.

2012: Bruce Feirstein through PrimaGames talks 007 Legends.

The Man Behind Many James Bond Missions

Talks 007 Legends
The new 007 shooter celebrates the 50th Anniversary of James Bond by sending players on updated missions based on
six Bond movies, including Moonraker, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and the upcoming Skyfall.

See the complete article here:

https://primagames.com/strategy/man-behind-many-james-bond-missions-talks-007-lege

Published July 26, 2012, 2:54 p.m. about 007 Legends
by Mojo Media

Bruce Feirstein has written three James Bond movies and worked on five games over the years. The screenwriter has been collaborating with Activision and developer Eurocom lately on 007 Legends. The new shooter celebrates the 50th Anniversary of James Bond by sending players on updated missions based on six Bond movies, including Moonraker, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and the upcoming Skyfall.

“Bond came onto the scene in 1962 with the first movie, Dr. No, and in November Skyfall will be coming out,” said Feirstein. “What Activision decided to do is create one game with Bond’s most iconic moments and somehow link them all together with an overarching story. Players will get to play through Bond’s most interesting missions.”

Launching on October 16, 2012, 007 Legends equips players with state-of-the-art spy gadgets, an arsenal of weapons and sleek vehicles as they jet off to exotic locations and utilize Bond’s quick wits, class and style to take down notorious villains and their brutal henchmen while performing impressive stunts. Gamers will be taking on villains like Ernst Stavro Blofeld and Sir Hugo Drax.

“It’s funny the way Bond villains over all of these years have stayed the same in a way and have been timely,” said Feirstein. “That’s been part of the success of the series and it’s what we’re trying to do in the game. There is something ultimately about Bond that is very deep and archetypal, meaning that there’s something inside of us that we recognize in Bond. We connect with the story of what ultimately is Bond as a lone warrior who is sent out to avenge a vanquished nation.” Going with a first-person shooter perspective, which Activision used for its GoldenEye remake (also written by Feirstein), allows the player to become Bond. It also circumvents the fact that different actors played Bond in these six films.

The structure of the Bond films, for the most part, has made the task of updating them for today’s gamers an easier task. “Part of the advantage of Bond, which I can say as an American, is that you’ll never see the Oval Office in a James Bond movie,” said Feirstein. “And with the exception of Thunderball, the Prime Minister is never seen. This makes it easier for fans from around the world to connect with the character. You can travel to the craziest place in the world like Cambodia, which I’ve done, and you’ll find someone who can relate to James Bond -- the lone warrior out to avenge the nation.”

The last couple of Activision games had a big multiplayer focus. Although details on 007 Legends multiplayer haven’t been revealed yet, Feirstein believes this aspect of gaming is important for the virtual Bond franchise. “That moment when the father and son play together as a team together is the equivalent for someone like me with my father taking me to see the New York Yankees,” said Feirstein. “It’s a much larger experience than just the game.

If you’re a father and your kid has left and gone to college, you can reconnect over your Xbox while also going back and reliving some of the great experiences from the Bond movies that you grew up with.” 007 Legends will ship for PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 on October 26.

2020: Asahi Shimbun reports on Toyota manufacturing classic sports car replacement parts--includes the 2000GT.

Toyota to reproduce parts for 2000GT driven by 007

See the complete article here:

https://www.asahi.com/ajw/articles/13538354

By DAIKI ISHIZUKA/ Staff Writer | July 26, 2020 at 08:00 JST

The Toyota 2000GT, for which Toyota Motor Corp. will reproduce and sell replacement parts
(Provided by Toyota Motor Corp.)

The fabled Toyota 2000GT sports car model that James Bond drove in his 1967 film "You Only Live Twice" has been given a new life by Toyota Motor Corp.

Toyota announced July 6 it will reproduce and sell replacement parts for the rare 2000GT, last produced 50 years ago.

The project is aimed at reproducing discontinued parts and helping owners to continue to drive the iconic sports car.

Orders will be accepted from August.

The 2000GT was a specialty sports car for the auto giant, with only 337 units produced between 1967 and 1970. Boasting a maximum speed of 220 kph, it set three world records.

About 10 parts, including those for the transmission, will be offered for sale.

Toyota decided to reproduce the parts in response to requests from owners who said it was getting difficult to replace broken parts 50 years after production ended.

Sales will be restricted to 2000GT owners. Prices have yet to be determined.

Toyota has been selling reproduction parts for fans of its classic cars.

In May last year, the automaker announced it would reproduce parts for the A70 and A80 Supra, which were popular in the 1980s and 1990s.

The latest offering is the second batch of the parts reproduction project.

Toyota will reproduce and sell replacement parts including gears for its 2000GT sports car.
(Provided by Toyota Motor Corp.)

Only 337 units of the Toyota 2000GT were produced between 1967 and 1970.
(Provided by Toyota Motor Corp.)




















http://www.2000gt.net/007/Bond2.php

2021: From Russia With Love screens at the Wayne Theater, Waynesboro, Virginia.

July 26: From Russia With Love (Film)
Mon Jul 26 2021 at 02:00 pm to 04:30 pm UTC-04:00
Wayne Theatre | Waynesboro

See the complete article here:

https://stayhappening.com/e/july-26-from-russia-with-love-film-E2ISTLI8S1T

Publisher/Host
Wayne Theatre

July 26: From Russia With Love (Film) The Wayne Theatre presents our Monday at the Movie series hosted by Jimmy Overton with the Classic Cinema Club. Pay What You Will.

From Russia With Love (1963)
James Bond willingly falls into an assassination plot involving a naïve Russian beauty in order to retrieve a Soviet encryption device that was stolen by S.P.E.C.T.R.E. Action/Adventure

PLEASE NOTE THAT ALL FILM TITLES ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE.
Please Pay What You Will by making a secure donation online, here: https://www.waynetheatre.org/support-us

Event Venue
Wayne Theatre, 521 Main St, Waynesboro, United States

RichardTheBruce

July 27th

1922: Adolfo Celi is born--Messina, Sicily, Italy.
(He dies 19 February 1986 at age 63--Siena, Tuscany, Italy.)

Adolfo Celi Dies at 64; An Actor and Director

See the complete article here:

https://www.nytimes.com/1986/02/20/obituaries/adolfo-celi-dies-at-64-an-actor-and-director.html

AP FEB. 20, 1986

Adolfo Celi, the Italian actor and director, died today, two days after suffering a heart attack. He was 64 years old.

Mr. Celi, a Sicilian who began acting on the Italian screen in the 1940's and performed for 15 years in Brazil, was known for his comic roles, but was also frequently cast as a villain in films. He won international fame in the 1965 film of ''Thunderball'' as Emilio Largo, the black eye-patched adversary of James Bond.

He had more than three dozen roles to his credit, including that of Giovanni de Medici in ''The Agony and the Ecstasy,'' the 1965 film biography of Michelangelo, and that of a Scottish colonel in ''King of Hearts'' (1966), which starred Alan Bates.

His other film credits included ''That Man From Rio'' (1964); ''Von Ryan's Express'' (1965); ''Grand Prix'' (1966); ''The Alibi'' (1969), for which he was also co-director and co-author; a 1971 remake of ''Murders in the Rue Morgue,'' and a 1974 version of Agatha Christie's 'Ten Little Indians' titled ''And Then There Were None.'' In the past few years he had starred in several Italian-made movies, including the series ''Amici Miei'' (''My Friends'') and also directed stage productions.

He suffered the heart attack a few hours before the premiere in this Tuscan city of ''I Misteri di Pietroburgo'' (''The St. Petersburg Mysteries''), which he directed and acted in.

Adolfo Celi (1922–1986)

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0148041/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

Filmography

Actor (103 credits)

-1987 International Airport (TV Series) - Il Caposcalo - 10 episodes
1987 T.I.R. (TV Series) - Oreste
- Aki elsönek érkezik (1987) ... Oreste
1985 Il giocatore invisibile
1985 All My Friends Part 3 - Professor Sassaroli
1984 Cindy - Cinderella '80 - Prince Gherardeschi
1982 L'occhio di Giuda (TV Mini-Series)
- Episode #1.3 (1982)
- Episode #1.2 (1982)
- Episode #1.1 (1982)
1982 All My Friends Part 2 - Professor Alfeo Sassaroli
1982 Monsignor - Vinci
1982 La sconosciuta (TV Mini-Series) - Taladis - 4 episodes
1981 Madly in Love - Gustavo VI di San Tulipe
1981 The Borgias (TV Mini-Series) - Rodrigo Borgia - 9 episodes
1980 Carnapping - Head of police in Palermo
1980 Café Express - Ispettore capo Ministero

1979 L'altro Simenon (TV Series)
1978 Le braghe del padrone - Eugenio - the president
1978 Professor Kranz tedesco di Germania - Carcamano
1978 Indagine su un delitto perfetto - Sir Harold Boyd
1977 Man of Corleone
1977 The Tiger Is Still Alive: Sandokan to the Rescue (TV Movie) - James Brooke
1977 The Chosen - Dr. Kerouac
1977 Pane, burro e marmellata - Aristide Bertelli
1977 The Passengers - Boetani
1977 Che notte quella notte! - Dottore
1976 Merciless Man - Commissario Lo Gallo
1976 The Big Operator - Rifai
1976 The Next Man - Al Sharif
1976 Febbre da cavallo - Judge
1976 Goodnight, Ladies and Gentlemen - Commendatore Vladimiro Palese
1976 L'affittacamere - Giudice Damiani
1976 Confessions of a Frustrated Housewife - Antonio
1976 Live Like a Cop, Die Like a Man - Captain
1976 Pure as a Lily - L'onorevole
1976 Sandokan (TV Mini-Series) - James Brooke - 6 episodes
1975 L'amaro caso della baronessa di Carini (TV Mini-Series) - Don Mariano D'Agrò - 4 episodes
1975 Amici miei - Professor Sassaroli
1975 Libera, My Love - Felice Valente - Libera's father
1974 Last Moments - Dr. Monforte
1974 Ten Little Indians - The General
1974 The Phantom of Liberty - Le docteur de Legendre / Doctor Pasolini
1974 The Devil Is a Woman - Father Borelli
1973 La villeggiatura - Commissioner Rizzuto
1973 Le mataf - Me Desbordes
1973 Hitler: The Last Ten Days - General Krebs
1973 Pete, Pearl & the Pole - The Pole
1972 Joe Petrosino (TV Mini-Series) - Joe Petrosino - 4 episodes
1972 The Italian Connection - Don Vito Tressoldi
1972 The Long Arm of the Godfather - Don Carmelo
1972 Ragazza tutta nuda assassinata nel parco - Inspector Huber
1972 Who Saw Her Die? - Serafian
1972 Who Killed the Prosecutor and Why? - Inspector Vezzi
1972 Eye in the Labyrinth - Frank
1972 Brother Sun, Sister Moon - Consul
1972 Il sospetto (TV Movie) - Dott. Fritz Emmemberger
1971 Una chica casi decente - César Martín de Valdés 'Duque'
1971 Murders in the Rue Morgue - Inspector Vidocq
1971 They Have Changed Their Face - Giovanni Nosferatu
1970 Finale di partita (TV Movie)
1970 Brancaleone at the Crusades - Re Boemondo
1970 The Cop - Le commissaire principal / Chief of police
1970 Fragment of Fear - Signor Bardoni
1970 The Night of the Assassin - Hermes

1969 It Takes a Thief (TV Series) - Eric 'The Red' Redman / Eric Redman
- The Second Time Around (1969) ... Eric 'The Red' Redman
- The Great Casino Caper (1969) ... Eric Redman
1969 In Search of Gregory - Max
1969 Death Knocks Twice - Professor Max Spiegler
1969 A Man for Emmanuelle - Sandri
1969 Detective Belli - Avvocato Fontana
1969 Midas Run - General Ferranti
1969 The Archangel - Marco Tarocchi Roda
1969 Alibi - Adolfo
1968 Seven Times Seven - Warden
1968 Fantabulous Inc. - Karl Maria van Beethoven
1968 It's Your Move - Bayon / Guinet
1968 Danger: Diabolik - Ralph Valmont
1968 Death Sentence - Friar Baldwin
1967 Dirty Heroes - Luc Rollman
1967 Grand Slam - Mark Milford
1967 Operation Kid Brother - Mr. Thai - 'Beta'
1967 The Bobo - Francisco Carbonell
1967 The Honey Pot - Inspector Rizzi
1967 Master Stroke - Mr. Bernard
1966 Grand Prix - Agostini Manetta
1966 King of Hearts - Le Colonel Mac Bibenbrook (as Adolfo Celli)
1966 Pleasant Nights - Bernardozzo
1966 Target for Killing - Henry Perkins
1966 Yankee - Grande Concho
1966 El Greco - Don Miguel de las Cuevas
1965 Thunderball - Largo
1965 A Man Named John - Msgr. Radini Tedeschi
1965 Slalom - Riccardo
1965 The Agony and the Ecstasy - Cardinal Giovanni de' Medici (pope Leo X)
1965 Von Ryan's Express - Battaglia
1965 Crime on a Summer Morning - Van Willie
1964 Beautiful Families - Professore Della Porta (segment "Amare è un po' morire")
1964 Male Companion - Benvenuto
1964 3 notti d'amore - Alberto (segment "La moglie bambina")
1964 That Man from Rio - Mário de Castro
1963 Sandokan the Great
1952 Tico-Tico no Fubá (uncredited)
1950 Caiçara - Genovês
1948 Immigrants - Il professore
1948 Guaglio - Don Pietro
1947 Natale al campo 119 - John, il sergente americano
1946 Un americano in vacanza - Tom

Director (4 credits)

1969 Alibi

1957 Grande Teatro Tupi (TV Series) (1 episode)
- Esta Noite é Nossa (1957)
1952 Tico-Tico no Fubá
1950 Caiçara

Writer (2 credits)

1969 Alibi (screenplay) / (story)

1950 Caiçara (story and screenplay)

Producer (1 credit)

1952 Tico-Tico no Fubá (producer)

Miscellaneous Crew (1 credit)

1973 Lucky Luciano (voice dubbing: Charles Siragusa - uncredited)

1963: The Dr. No soundtrack enters US charts eventually reaching #82.
1966: At a press conference in Japan Sean Connery comments--"Japanese women are just not sexy."
1968: Maria Grazia Cucinotta is born--Messina, Sicily, Italy.

1987: Cathleen McGuigan in Newsweek reviews The Living Daylights.

The name's Dalton, Timothy Dalton, and in the film The Living Daylights he abandons the winks, the arched eyebrow and laid-back smile to get down to the dirty business of espionage.

1988: Licence to Kill films a barroom brawl at the Barrelhead Bar in Key West, Florida.

2007: Park Circus re-releases Goldfinger digital prints in the UK at 150 multiplex cinemas. It charts number 12 at the weekly box office.

2012: BBC News reports on Olympic events.

How James Bond whisked the Queen to the Olympics

See the complete article here:

By Nicolas Brown | BBC Director of UK Drama Production
Published | 27 July 2012

In this year of extraordinary events there was a week in late March of unseasonal glorious sunshine, when we basked in its early arrival and dreamed we might be set fair for summer.

That week, an extraordinary - surreal, even - event happened at Buckingham Palace when Her Majesty The Queen made herself available for a few short hours to appear in a film sequence alongside another British icon, James Bond, 007.

Although not a drama in the conventional sense, "Happy and Glorious", as conceived by Danny Boyle, has a gentle narrative which sets up the Queen's arrival at the stadium for the opening ceremony.

Her Majesty, Daniel Craig, our Brazilian schoolchildren (a nod to four years hence of course) and the corgis all played their parts impeccably and none of it would have happened without the extraordinary and tenacious Tracey Seaward who somehow fitted in co-executive producing these two films with her day job of producing the entire ceremony.

That was the very first element shot of two films - "Happy and Glorious" and "Isles of Wonder" which opens the entire worldwide coverage - that BBC Drama Production have contributed to the ceremony and which started with a brief phone call back in February.

Two short films for the Olympics? Directed by Danny Boyle? Sure, that didn't appear too tall an order and in fact sounded something of an alluring prospect. How difficult could it be?

Bold and exciting
The task had seemed surmountable as we sat in a small windowless room at Three Mills Studios in East London - then the base for the ceremonies team - and watched a computer generated/sketched visualisation of what Danny wanted to achieve.

It was bold, ambitious and exciting - everything one would expect from him.

On that day in March, watching footage of the helicopter rising from the Palace lawn into an azure blue sky (even whilst noting the still thin spring foliage that would have to be improved on in post-production to become convincing summer) the auguries still looked good.

This was despite knowing that ahead lay the challenges of shooting aerial and marine sequences, complex coordination with action on the ground.

All of this in the centre of a city that, not easy to film in at the best of times, was heading towards a period of unprecedented sensitivity and security. Everything was possible.

Then came the weather. We all know about this summer - flooding, monsoon conditions, records broken, the jet stream that stubbornly refused to shift.

Neither of the films is long, but they are largely exterior and each is made up of myriad elements that needed a huge amount of planning and resources, as well as weather, to get right for our expected audience of over one billion people.

Permission to fly
If you are having to secure permissions to fly along the Thames, through Tower Bridge with two helicopters (never done before) or clear the river of commercial traffic you need to do so with several weeks' notice.

If you then find that over the dates you have picked the helicopter can't fly because of the low cloud or is grounded because of a bomb scare on Tottenham Court Road or the footage you do achieve is so utterly grey, damp and joyless as to be unusable, you have a big problem.

Daniel Craig with co-stars in the coming Bond film Skyfall

We had several of those days, with an immovable date in the diary that was racing towards us.

In the end we were lucky. Lucky that the cloud lifted and sun shone at the very end of the day at our second attempt at Tower Bridge (I will always remember producer Lisa Osborne sending me a sequence of stills through the day starting with a crew in wet weather gear, moving to a glimpse of blue sky and ending with glorious shots of two helicopters flying through the bridge as the sun began to set).

Lucky that there was just enough sunshine around - on the third attempt - to capture the beauty of the Thames in its early meanderings.

The look around the source itself, we have to confess, is the result of a lot generators, cabling and bulbs and lucky that there was a team who stuck with it through disappointment, frustration, the cold and the wet.

The result is the delivery of what I think are films full of warmth, joy, affection, wit, surprise and excitement and sunshine and which I hope played their part in a memorable night.

2012: BBC's film Happy & Glorious, directed by Danny Boyle, showcases Craig as Bond with the Queen to open the London 2012 Summer Olympics. Watched by an estimated nearly one billion viewers.

London 2012 Olympic Opening Ceremony: Isles of Wonder (2012)

TV Special | 2012 | 5h 52min
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt2305700/?ref_=fn_al_tt_1

The world's best all-round sporting event returns in 2012, this time in London, and England's capital has a lot in store.

Directed by
Danny Boyle
Writing Credits (in alphabetical order)
Danny Boyle, Frank Cottrell Boyce

Cast (in credits order) includes
Darius Alexander ... Pandemonium Drummer / Athlete Marshall
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Arctic Monkeys ... Themselves
Rowan Atkinson ... Mr. Bean
David Beckham ... Self
Daniel Craig ... James Bond
Prince Philip ... Self
Queen Elizabeth II ... Self

2014: MGM-Danjaq denies ‘scaring off’ Bond competition.

NewsFilm News
Studio deny dirty tricks after launching lawsuit against Universal
James Bond studio denies ‘scaring off’ 007 competitors

See the complete article here:

https://www.nme.com/news/film/james-bond-studio-denies-scaring-off-007-competito-874743

By John Earls | 27th June 2014

The distributors of the James Bond films have denied they’re trying to “scare off” competition from rival film-makers, after launching a lawsuit against Universal Studios for allegedly stealing their ideas with plans for a supposedly similar new movie.

According to The Hollywood Reporter MGM-Danjaq are suing Universal claiming that its new movie Section 6 copies ideas from the Bond franchise. Universal had attempted to dismiss the lawsuit, claiming that MGM-Danjaq were attempting to scare away any Bond rivals. Universal also said that Section 6 was being revised and that the film hadn’t even officially been given the go-ahead.

But, in a new brief filed in the US District Court in Los Angeles, MGM-Danjaq have reproduced scriptwriter Aaron Berg’s script for the film, highlighting areas they contend “directly infringes” the James Bond copyright.

The brief claims Berg was paid $1 million (£590,000) for his script, stating: “It would be contrary to industry practice and make no sense to pay anything close to that amount” for a script unless it was likely to be used. Universal say they have given assurances that Section 6 won’t infringe MGM-Danjaq’s copyright. The hearing is due to take place on July 28.

MGM, which also owns the rights to The Hobbit, has begun producing the 24th Bond film. It will again star Daniel Craig and be directed by Sam Mendes, who helmed 2012’s Skyfall. Penelope Cruz is rumoured to be playing Bond’s love interest, though her agents have so far denied this.

2017: GQ proposes Bourne better than Bond.

Why Bourne is better than Bond

See the complete article here:

https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/bourne-vs-bond

By Helen O Hara
27 July 2016

James Bond is a right-wing imperialist but Jason Bourne is a thorn to his masters’s foot. Isn’t that worth cheering?

This week sees the return of Jason Bourne to cinemas, and thank goodness. After last year’s ridiculous, overblown Spectre, we need Matt Damon and director Paul Greengrass’ particular brand of spy story back in cinemas. Because while James Bond has been around a little longer, Jason Bourne’s cinematic outings have been better on average and far more politically daring.

The fact is that Bourne is a superior character to Bond. He’s a better spy, for those of you who care about the thriller aspect to these films. Bourne wears carefully generic clothes, disappears in a crowd and lives under the radar for long periods with great success. He doesn’t, say, pause in Tangiers to pick up some designer duds before buying first-class train tickets to go visit his supervillain opponent, as Bond did in Spectre. He has multiple identities and uses them, rather than announcing himself publicly anyplace that sells a vodka martini. Bourne is capable of honest-to-goodness sneakiness.

He’s also a better person. He’s a one-woman sort of guy, who settled down with Bourne Identity’s Marie (Franke Potente) and has remained apparently single since she was killed in action. Women are not disposable, as in Bond; even supporting characters like Julia Stiles’ analyst or Joan Allen’s CIA director keep cropping up in repeated films. Only Judi Dench’s M had the same distinction in the Bond series, and of course she died for her trouble. Bourne doesn’t quip over the bodies of his foes, like the sociopathic Bond. Most importantly, Bourne is tormented by his own dark past – and in The Bourne Supremacy (the best of the series) his entire drive is not towards his enemies, but towards a woman he wronged, and to whom he wishes to offer some sort of restitution. Now that’s a value worth celebrating.

Fans love the fantasy element to Bond, what with the cars and the money and the girls and the gambling and the travel and the gadgets and the power – but the obsession with those things makes him a terrible human being. It’s no coincidence that the most lauded recent Bond movies were reinventions with more than a dash of Bourne: since Casino Royale, they’ve borrowed everything from Greengrass’ shaky-cam action style to Bourne stunt coordinator Dan Bradley to a sudden willingness to pause the action for moments of introspection. But even Daniel Craig’s Bond couldn’t keep it low-key for long, so soon he was back to normal, wearing suits that cost as much as your car and driving cars that cost as much as your house. Craig hasn’t had to contend with a double-taking pigeon yet like Roger Moore, but it’s only a matter of time in Bond’s boom-and-bust cycle between ridiculous overstatement and (temporary, always temporary) seriousness of purpose.

Even when Bond is at his grittiest and Bourne at his silliest (cough cough Legacy – even if Damon didn’t appear) there will always be a gulf between the characters. Bond is obsessed with fitting in, with being a part of the system. He moves in corridors of power, he poses on rooftops in Whitehall and appears before Parliament. Paul Greengrass once described him as an “right-wing imperialist”, and no matter how the incarnations twist to show a more human side, that’s what he remains. Bourne, however, is a thorn to his masters’s foot and a bramble to his hand, more likely to uncover dirty tricks than carry them out anymore. And in these days of all days, isn’t that worth cheering?

2017: GQ reports a shortlist of directors for BOND 25, specifically Denis Villeneuve, David MacKenzie, Yann Demange.

The Next James Bond Movie Now Has 3 Possible Directors

See the complete article here:

https://www.gq.com.au/entertainment/film-tv/the-next-james-bond-movie-now-has-3-possible-directors/news-story/399a15b6435e6a021bec416741a14273

Scott Melsow | 27 July 2017

And their renditions of Daniel Craig's last mission as
007 could all look very different.

We compare the three directors that have reportedly been
shortlisted to carry this 007 over the finish line.

Earlier this week, Sony announced that the next James Bond movie will arrive in theaters on November 8, 2019. It’s not much to go on—the announcement didn’t include the director, the title, or even the actor who will play 007. But it is a ticking clock—and as James Bond himself would tell you, you don't want to run out of time on one of those.

Fortunately, details on the as-yet-untitled Bond 25 are already trickling in.

Deadline reports that Craig will likely return to play Bond one more time. (The report also suggests that after the Daniel Craig era ends, the next 007 reboot might be spearheaded by Christopher Nolan or Edgar Wright, which is damn interesting.)

For now, however, it looks like Bond 25 will be one last outing for Craig. And three directors have reportedly been shortlisted to carry this 007 over the finish line: Denis Villeneuve, David MacKenzie, and Yann Demange. Let’s take a look at each of them.

Denis Villeneuve
What you know him from: Prisoners, Sicario, Arrival
https://youtu.be/3_T6vZ8HxbA

Denis Villeneuve is turning out to be one of the most in-demand directors in Hollywood. Last year, Arrival scored Villeneuve his first Oscar nominations for both Best Director and Best Picture. In October, his Blade Runner 2049 will serve as a belated sequel to one of the most acclaimed sci-fi movies in history. And then there are the persistent reports about Villeneuve helming a new adaptation of Dune, which is based on one of the most acclaimed sci-fi novels in history.

So it’s no surprise that Villeneuve is on a shortlist of directors who might be able to breathe some new life into Craig’s 007. The bigger question is when he’d find the time to do it.

What his Bond 25 might look like: Foggy, morally ambiguous, kickass score. James Bond fights a giant spider.

David MacKenzie
What you know him from: Starred Up, Hell or High Water
https://youtu.be/J2SsOOkdIrE

Like Villeneuve, MacKenzie’s star rose just last year, when his Hell or High Water scored a dark-horse Best Picture nomination at the Oscars. And though MacKenzie’s directing credits stretch back for more than a decade, it’s the feature he did before Hell or High Water that might be the biggest litmus test for what his 007 could look like: Starred Up, a smart and brutal U.K. prison drama.

What his Bond 25 might look like: Rural, physical, disproportionate number of mustaches.

Yann Demange
What you know him from: Dead Set, ’71
https://youtu.be/Qyzj6gsg1Z8

Yann Demange has the lowest profile of the directors rumored to be taking over the 007 franchise, but Variety reports that he’s currently the frontrunner for the job.

The Paris-born Demange helmed every episode of Dead Set—a clever mashup of Big Brother and zombie horror, created by Charlie Brooker of Black Mirror fame—and ’71, a tense war thriller about a British soldier who ends up separated from the rest of his troop during a riot in Belfast.

Unfortunately, ’71 is Demange’s only feature to date, so we don’t have a lot to go on—but next January sees the release of his crime drama White Boy Rick, which stars an ensemble cast that includes Matthew McConaughey, Jennifer Jason Leigh, and Bruce Dern.

What his Bond 25 might look like: Tense, darkly lit, full of actual espionage

--

2021: The Waterfront Cinema screens Octopussy at Greencock, UK.

Film Series
James Bond Series
Octopussy

See the complete article here:

https://waterfrontcinema.savoysystems.co.uk/WaterfrontCinema.dll/TSelectItems.waSelectItemsPrompt.TcsWebMenuItem_2353181.TcsWebTab_2353182.TcsProgramme_2339986

Octopussy (PG)
A fake Fabergé egg, and a fellow Agent's death, lead James Bond to uncover an international jewel-smuggling operation, headed by the mysterious Octopussy, being used to disguise a nuclear attack on N.A.T.O. forces.

Book Tickets
Tuesday 27 Jul 2021 - 19:30

RichardTheBruce

July 28th

1964: The Goldfinger production's last day for Honor Blackman includes publicity shots, dialogue recording.

1978: 007 ja Kultasormi (007 and Goldfinger; or Swedish 007 och Guldfinger) re-released in Finland.

Swedish

1989: The Palm Beach Post prints "Bond Violence Gets Artistic 'Licence.'"

MOVIE NOTES
Bond violence gets artistic 'Licence'

See the complete article here:

https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/132535356/

Lots of critics took shots at the latest James Bond picture, Licence to Kill, for its violence. We counted some 22 visibly dead on screen, some in pretty gruesome fashion. There is death by electric eel, shark and hungry maggots. One bad guy is decompressurized. Another is sent via conveyor belt to some sharp-edged machinery. There is an impaling and an incineration, along with your more traditional shootings, stranglings and falls from planes.

So how did all this manage a PG-13? Richard Heffner, chairman of the MPAA ratings board, would only respond: "The rating reflects the majority opinion of the board . . . Our decisions aren't made by doing a body count." By the way, Heffner said, it has been an "established tradition" for United Artists to fly several MPAA board members first class to London to view and rate the Bond films. But this year, they saw Licence to Kill in the States.

Meanwhile, Licence to Kill is out as a graphic novel. But don't look for Timothy Dalton as a new comic book character. The English star known before Bond for more dignified roles has refused to allow his likeness to be licensed in the just-out book from Eclipse Comics.

1989: The Christian Science Monitor reports on film smoking and product placement and Bond.

Tobacco's Cloudy Image on The Silver Screen

See the complete article here:

https://www.csmonitor.com/1989/0728/ebond.html

July 28, 1989 | By Carol Bergman Carol Bergman, a free-lance journalist specializing in media subjects, is a member of the Media Studies Faculty at The New School for Social Research in New York City.

There is no greater promotional value - short of a direct endorsement - than having a major motion picture star use a product in a big budget film. - Robert H. Kovoloff, President, Associated Film Promotions.

A NEW James Bond movie, "Licence to Kill,'' has just been released in the United States. Featured prominently in the film - in one instance clearly centered in the frame as a bomb that is about to explode - is a package of Lark cigarettes, manufactured and marketed in Japan but owned jointly by Philip Morris and The Liggett Group, two of the six American cigarette manufacturers. The producers have added a Surgeon General's warning to the end of the film but most of the audience has gone home by the time it rolls by.

For the privilege of placing their product in the movie, to appear in clear association with the James Bond character, who lights up twice during the film and whose glamourous lover according to the script has gone back to smoking after five years, Philip Morris and The Liggett Group contributed to the production and promotional costs of "Licence to Kill'' with a precedent-setting sum of $350,000.

Philip Morris and Liggett are also "tying-in'' the promotion of "Licence to Kill'' with the promotion of Lark cigarettes. Although Larks are not sold in this country, and the back-end promotion will be handled by a Japanese advertising agency, it cannot have escaped the companies' notice that "License to Kill'' will ultimately conclude its economic journey on American and many other nations' television, as well as on video-cassettes around the world.

The continuing and pervasive presence of cigarettes and smoking in clear association with movie heroes and heroines insures that the image of the smoker will not atrophy. It is a deliberate corporate strategy. And because the advertising is embedded neatly in the movie without any statement except in small credits at the end of the film, the audience will remain unaware that it has been targeted by an ad agency. Whether such embedded cigarette advertising in motion pictures, many of which are ultimately screened on television which has its own set of regulations, is a violation of the 1970 broadcast ban and the Cigarette Advertising and Labeling act will be determined by the courts.

"This can be one of the most insidious forms of advertising because people aren't informed that it is advertising,'' explains Charles Mitchell, staff attorney for Center for Science in the Public Interest, a consumer advocacy group that recently filed a petition concerning product placement in motion pictures that appear on television with the Federal Communications Commission."When a cigarette or alcoholic beverage company pays or gives some other kind of consideration to people making the film, that film is probably not going to show the terrible harm that cigarettes and alcohol can do to people.''

The deal between Liggett, Philip Morris, and the producers of "Licence to Kill,'' came to light in January when Congressman Tom Luken (D) of Ohio, chairman of the House Subcommittee on Transportation and Hazardous Materials, wrote to cigarette manufacturers requesting disclosure of their Hollywood tie-ins.

Philip Morris acknowledged its involvement with the new James Bond film and also eventually admitted paying $42,500 to have Marlboro cigarettes appear in "Superman II.'' In that film heroine Lois Lane smokes Marlboro cigarettes and, in the center of the movie, a battle between Superman and his evil compatriots takes place in a forest of Marlboro billboards and trucks. As Philip Morris has admitted, none of this happened by accident.

"We've also heard allegations that not only do [cigarette manufacturers] do specific placement in the sense of a particular brand,'' says an aide to Congressman Luken, "they also pay to get general smoking scenes, particularly on television programs.''

Although in many films cigarette smoking could be considered an integral part of character development or period ambience, it is equally true that in many instances cigarette smoking seems inappropriate, extraneous, or excessive. Sometimes, in fact, a brand name is not even visible in the film. What is glaringly apparent, however, is the extent to which smoking in general is evident.

A watchdog group - Stop Teenage Addiction to Tobacco (STAT) - has been monitoring cigarette placement in movies for several years. A recent newsletter states: "We believe that when movie producers accept tobacco company money, part of the deal is that they include scenes in which smoking appears in a positive light. In almost every movie in which embedded cigarette advertising appears, one or more of the leading characters smoke in a highly glamorized fashion.'' Such glamorization appeals particularly to teenagers who comprise more than 40 percent of moviegoers. In a health conscious America, the greatest threat to cigarette manufacturers is loss of new smokers through attrition.

STAT has compiled a list of movies containing cigarette product placement as well as a glamorized smoking ambience. The list is formidable and diverse. It includes such films as "Who Framed Roger Rabbit, "Crimes of the Heart,'' "Risky Business,'' "Crocodile Dundee,'' "Desperately Seeking Susan,'' and "Batteries Not Included.'' In "Batteries Not Included,'' for example, not only is there a Salem billboard prominently displayed, but the two main characters both smoke. "In one of the cutest scenes,'' states the STAT newsletter, ``an adorable little spaceship flicks a built-in cigarette lighter to fire-up the elderly gentleman's cigar.''

Despite a preponderance of on-screen evidence to the contrary, only one of the five other cigarette manufacturers wrote back to Congressman Luken affirming past payments to film production companies. In his letter to Attorney General Richard Thornburgh requesting an investigation of possible criminal violation of the Federal Cigarette Advertising and Labeling Act, Luken cites the delayed response he received from Philip Morris, and a letter from the Liggett Group which confirmed that in 1983 it had paid $30,000 to have its Eve cigarette appear in "Supergirl.''

But none of the other companies, as yet, have owned up.

Facing investigation from Luken's committee, the Federal Communications Commission, and the US Attorney General, Hollywood producers, as well as the cigarette manufacturers, have closed ranks against prying reporters sniffing a story as big as the payola scandals of the early 1960s. When questioned about their dealings with the tobacco industry, two prominent product placement companies, Marvin Cohen & Associates and Wills & Evans Sponsorship Group, claimed that they also "don't do it.''

"Quite frankly, any tobacco placement in films in the past few years have been very negligible,'' says Marvin Cohen, whose company is hired by the studios rather than the corporate clients. "It's rare that any tobacco is actually I.D'd [identified] on the screen. (A) It's a very small package, and (B) normally it occurs in a darkened room and the actor or actress' hand encompasses the package itself.''

"Do you deal with the tobacco companies?'' a reporter asked Norm Marshall who is affiliated with the Wills & Evans Sponsorship Group. "No. Let me qualify that. One of our clients is Miller which is owned by Philip Morris. We do not deal with Philip Morris directly. I can tell you that there really aren't any [product placement companies] that do.''

If the product placement companies aren't doing it and only two of the six cigarette manufacturers say they are doing it, what gives? Allegations abound. It has been suggested that in view of all the money "out there,'' producers are instructing writers to include smoking characters. Or that producers are encouraging directors to ask the characters to smoke. Or that set decorators and property masters, the people who deal with the day-to-day, hands-on business of getting props on the set and into the hands of unwitting actors, are cutting their own deals with cigarette manufacturers. Absolutely anything is possible in the city of dreams where blockbuster film production is a very expensive proposition.

Nonetheless, $350,000 is a goodly sum to add to the production and promotion budget of a movie by any standards, even those of the product placement companies who have been in the business for a long time and state that $30,000-$50,000 is the usual range paid. The high price paid for the Lark placement and back-end promotion in "Licence to Kill'' is indicative of the mood of the cigarette manufacturers as they seek new and imaginative means of capturing the next generation of would-be smokers. It is this teen market which may further elude them if a print media ad ban is accomplished within the next few years. Product placement in motion pictures is good insurance against such an eventuality.

Timothy Dalton James Bond 007 Lark Cigarette Advert.

1991: The New York Times prints " 'Casino Royale' Is an LP Bond With a Gilt Edge" by Richard Panek.

'Casino Royale' Is an LP Bond With a Gilt Edge

See the complete article here:

https://www.nytimes.com/1991/07/28/movies/casino-royale-is-an-lp-bond-with-a-gilt-edge.html

By Richard Panek | July 28, 1991

As vinyl verges on extinction, one album has emerged as the prime specimen of the species. Of all the millions of recordings released in the 114 years since Thomas Edison asked, "What hath God wrought?" this album has come closest to achieving the potential of a vanishing medium. It represents "the paradigm," says one audiophile, "the paramount, if you will."

It is . . . the original soundtrack of the 1967 movie "Casino Royale."

This unlikely choice -- a jaunty Burt Bacharach score for a James Bond spoof -- makes sense only if one disregards traditional criteria for liking an album. Collectors of "Casino Royale" aren't necessarily interested in the music. "Some people enjoy it," says one rare-record dealer, shrugging. "Some people can't stand it."

What interests audiophiles is the quality of sound. They swap stories about the legendary recording session in London, spend hundreds of dollars for a pristine copy if and when they can find one, and then, like oenophiles who wouldn't dream of opening a 1945 Lafite-Rothschild, often refuse to listen to it. So volatile is the market for this LP that any nugget of news that enhances its considerable mystique can affect the price -- and some significant new information, about the deteriorating condition of the master tape, indicates that the price is about to rise dramatically.

The "Casino Royale" movie is memorable mostly as an artifact of its era. The producer, Charles K. Feldman, who had bought the rights to Ian Fleming's first James Bond novel before the movie series became a hit, conceived of "Casino Royale" as the film that would out-Bond Bond. He threw $12 million, five credited directors and a host of uncredited screenwriters at the material. He assembled a cast that included Peter Sellers, David Niven and Woody Allen -- but not Sean Connery -- as only three of the movie's various James Bonds. And he hired the hottest movie composer of the time, Mr. Bacharach, who in turn enlisted Herb Alpert and the Tijuana Brass to play the title cut.

The soundtrack, like everything else about the movie, was over the top. "The legend is that the original master tape had 'mad' levels on it," says Harry Pearson, editor and publisher of the audiophile bible Absolute Sound and, by general consensus, the person most responsible for creating the "Casino Royale" cult.

Mr. Pearson explains that a sound engineer usually adjusts recording levels so that when musicians are playing their loudest, the meters on the console reach zero. "Once the meters pass zero, it means that you're saturating the tape and running the risk of distortion," he says. "On 'Casino,' they used a supposedly very fancy grade of tape, and the engineers really pushed it, so the meters were typically running deep into the red -- plus one, plus two, plus three, plus four." As a result, he says, the record has an "extremely wide dynamic range" -- higher highs and lower lows.

"They weren't afraid to push the medium to the limits of the recording process," Mr. Pearson adds. "It can lead to disaster, but in the case of 'Casino,' it doesn't. There's no saturation, no distortion. The record is as clean as a whistle."

For this reason, ever since the album's release, audiophiles have valued "Casino Royale" as a test for stereo equipment. "The better your system gets," says Mr. Pearson, "the more you get out of that album."

"The Look of Love" provides several such tests. Dusty Springfield recorded her vocal in a "tiny isolation booth, so on a really good system, you can hear her voice emerging from what sounds like a little hole in space," Mr. Pearson says. "She's not part of of the general orchestral acoustic, and once your system gets to a certain point, you can hear that."

The song also features a sudden saxophone dip and rise that, on less sophisticated equipment, sounds like two or three distinct instruments, and a serrated gourd called a guirot, whose every notch will sound, under ideal conditions, Mr. Pearson says, "like a tooth on a comb. A normal sound system simply can't reproduce this series of very quick transients" -- stiff sound waves -- "at a very soft level. Just cannot do it."

Mr. Pearson founded the Absolute Sound in 1973 when he was still an environmental reporter for Newsday, and he tries to apply objective reporting to the subjective experience of listening to music. "Whenever we get a piece of equipment that we think is setting new records," he says, "out comes 'Casino.' "

Mr. Pearson has often cited the record in the Absolute Sound, which has a circulation of 35,000. It is these references that have contributed to the soundtrack's cult status. Other albums are rarer than "Casino Royale," with prices as high as $10,000, and even Mr. Pearson has to admit that "there are better-sounding records. But I don't think there's one quite as useful overall."

Today a pristine copy of "Casino Royale" can fetch upwards of $400. "I've seen scratched-up copies go for $100 to $125," says Ron Saja, manager of Footlight Records, a Manhattan rare-record store that specializes in movie and stage recordings. Footlight has sold "Casino Royale" for as much as $195, though the current price would be $150 -- if the shop had one in stock. "Amazing," Mr. Bacharach said when he heard how valuable "Casino Royale" has become, in an interview with the Absolute Sound several years ago. "I don't even have a copy."

Collectors, however, take pride in buying copies for a song. Frank Doris, technical director for the Absolute Sound, remembers finding his first "Casino" in a bin at a record convention. "Eighteen dollars!" he shouted, losing his collector's cool. To which the unwitting dealer replied, "And not a penny less!"

Those who appreciate the music of "Casino Royale" but don't have the luck or the cash to buy the album can take solace from the recent release of the soundtrack on compact disk (Varese Sarabande VSD-5265). Tom Null, the label's executive vice-president and supervisor of the CD release, has his own "Casino Royale" story: used-record store, five years ago, two bucks. Even so, Mr. Null says, Varese Sarabande didn't send out advance copies of the CD for review "because the preconceived, closed minds of audiophiles made it a foregone lost battle. I knew they're going to say" -- here he slows his voice to an academic drone and repeats a frequent criticism of compact disks in general -- 'The digital transfer added a brightness to the treble.' "

The problem, he says, was with the master tape -- the one audiophiles have spun legends around for decades. Mr. Null knows all the legends, too, and he says he was as surprised as anyone when he played the tape and heard "a certain brightness."

"Vinyl masked and rounded off the brightness," he says. So for the CD transfer he had to choose between being faithful to the master tape and risking the wrath of audiophiles, or masking the treble and misrepresenting the music.

"I said, 'Better to be faithful,' " he says. Mr. Null calls the CD "a tiny bit too bright," but he says the sound is "exactly as the producers mixed it onto the tape."

Whatever its merits, the CD release has sparked a new "Casino Royale" legend only now starting to make the rounds -- that Varese Sarabande inadvertently destroyed the master tape during the transfer. Mr. Null has heard that rumor, too, and he attributes it to a loss of iron oxide that is inevitable when rewinding analog tapes, especially at high speeds. "It might have been done better" using a slower, more expensive process, he says, but he adds, "The significance would have been if there had been a way to avoid it."

In any event, he continues, the master tape had suffered damage even before Varese Sarabande licensed it -- a similar loss of iron oxide, apparently during an earlier transfer for a foreign pressing. Mr. Null says he located and listened to a copy of that record, and the damage was already evident -- barely audible, but unmistakable.

For audiophiles, this effectively ends speculation about a reissue of the LP. Mr. Pearson, for one, had once fantasized about reissuing "Casino Royale" on vinyl as a benefit for the Absolute Sound.

"As soon as this gets around," says Mr. Doris, technical director of the Absolute Sound, "you know what's going to happen to the price of the records."

Mr. Pearson laughs at first, but then he sobers.

"The vinyl they used in those days is pretty good, so copies, with a little bit of care -- a record-cleaning machine, a properly tracking stylus -- should last. I mean, longer than the average thing.

"But now," he says, "once they're gone, they're gone."

Correction: Aug. 11, 1991
An article in the Arts and Leisure section on July 28 about the soundtrack recording of "Casino Royale" misstated the first words recorded by Thomas A. Edison for a phonograph. They were, "Mary had a little lamb." The question "What hath God wrought?" was the first message tapped out by Samuel F. B. Morse on the telegraph.
A version of this article appears in print on July 28, 1991
, Section 2, Page 15 of the National edition with the headline: 'Casino Royale' Is an LP Bond With a Gilt Edge. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

2007: Female First reports Chris Cornell almost turned down the Bond theme opportunity.

Chris Cornell: 'i Almost Turned Down Bond Theme'.

See the complete article here:

https://www.femalefirst.co.uk/movies/movie-news/James+Bond-21140.html

28 July 2006

Chris Cornell: 'i Almost Turned Down Bond Theme'.... Chris Cornell almost turned down the chance to record the new James Bond film's theme song, because he disliked Pierce Brosnan's recent 007 movies. The Audioslave frontman's You Know My Name has been selected for the soundtrack of Casino Royale. But Cornell only agreed to compose the track once he had watched a rough edit of the upcoming Daniel Craig-starring movie.

He tells VH1, "I wasn't really sure about doing a Bond theme, because I wasn't really a big fan of the last several movies.

"And then I heard that there was going to be a new guy - Daniel Craig - who was going to play Bond. And he's so different. I have seen him in several movies, and I was kind of intrigued.

"So I went to Prague (in Czech Republic), where they were shooting the movie, and they showed me a rough edit of it. I was just completely blown away by it, because it's unlike any Bond film ever, really.

"Craig is an actor's actor, and there's emotional content to the movie. He's not like the swaggering, winking sort of super-agent guy. He's like a human being in this movie, and it's going to completely readjust the way people think of the character".

2012: William F. Milliken, Jr. dies at age 101--Williamsville, New York.
(Born 18 April 1911--Old Town, Maine.)

Milliken won renown as an engineer and pilot

See the complete article here:

https://www.bendbulletin.com/localstate/milliken-won-renown-as-an-engineer-and-pilot/article_c20e7b68-29ab-5f0d-bcea-8aa7e45b273f.html

T. Rees Shapiro / The Washington Post | Aug 3, 2012 Updated Jan 31, 2020

William F. Milliken Jr., a renowned aeronautical engineer, pilot and road racer who helped dream up a car-flying James Bond movie stunt, died July 28 at his home in Williamsville, N.Y. He was 101.

As an engineer for Boeing during World War II, Milliken conducted perilous high-altitude flight tests aboard the B-17 bomber and also helped develop the B-29, later used to drop the atomic bombs over Hiroshima and Nagasaki. Later, he became one of the world’s foremost researchers on vehicle dynamics, the study of improving how a car handles on the road by using advanced mathematical calculations.

He wrote a book on vehicle dynamics that is considered the bible of Formula 1 race car design, and he was a consulting engineer to General Motors, Rolls-Royce, Ford, Bridgestone and Goodyear.

One of his successes in high-speed car driving was his role helping to design a stunt for the 1974 James Bond film starring Roger Moore, The Man With the Golden Gun.

For many years, Milliken worked as a senior engineer at the Cornell Aeronautical Laboratory in Buffalo, N.Y. In the late 1960s, some of the more imaginative scientists under his purview began running computer experiments on how to flip a car in midair using ramps.

The researchers, using complex mathematical calculations, proved it was possible and invited a test driver to try it out. The resulting barrel-roll move was employed by Moore’s 007 secret agent during a car chase scene filmed in Thailand in a single take.

Simanaitas Says

MILLIKEN M-1 TAKES TO THE (VIRTUAL) AIR

See the complete article here:

https://simanaitissays.com/2012/09/04/milliken-m_1-takes-to-the-virtual-air/

BILL MILLIKEN built and flew his own airplane. Maybe that’s not so remarkable, but he was a college student at the time and the year was 1933.

William F. Milliken interview at EAA 2006 - Part 1 - Meeting Charles Lindbergh


William F. Milliken interview at EAA 2006 - Part 2 - First airplane

2021: Peter and Will Anderson direct and present The Spy Who Loved Me - The Music of Espionage at the John G. Shedd Institute for the Arts in Eugene, Oregon.

OFAM 2021 The Spy Who Loved Me: The music of espionage
Jul 28, 2021 - Jul 30, 2021

See the complete article here:

https://allevents.in/eugene/ofam-2021-the-spy-who-loved-me-the-music-of-espionage/200019581579902

OFAM 2021 The Spy Who Loved Me: The music of espionage
28 July | Event in Eugene | AllEvents.in OFAM 2021

Okay, so espionage represents a HUGE genre, and accordingly there are a LOT of spy films out there…and almost as many spy film themes, from the always intriguing world of James Bond and his many predecessors, fellow travelers and imitators to the ridiculous madcap of The Pink Panther and sundry other tongue-in-cheek agents in the shadows. Peter and Will Anderson invite you to step with them heartily into this morass of deceit, adventure and great tunes.

You may also like the following events from The John G. Shedd Institute for the Arts:

• Wednesday, 28th July, 07:30 pm, OFAM 2021 The Spy Who Loved Me: The music of espionage in Eugene

Date & Time
Wed Jul 28 2021 at 7:30 pm
(Eastern Daylight Time)

Location
The John G. Shedd Institute for the Arts, 868 High St, Eugene, United States

OFAM 2021 - Reel Music
The Spy Who Loved Me
The music of espionage

See the complete article here:

https://theshedd.org/divp/series.aspx?event=5218

Wed Jul 28, 7:30-9:00 pm
Jaqua Concert Hall, The Shedd Institute
Verda Giustina - Concert sponsor

Description
Okay, so espionage represents a HUGE genre, and accordingly there are a LOT of spy films out there…and almost as many spy film themes, from the always intriguing world of James Bond and his many predecessors, fellow travelers and imitators to the ridiculous madcap of The Pink Panther and sundry other tongue-in-cheek agents in the shadows. Peter and Will Anderson invite you to step with them heartily into this morass of deceit, adventure and great tunes.

Event Personnel
Will Anderson, director
Peter Anderson, director
Vocalists
Lynnea Barry, vocals
Bill Hulings, vocals
Musicians
Randy Porter, piano
Nicki Parrott, bass
Chuck Redd, vibes
Paul Wells, drums
Randy Napoleon, guitar
Bruce Harris, trumpet
Will Anderson, reeds
Peter Anderson, reeds

Program
I Spy Theme (1965) I Spy Earle Hagen (m)
As Time Goes By (Casablanca) (1931) Everybody's Welcome Herman Hupfeld (w/m)
La Mer (Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy) (1945) Charles Trénet (w) Charles Trénet, Léo Chauliac (m)
Peter Gunn Theme (1959) Peter Gunn Henry Mancini (m)
Dreamsville (Peter Gunn) (1958) Peter Gunn Ray Evans, Jay Livingston (w) Henry Mancini (m)
Charade Theme (1963) Charade Johnny Mercer (w) Henry Mancini (m)
Soul Bossa Nova (Austin Powers) (1962) Quincy Jones (m)
Who Needs Forever (The Deadly Affair) (1966) The Deadly Affair Howard Greenfield (w) Quincy Jones (m)
The Spy Who Came In From The Cold theme (1965) The Spy Who Came In From The Cold Sol Kaplan (m)
Mission Impossible Theme (1966) Mission Impossible Lalo Schifrin (m)
Nobody Does It Better (The Spy Who Loved Me) (1977) The Spy Who Loved Me Marvin Hamlisch, Carole Bayer Sager (w/m)
You Only Live Twice (1967) You Only Live Twice Leslie Bricusse (w) John Barry (m)
James Bond Theme (Dr. No) (1962) Dr. No John Barry (m)
The Pink Panther (1963) The Pink Panther Henry Mancini (m)
The Windmills Of Your Mind (1968) The Thomas Crown Affair Alan Bergman, Marilyn Bergman (w) Michel Legrand (m)

The Spy Who Loved Me is one of 6 OFAM 2021 concerts presented twice:
Evening: Wed, July 28, 7:30 pm
Matinee: Fri, July 30, 1:30 pm

RichardTheBruce

July 29th

1953: Ian Fleming responds to publisher Jonathan Cape's comments on American publisher Macmillan.

'Yes, the royalties accepted from Macmillans were very modest
but then they have given me a present of $750 which is
rather more, I guess, than I shall recoup on the English
edition. If it is a success in America you will be surprised
how tough I shall be over "Live and Let Die"!'

1965: El regreso del agente 007 (The Return of Agent 007) released in Mexico.

1966: Sean Connery photographed on location in Tokyo during You Only Live Twice filming.

1967: Official statement says Sean Connery is leaving the OO7 role.

1982: Harold Sakata (Tosh Togo) dies at age 62--Honolulu, Hawaii.
(Born 1 July 1920--Holualoa, Hawaii.)

Archives | 1982

HAROLD T. SAKATA

See the complete article here:

https://www.nytimes.com/1982/07/31/obituaries/harold-t-sakata.html

AP JULY 31, 1982

Harold T. Sakata, an actor best known for his sinister characterization of the killer bodyguard Oddjob in the James Bond movie ''Goldfinger,'' died Thursday. He was 62 years old.[/b]
Mr. Sakata, who won an Olympic silver medal in London in 1948 for weightlifting, was a top-card professional wrestler under the name Tosh Togo before achieving fame as an actor.

The eldest of 10 children born on Hawaii Island, Mr. Sakata worked in the plantation fields and as a stevedore when he was young. He never finished high school.

In the early 1960's, the producer Harry Saltzman and the director Guy Hamilton discovered Mr. Sakata when they saw him wrestling on television in London.

Mr. Sakata also appeared in a series of cold-remedy commercials for national television, in the television series ''Sarge,'' and as a guest on such shows as ''Hawaii Five-O'' and ''Police Woman.''

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0757138/?ref_=nv_sr_1?ref_=nv_sr_1

Filmography

Actor (32 credits)

1982 Invaders of the Lost Gold - Tobachi
1982 Ninja Strikes Back - Sakata
1981 The Misadventures of Sheriff Lobo (TV Series) - Ku Long
- The Roller Disco Karate Kaper (1981) ... Ku Long

1979 Highcliffe Manor (TV Series) - Cheng
- Stark Terror (1979) ... Cheng
- Sex & Violence (1979) ... Cheng
- The Blacke Death (1979) ... Cheng
1979 The Billion Dollar Threat (TV Movie) - Oriental Man
1978 Goin' Coconuts - Ito
1978 Death Dimension - The Pig (as Harold 'Odd Job' Sakata)
1978 The Amazing Spider-Man (TV Series) - Matsu
- Escort to Danger (1978) ... Matsu
1978 The Rockford Files (TV Series) - John Doe
- The Competitive Edge (1978) ... John Doe
1978 Police Woman (TV Series) - Lee's Killer
- The Human Rights of Tiki Kim (1978) ... Lee's Killer
1977 Quincy M.E. (TV Series) - Master Sensei Tobi
- Touch of Death (1977) ... Master Sensei Tobi
1977 Record City - Gucci
1977 The Happy Hooker Goes to Washington - Wong (as Harold Odd Job Sakata)
1976 Broken House
1976 Mako: The Jaws of Death - Pete (as Harold 'Odd Job' Sakata)
1976 The Blue Knight (TV Series) - Car smasher
- Everybody Needs a Little Attention (1976) ... Car smasher
1974 The Wrestler - Odd Job
1974 Impulse - Karate Pete
1972 Hawaii Five-O (TV Series) - Shibata Hood
- I'm a Family Crook - Don't Shoot! (1972) ... Shibata Hood
1971-1972 Sarge (TV Series) - Takichi / Kenji Takichi / Kenji (9 episodes)
1971 Jamison's Kids (TV Movie)
1971 Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In (TV Series) - Guest Performer
- Episode #5.4 (1971) ... Guest Performer (uncredited)
1970 The Phynx - Oddjob (as Harold 'Oddjob' Sakata)
1967 The Jerry Lewis Show (TV Series) - Assassin
- Episode #1.1 (1967) ... Assassin
1967 Gilligan's Island (TV Series) - Ramoo
- The Hunter (1967) ... Ramoo
1966 Dimension 5 - Big Buddha
1966 Seventeenth Heaven (uncredited)
1966 The Poppy Is Also a Flower - Martin
1966 Balearic Caper - Direttore del museo
1966 4 Schlüssel - Odd Job (uncredited)
1965 Kraft Suspense Theatre (TV Series) - Ching
- Jungle of Fear (1965) ... Ching
1964 Goldfinger - Oddjob (as Harold Sakata {Tosh Togo})

Thanks (1 credit)

1978 Flying High (TV Series) (thanks - 1 episode)
- A Hairy Yak Plays Musical Chairs Eagerly (1978) ... (thanks)

Self (2 credits)

1971 Rowan & Martin's Laugh-In (TV Series) - Himself
- Episode #5.7 (1971) ... Himself (uncredited)
1969-1971 The Tonight Show Starring Johnny Carson (TV Series) - Himself / Himself - Guest
- Episode dated 16 February 1971 (1971) ... Himself
- Episode dated 7 March 1969 (1969) ... Himself - Guest

Archive footage (21 credits)

2015 No Small Parts (TV Series documentary) - Himself
- James Bond Henchmen Part 1: Harold Sakata (2015) ... Himself
2015 Heineken's the Chase (Short) - Oddjob
2012 Top Gear (TV Series) - Odd Job
- 50 Years of Bond Cars (2012) ... Odd Job (uncredited)
2012 Everything or Nothing (Documentary) - Odd Job (uncredited)

2006 Wetten, dass..? (TV Series) - Oddjob
- Wetten, dass..? aus Düsseldorf (2006) ... Oddjob
2002 Happy Anniversary Mr. Bond (TV Movie documentary) - Oddjob
2002 Best Ever Bond (TV Movie documentary) - Himself (uncredited)
2002 Bond Girls Are Forever (TV Movie documentary) - Oddjob (uncredited)
2000 Harry Saltzman: Showman (Video documentary short) - Himself

1999 And the Word Was Bond (TV Movie documentary) - Himself
1997 The Secrets of 007: The James Bond Files (TV Movie documentary) - Oddjob (uncredited)
1995 Behind the Scenes with 'Goldfinger' (Video documentary short) - Himself / Oddjob
1995 The Goldfinger Phenomenon (Video documentary short) - Himself

1983 Bonds Are Forever (Video documentary) - Oddjob / Himself
1983 James Bond: The First 21 Years (TV Movie documentary) - Oddjob
1982 The 54th Annual Academy Awards (TV Special) - Oddjob (For Your Eyes Only musical segment)

1967 Welcome to Japan, Mr. Bond (TV Movie) - Oddjob
1965 Telescope (TV Series documentary) - Himself
- Licensed to Make a Killing (1965) ... Himself
1965 The Incredible World of James Bond (TV Movie documentary) - Himself
1965 Take Thirty (TV Series) - Himself
- Sean Connery on Being Bond (1965) ... Himself
1964 Goldfinger Original Promotional Featurette (Video short) - Oddjob / Himself

Personal Details

Other Works: TV commercial for Vicks Formula 44 (1964)
Publicity Listings: 1 Portrayal | 4 Articles | See more »
Alternate Names: Harold 'Odd Job' Sakata | Harold 'Oddjob' Sakata | Harold Odd Job Sakata | Tosh Togo | Harold Sakata {Tosh Togo}
Height: 5' 10" (1.78 m)

Trivia (6)

Won a silver medal in light-heavyweight weight-lifting at the 1948 summer Olympics. He pursued a successful career as a professional wrestler before moving into acting.

Weighed 284 lbs at the time of Goldfinger (1964).

Sakata apparently liked his role in the movie Goldfinger (1964) so much that he took "Oddjob" as an informal middle name.

In the rehearsals at the Golf Club where he is to throw his hat at the statue, with the head subsequently falling off, after three attempts the special effects crew could not "arrange" the head to fall off correctly. On the fourth take he told the special effects team to just stand still - then he threw his iron-brimmed hat at the statues neck and successful severed the head at the neck on the "first" attempt - to the amazement of all!.

Father: Tamotsu Sakata.

As a professional wrestler. he was one of the great heels in the ring. On screen he is best remembered for playing "Oddjob" in "Goldfinger" (1964) which is regarded as one of the great villains of the movies. Out of the ring, or off camera, he is remembered as being charming and friendly.

1983: David Niven dies at age 73--Château-d'Œx, Switzerland.
(Born 1 March 1910--Belgravia, London, England.)

Actor David Niven's Dashing Life Ends at 73

https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/archives/la-me-david-niven-19830730-snap-story.html
By Michael Seiler and Times Staff Writer | Jul 30, 1983 | 12:00 AM


Cary Grant, Loretta Young and David Niven in "The Bishop's Wife." (File photo)

David Niven, whose clipped accent and thin mustache made him the personification of the British gentleman in more than 90 films spread over nearly half a century, died Friday in his mountain chalet in Chateau D'Oex, Switzerland.

Niven was 73 and moved to the Swiss Alps three weeks ago from his home in southern France.

"My uncle died peacefully and without pain," said his nephew Michael Wrangdah. "His last gesture a few minutes before he died had been to give the thumbs-up sign."

The Oscar-winning actor died after a months-long battle with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, a debilitating nerve and muscle disorder commonly called Lou Gehrig's disease.

He had lost some of his power of speech and the use of his left hand, his wife told newsmen last March.

To generations of English-speaking peoples he was more than a first-rate film actor. Niven authored several books, including two well-received autobiographical memoirs, "The Moon's a Balloon" and "Bring on the Empty Horses," which confirmed Niven's reputation as a raconteur.

More than that, the books attested to the fact that Niven—a man of considerable charm, wit and sophistication—had an extraordinary life, filled with such entertainment industry giants as Darryl F. Zanuck, Errol Flynn and Humphrey Bogart, and political figures such as Winston Churchill and John F. Kennedy.

James David Graham Niven was born March 1, 1910, in Kirriemuir, Scotland, the son of an army reserve lieutenant who was to die five years later during the World War I Gallipoli campaign.

Niven's widowed, financially strapped mother moved to England and young David bounced around from school to school. He was, quite possibly, "a thoroughly poisonous little boy," Niven said later in explaining his expulsion from one school. He finally ended up at Sandhurst, Britain's equivalent of West Point.

Young Niven's military career was relatively brief and undistinguished. He served three years as a lieutenant in a Scottish infantry regiment, two of them on the hot, dusty island of Malta where he did little more than polish his skills in rugby and polo—on horses borrowed from other officers because young Niven had little money of his own.

Niven disliked the army—he had gone to Sandhurst for lack of anything more promising to do—and the future of a junior officer in the peacetime army seemed dim.

The frustrations came to a head when Niven insulted a general and, rather than face court martial, resigned his commission in 1932.

Niven sailed off to Canada to visit friends, then went on to New York City where other friends, capitalizing on the end of Prohibition, hired him as a wholesale liquor salesman. But Niven flopped at that, and was little more successful at his next try—promoting a sort of rodeo-equestrian show in Atlantic City.

The unemployed but always-charming Niven drifted west to California, helped, as always, by a large circle of friends and acquaintances. He saw his first movie studio—Fox—when members of Loretta Young's family sneaked him past the guards under a rug on the floor of her limousine.

He was suitably impressed—"I just gaped and gaped and wondered if I could ever be a part of it," Niven wrote much later in The Moon's a Balloon. Encouraged by his friends, Niven signed on at Central Casting on Western Avenue.

They listed him, back in 1935, as "English type, No. 2008. Niven, David."

Niven was on his way—slowly.

A chance meeting with old military friends on a British cruiser in Santa Barbara Bay led to a hangover and an introduction to director Frank Lloyd, who later signed him as an extra in the original "Mutiny on the Bounty"—Niven's first film appearance.

Lloyd passed him on to another leading director of the period, Edmund Goulding, who had Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer do a screen test, which got Niven nowhere. Another screen test of sorts—an appearance at Paramount before an imperially silent Mae West—was also in vain. (Nearly 40 years later, however, Miss West recanted and told a reporter that "Niven has charm where other men only have cologne.")

Third Man Out
Yet another screen test ended in failure when newcomers Fred MacMurray and Ray Milland both got contracts with Paramount after appearing opposite Claudette Colbert. But Niven, the third man tried out that day, got nothing.

There were occasional jobs as a $2.50-a-day extra—the first one was as a spray-painted "Mexican" in a low-budget cowboy flick—but for a while it looked as if Niven wasn't going to make it, despite his charm and growing circle of friends.

Nothing seemed to work. Not even luck.

One day Niven found himself playing polo against a team headed by powerful studio boss Zanuck. Niven, who was, of course, hopeful of impressing the film magnate, was instead chagrined when his borrowed mount bit Zanuck on the buttocks.

And then the immigration authorities intervened, pointing out that Niven's visitor's permit had long since expired. Niven was forced to take off for the Mexican border, hiring out as a gun bearer for rich U.S. tourists hunting in the hills around the then small, dusty border town of Mexicali.

At last, Niven got lucky when the legendary Samuel Goldwyn viewed his initial screen test, liked what he saw, and signed Niven to a 7-year contract starting at $100 a week.

"I won't put you in a Goldwyn picture until you've learned your job," Goldwyn told Niven. "Now you have a base. Go out and tell the studios you're under contract to Goldwyn, do anything they offer you, get experience, work hard, and in a year or so, if you're any good, I'll give you a role."

Fluffed His Only Line
Niven did just that—but in his own inimitable style. Goldwyn sent him to Gilmore Brown's workshop at the Pasadena Playhouse, then Los Angeles' premier showcase theater. Niven was given a one-line part in a play and, with a celebrity audience on hand for his opening night, managed to drink a bit too much backstage in an effort to calm his nerves. He made a shambles of what little he had to do. Brown banished him from the theater, but Niven's career prospered anyway.

Most of the parts were small at first. In Howard Hawks' production of "The Barbary Coast" (1935), Niven played a Cockney sailor who was tossed out of a San Francisco brothel into a muddy street. He was signed the next year to play a bit part in the Jeanette MacDonald-Nelson Eddy opus "Rose-Marie," but after filming his brief scene he left the studio, only to find out months later that his part had been re-shot with another actor.

The roles quickly got more meaty. Niven played an officer and friend of Flynn in "The Charge of the Light Brigade" (1936), Capt. Clyde Lockert in "Dodsworth" (1936) and Fritz von Tarlenheim in "The Prisoner of Zenda" (1937). In 1938, Niven appeared in the classic "The Dawn Patrol" and the following year gained co-star status for the first time in "Bachelor Mother" with Ginger Rogers. Later in 1939, he played opposite Laurence Olivier and Merle Oberon as the devoted but unloved Edgar Linton, Miss Oberon's husband in "Wuthering Heights."

Despite the early frustrations, only four years after arriving in Hollywood, the one-time British officer had become a genuine star, critically well received and an actor of increasing capability. Life outside the studios also was happy. Niven dated Hollywood's most beautiful women, shared a beach house (called "Cirrhosis by the Sea") and caroused with Flynn, and was a friend of the industry's most talented stars and directors—people like Douglas Fairbanks Jr., Fred Astaire, Ronald Colman and William Wyler. And he was a frequent guest of William Randolph Hearst at San Simeon.

But then World War II intervened.
Though he had long ago resigned his commission and probably would not have been drafted into service, Niven left Los Angeles soon after Hitler invaded Poland in 1939, and after several false starts managed to return to England and gain a commission in an infantry regiment. He was assigned to a training battalion and, he claimed much later, out of infinite boredom volunteered for the newly formed commando units.

Niven, never at a loss for friends throughout his life, made a new one in Churchill, who occasionally invited him to his estate on weekends. On first meeting him, Churchill growled, "Young man, you did a very find thing to give up a most promising career to fight for your country."

But the, according to Niven's account, the soon-to-be prime minister added, "Mark you, had you not done so, it would have been despicable."

Niven saw action in Europe after the Normandy invasion and married an English girl, Primula Rollo, who was to bear him two sons. Niven rose from the rank of captain to lieutenant colonel during the war, and took time off to do a film overseas—"The Way Ahead" (1944), a glorification of the British infantryman.

The film, a government-backed propaganda effort, was directed by Carol Reed and written by Eric Ambler and Peter Ustinov. Ustinov, then a private in the army, doubled as Niven's orderly when they moved into London's Ritz Hotel to work on the movie.


David Niven, left, and Kim Hunter in "Stairway to Heaven. (File photo)

Niven did another film in England—"Stairway to the Stars" (1946)—and then returned to Hollywood, "thinking I was God's gift to the movies," he told an interviewer 20 years later. "I went to Sam Goldwyn, said I was being underpaid, and asked how soon I could get out of my contract. 'The minute you reach the street,' he told me."

It was a difficult time for Niven. His wife died in an accident at the age of 25 and his Broadway debut in 1951 as Gloria Swanson's lover in the unsuccessful "Nina" was a failure.

"I took a good look at myself," he said later, "still wandering vaguely about with a cup of tea in one hand and a duchess in the other. I was fast approaching that nervous no-man's land where actors feel down the backs of their necks the hot, sticky breath of leading men in their early 20s, while in front they see a solid phalanx of well-established character actors blocking their path. That is no place to hang around very long with a cup of fast-cooling tea and an aging duchess."

Later in the 1950s, life picked up for Niven when he married a young Swedish model, Hjordis Tersmeden. They were to adopt two girls. And then—with Dick Powell and Charles Boyer—he started the hugely successful television firm, Four Star Productions.

There was no fourth star, by the way, because, according to Niven, most of Hollywood was frightened by the power of the film studio bosses. But the production company was an incredible success. "Four Star Playhouse" begat "Zane Grey Theater" which in turn spawned "The Rifleman," which spun off "Wanted Dead or Alive," starring an unknown named Steve McQueen.

It went on that way through the late 1950s and early 1960s—Four Star in one year had 14 TV series on the air, including two of Niven's own—"The David Niven Show" and "The Rogues." And Niven was suddenly one of the richest men in Hollywood. He decided to take his money and his family to Europe—permanently.

Niven explained the move in "The Moon's a Balloon." Taxes were eating him up, he said; the smog, the freeways and nasty gossip columnists were all bothering him. But, more fundamentally, "Hollywood had completely changed. The old camaraderie of pioneers in a one-generation business still controlled by the people who created it was gone . . . the scent of fear was attacking to smog-filled lungs of the professional film makers, already resigned to the fact that their audience was brainwashed by television. . . . The pipe dream was gone—the lovely joke was over. . . . It was time to go."

Niven and his family moved to a chalet in Switzerland and, later, a villa overlooking the sea at Cap-Ferrat on the French Riviera, where he was to live a luxurious existence to his death.

It was an expensive life style—skiing the best slopes, tiger-hunting in India and entertaining his next-door neighbors, Princess Grace and Prince Ranier of Monaco—and Niven managed it by working a good deal of the time on films, both good and bad.

He turned down the role of Humbert Humbert in "Lolita" because he feared it would tarnish his gentlemanly image, but he had a long list of successes.


Shirley MacLaine, David Niven and Cantinflas in "Around the World in 80 Days." (File photo)

There was "The Bishop's Wife" (1947), "The Moon Is Blue" (1953), "Around the World in 80 Days" (1956), "Bonjour Tristesse" (1958), "Separate Tables" (1958), "Please Don't Eat the Daisies" (1960), "The Guns of Navarone" (1961) and "The Pink Panther" (1963), to name some of the better ones.

Niven liked to say his career was composed of playing officers, dukes and crooks, but he won an Academy Award as best actor in one of them, "Separate Tables," in which he portrayed a retired British officer.

"I always thank Deborah Kerr and Wendy Hiller," he told an interviewer in 1978. "They won the Oscar for me. They had to cry in the picture, which they did so beautifully that when I spoke, the camera panned to them sobbing . . . and I got the award."

He liked to refer to himself as "a displaced Cary Grant," and he was like that almost to the end—witty, classy, charming.

Like the time a few years ago when an interviewer asked him this old stock question: What is your philosophy of life?

"Life to me, I guess, is a sort of super Grand National Steeplechase, with all sorts of hurdles to jump over and places to fall down," Niven replied. "The trick is not to worry about winning, but to get around the course as best you can without doing any damage to the other riders and certainly not to the other horses."

Or, in another interview, in 1978, when he acknowledged that the ranks of his friends were thinning rapidly:

"We have to face it," Niven said. "An awful lot of my age group has been called up already. So many chums have gone, Cooper, Gable, Bogart. To say nothing of men of my own vintage—Errol Flynn and Ty Power. But there's no way they're going to get me off. I just won't go. I'll kick and scream and make a terrible fuss."

[email protected]

David Niven (I) (1910–1983)

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0000057/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

Filmography

Actor (113 credits)

1983 Curse of the Pink Panther - Sir Charles Litton
1983 Better Late Than Never - Nick Cartland
1982 Trail of the Pink Panther - Sir Charles Litton
1980 The Sea Wolves - Colonel W. H. Grice
1980 Rough Cut - Chief Insp. Cyril Willis

1979 A Man Called Intrepid (TV Mini-Series) - Sir William Stephenson
1979 A Nightingale Sang in Berkeley Square - Ivan
1979 Escape to Athena - Professor Blake
1978 Death on the Nile - Colonel Race
1977 Candleshoe - Priory
1976 Murder by Death - Dick Charleston
1976 No Deposit, No Return - J.W. Osborne
1975 The Remarkable Rocket (Short) - Narrator (voice)
1975 Paper Tiger - 'Major' Bradbury
1974 The Canterville Ghost (TV Movie) - The Ghost - Sir Simon de Canterville
1974 Old Dracula - Count Dracula
1972 King, Queen, Knave - Charles Dreyer
1971 The Statue - Alex Bolt

1969 The Brain - Colonel Carol Matthews
1969 The Extraordinary Seaman - Lt. Commander Finchhaven, R.N.
1968 Before Winter Comes - Major Burnside
1968 The Impossible Years - Jonathan Kingsley
1968 Prudence and the Pill - Gerald Hardcastle
1967 Eye of the Devil - Philippe de Montfaucon
1967 Casino Royale - Sir James Bond
1966 Where the Spies Are - Dr. Jason Love
1965 Lady L - Dicky, Lord Lendale
1964-1965 The Rogues (TV Series) - Alec Fleming - 30 episodes
1964 Bedtime Story - Lawrence Jameson
1963 The Pink Panther - Sir Charles Lytton
1963 Burke's Law (TV Series) - Harvey Cleeve
- Who Killed Billy Jo? (1963) ... Harvey Cleeve (as David Niven the World's Greatest Juggler)
1963 55 Days at Peking - Sir Arthur Robertson
1962 Conquered City - Maj. Peter Whitfield
1962 Guns of Darkness - Tom Jordan
1962 The Road to Hong Kong - Lama Who Remembers Lady Chatterley's Lover (uncredited)
1961 The Best of Enemies - Maj. Richardson
1961 The Guns of Navarone - Cpl. John Anthony Miller
1960 Please Don't Eat the Daisies - Laurence Mackay
1960 The DuPont Show with June Allyson (TV Series) - Marcus Dodds
- The Trench Coat (1960) ... Marcus Dodds
-
1959 Happy Anniversary - Chris Walters
1959 Ask Any Girl - Miles Doughton
1957-1959 Zane Grey Theater (TV Series) - Cameo / Milo Brant / Allen Raikes
- Checkmate (1959) ... Cameo (uncredited)
- The Accuser (1958) ... Milo Brant
- Village of Fear (1957) ... Allen Raikes
1958 Separate Tables - Major Angus Pollock
1958 Frances Farmer Presents (TV Series) - B.G. Bruno
- Happy Go Lovely (1958) ... B.G. Bruno
1957-1958 Goodyear Theatre (TV Series) - Charles Enright / 'Jeffrey Collins' / Paul Evans / ...
- Decision by Terror (1958) ... Charles Enright
- Taps for Jeffrey (1958) ... 'Jeffrey Collins'
- Episode #1.11 (1957) ... Paul Evans
- The Tinhorn (1957) ... Jeff Carleton
- Danger by Night (1957) ... Alan Kevin
1957-1958 Alcoa Theatre (TV Series) - 6 episodes
1958 Bonjour Tristesse - Raymond
1957 The Return of Phileas Fogg (Short) - Phileas Fogg
1957 My Man Godfrey - Godfrey Smith
1957 Mr. Adams and Eve (TV Series)
- Taming of the Shrew (1957)
1957 The Little Hut - Henry Brittingham-Brett
1957 Oh, Men! Oh, Women! - Dr. Alan Coles
1956 Around the World in 80 Days - Phileas Fogg
1956 The Silken Affair - Roger Tweakham
1952-1956 Four Star Playhouse (TV Series) - 33 episodes
1956 The Birds and the Bees - Colonel Patrick Henry Harris
1956 The Star and the Story (TV Series) - Johnny
- The Thin Line (1956) ... Johnny
1955 The King's Thief - James - Duke of Brampton
1954 Court Martial - Carrington
1954 Tonight's the Night - Jasper O'Leary
1954 The Love Lottery - Rex Allerton
1953 The Moon Is Blue - David Slater
1952-1953 Hollywood Opening Night (TV Series)
- Uncle Fred Flits By (1953)
- Sword Play (1952)
1952 Robert Montgomery Presents (TV Series) - Sheffield
- The Sheffield Story (1952) ... Sheffield
1952 Celanese Theatre (TV Series) - Alan Squier
- The Petrified Forest (1952) ... Alan Squier
1952 Chesterfield Presents (TV Series)
- A Moment of Memory (1952)
1952 Betty Crocker Star Matinee (TV Series)
- The Willow and I (1952)
1951 The Lady Says No - Bill Shelby
1951 Island Rescue - Maj. Valentine Moreland
1951 Schlitz Playhouse (TV Series)
- Not a Chance (1951)
1951 Soldiers Three - Capt. Pindenny
1951 Happy Go Lovely - B.G. Bruno
1950 The Fighting Pimpernel - Sir Percy Blakeney / The Scarlet Pimpernel
1950 Nash Airflyte Theatre (TV Series) - Arthur Carstairs
- Portrait of Lydia (1950) ... Arthur Carstairs
1950 The Toast of New Orleans - Jacques Riboudeaux

1949 A Kiss for Corliss - Kenneth Marquis
1949 A Kiss in the Dark - Eric Phillips
1948 Enchantment - General Sir Roland Dane
1948 Bonnie Prince Charlie - Prince Charles Edward Stuart
1947 The Bishop's Wife - Henry Brougham
1947 The Other Love - Dr. Anthony Stanton
1946 Magnificent Doll - Aaron Burr
1946 The Perfect Marriage - Dale Williams
1946 A Matter of Life and Death - Peter Carter
1944 The Way Ahead - Lt. Jim Perry
1942 Spitfire - Geoffrey Crisp

1939 Raffles - Raffles
1939 Eternally Yours - Tony aka The Great Arturo
1939 The Real Glory - Lieut. Terence McCool
1939 Bachelor Mother - David Merlin
1939 Wuthering Heights - Edgar
1938 The Dawn Patrol - Scott
1938 Three Blind Mice - Steve Harrington
1938 Four Men and a Prayer - Christopher Leigh
1938 Bluebeard's Eighth Wife - Albert De Regnier
1937 Dinner at the Ritz - Paul de Brack
1937 The Prisoner of Zenda - Fritz von Tarlenheim
1937 We Have Our Moments - Joe Gilling
1936 Beloved Enemy - Gerald Preston
1936 The Charge of the Light Brigade - Capt. Randall
1936 Thank You, Jeeves! - Bertie Wooster
1936 Dodsworth - Captain Lockert
1936 Palm Springs - George Britell
1936 Rose-Marie - Teddy (as David Nivens)
1935 Splendor - Clancey Lorrimore
1935 Mutiny on the Bounty - Able-Bodied Seaman (uncredited)
1935 A Feather in Her Hat - Leo Cartwright
1935 Barbary Coast - Cockney Sailor Thrown Out of Saloon (uncredited)
1935 Without Regret - Bill Gage
1935 Hop-a-Long Cassidy - Mexican Bandit (uncredited)
1934 Cleopatra - Slave (uncredited)
1933 Eyes of Fate - Man at Race Course (uncredited)
1932 There Goes the Bride - Bit Role (uncredited)

Producer (2 credits)

1957 Zane Grey Theater (TV Series) (producer - 1 episode)
- Village of Fear (1957) ... (producer - uncredited)
1952-1956 Four Star Playhouse (TV Series) (producer - 28 episodes)

Soundtrack (3 credits)

1956 Around the World in 80 Days (performer: "Have Courage to Say No" - uncredited)

1949 Inside U.S.A. with Chevrolet (TV Series) (performer - 1 episode)
- David Niven (1949) ... (performer: "Way Up North")
-
1938 The Dawn Patrol (performer: "Plum and Apple" - uncredited)

Director (1 credit)

1958-1960 Zane Grey Theater (TV Series) (2 episodes)
- Wayfarers (1960)
- The Vaunted (1958)

On the set of The Sea Wolves.

1986: Timothy Dalton signs a contract.
1987: Dah Smrti (Breath of Death) released in Belgrade, Yugoslavia.

NEW JAMES BOND -- MORE DANGEROUS THAN EVER!

https://twitter.com/007collector

2008: Announcement reveals Jack White & Alicia Keys to collaborate on title song "Another Way to Die"--a duet.

Alicia Keys, Jack White
Team For Bond Theme

See the complete article here:

https://www.billboard.com/articles/news/1044639/alicia-keys-jack-white-team-for-bond-theme

By Ann Donahue | 7/29/2008

Alicia Keys and the White Stripes' Jack White will record the theme song to "Quantum of Solace," the 22nd James Bond film, which hits U.S. theaters Nov. 7. The song, "Another Way To Die," will be the first duet in Bond soundtrack history. White wrote and produced the song, and also will play drums. The soundtrack to the movie will be released Oct. 28.

The score for the film will be composed by David Arnold.

"Quantum of Solace," starring Daniel Craig, will be directed by Marc Forster from a screenplay by Neal Purvis & Robert Wade and Paul Haggis.

Amy Winehouse and Leona Lewis had previously been rumored as the vocalists for the latest Bond theme.

2011: Daniel Craig confirms a plan to use India locations for BOND 23 and pre-titles train action.

2020: Dynamite Entertainment releases James Bond: Origin: Volume 1
(Parker Signed Edition Hardcover).

JAMES BOND ORIGIN HC VOL 01 PARKER SGN ED
DYNAMITE

See the complete article here:

https://forbiddenplanet.com/271220-james-bond-origin-volume-1-parker-signed-edition-hardcover/

MAR191187
(W) Jeff Parker (A) Bob Q (CA) John Cassaday
Signed by writer Jeff Parker!

At last, the definitive account of James Bond's exploits during World War II!

MARCH, 1941: Seventeen-year-old James Bond is a restless student in Scotland, an orphan, eager to strike out and make his mark on the world. But a visit by an old family friend coincides with THE CLYDEBANK BLITZ, the most devastating German attack on Scotland during the War. James will fight through hell to survive, coming out the other side determined to make a difference. He'll find his calling in a new British government service, secret in nature...

In Shops: Jul 29, 2020

2020: Drug and Device Law does a rundown of Bond-related tobacco.

FDA Cigar/Pipe Warnings Go Up in
Smoke

See the complete article here:

https://www.druganddevicelawblog.com/2020/07/fda-cigar-pipe-warnings-go-up-in-smoke.html

Home » FDA Cigar/Pipe Warnings Go Up in Smoke
By Stephen McConnell on July 29, 2020 | Posted in Administrative Law

We light up a cigar maybe once a month. Of course, they’re no damned good for us. If we had any doubts, the headache and swamp-breath the next day would remove them. Still, a spirit of convivial dissipation tells us to smoke’em if we’ve got’em. No need to warn us off cigars, or the inevitable accompaniments of brown liquor, rich food, and bad behavior. That would be futile.

The current issue of Cigar Aficianado has Sean Connery as James Bond on the cover. Connery, though our favorite incarnation of 007, is an odd choice, because Connery’s Bond smoked cigarettes (think of the introduction of “Bond, James Bond” in the casino scene in Dr. No), not cigars. In fact, Bond turns down an offer of a cigar in Goldfinger. Cigars are associated with plutocrats. (There is a reason why Pink Floyd’s song about corruption in the music biz is titled, “Have a Cigar.”) Several Bond villains smoked cigars (e.g., Largo in Thunderball, Sanchez in License to Kill, and Onatopp in Goldeneye). The only Bond who had a cigar habit was Roger Moore. He used one as a weapon, along with an aerosol shave cream can, to dispatch a snake. Moore supposedly had a deal that the producers would furnish an endless supply of Montecristos on Bond sets. By contrast, Moore’s successors seldom smoked. True, Pierce Brosnan lit up a cigar in Die Another Day. Bond was in Cuba, and a good spy finds ways to fit in. Word has it that Daniel Craig was originally going to smoke a cigar in Casino Royale, but the powers that be fretted over the possible effect on young impressionables. That is a foreshadowing of today’s case, the arrival of which, we promise, is imminent.

The fact remains that Bond, as written by Ian Fleming, smoked cigarettes. Lots of them. That is because Ian Fleming smoked cigarettes. Lots and lots of them. Most accounts peg Fleming’s intake at four to five packs per day. Fleming knew his tobacco usage was deleterious to his health. So was his diet of scrambled eggs and martinis. Fleming said that he was not going to waste his days trying to prolong them. He died at age 56. (While his consumption habits seem an obvious culprit for his early demise, Fleming’s friends laid much of the blame on his immense stress from being sued over the authorship of Thunderball. Lawyers, like tobacco, should come with health warnings.

So much for our pretitle sequence. The point of today’s blog (which we are NOT calling “Live and Let Die,” or “Die Another Day,” or even the probably-never-ever-coming out “No Time To Die”), is that we should not assume that health warnings make any difference.

The D.C. Circuit opinion in Cigar Ass’n is worth celebrating. We might even break out an old Romeo y Julieta. At least let’s break out an old cigar joke. A cigar smoker bought several hundred expensive cigars and had them insured against fire. After he’d smoked them all, he filed a claim, pointing out that the cigars had been destroyed by fire. The insurance company refused to pay, and the man sued. A judge ruled that because the insurance company had agreed to insure against fire, it was legally responsible. The insurer paid the claim and and when the man accepted the money, the insurer had him arrested for arson.

2020: Upper Deck releases Legendary: James Bond Expansion (for the Legendary 007), adding On Her Majesty's Secret Service and Licence to Kill.

ADD TWO MORE CLASSIC 'BOND' FILMS TO GAMES
OF 'LEGENDARY 007'
'Legendary: James Bond Expansion' by Upper Deck

See the complete article here:

https://icv2.com/articles/news/view/46198/add-two-more-classic-bond-films-games-legendary-007

Posted by Jeffrey Dohm-Sanchez on July 27, 2020 @ 8:52 am CT

Upper Deck will release Legendary: James Bond Expansion, for the Legendary 007, on July 29.

This first expansion to Legendary 007 adds two classic Bond films to the mix: On Her Majesty's Secret Service and Licence to Kill. This set adds new missions and villains from these movies, and pits players up against their nefarious schemes. Players must defeat the evil masterminds and complete their mission before the danger level gets out of control. This expansion requires the core set to play.

Legendary: James Bond Expansion will retail for $39.99.

Legendary 007 was unveiled last year around Gen Con (see " 'Legendary: 007' Has A License To Kill" https://icv2.com/articles/news/view/43745/legendary-007-has-a-license-to-kill).

2021: James Bond's Aston Martin goes to Rocket League.

James Bond Is Coming To Rocket League
(Or His Car Is, Anyway)
License to beep

See the complete article here:

https://www.nintendolife.com/news/2021/07/james_bond_is_coming_to_rocket_league_or_his_car_is_anyway

by Kate Gray 6

Rocket League is a game about cars playing football. But are people inside the cars? Apparently not — the cars, like the audience, are filled with sentient eggs, according to actual Rocket League lore — but we like to think that James Bond can be the eggception. Er, exception.

007's iconic Aston Martin DB5 first appeared in Goldfinger in 1964, and has since become known as Jamie B's favourite spymobile, appearing again in movies like GoldenEye, The World Is Not Enough, Casino Royale, Skyfall (in which it was blown up by the bad guys), and Spectre. It's also been immortalised in LEGO, and the GoldenEye DB5 currently lives in the London Film Museum, as the second most famous car in the UK, after Brum.

Rocket League x James Bond

Now, the car that none of us at Nintendo Life could ever hope to afford even if we pooled all our money together is appearing in Rocket League alongside other well-known automobiles like the '89 Batmobile, K.I.T.T., and the Jurassic Jeep Wrangler.

The Aston Martin DB5 will be available from the 29th of July to the 4th of August, as part of a bundle that also includes the wheels, a "one-of-a-kind" engine audio, the signature Silver Birch paintjob, and a Reel Life decal. These items can only be equipped on the DB5. It costs 1100 credits, and will only be available for a limited time, although apparently "James Bond will return" with more classic cars later in the year.

James Bond's DB5 has been through a lot, but we're still a bit nervous to play football with it. What if we dent it? Are footballs soft enough that they won't scratch the paintwork? Please don't send hitmen after us, Mr Bond.

Please note that some external links on this page are affiliate links, which means if you click them and make a purchase we may receive a small percentage of the sale. Please read our FTC Disclosure for more information.

[source rocketleague.com]

007's Aston Martin arrives in Rocket League

RichardTheBruce

July 30th

1945: Maud Russell writes about Ian Fleming in her diary.

Spies, affairs and James Bond... The
secret diary of Ian Fleming's wartime
mistress

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/spies-affairs-james-bond-secret-diary-ian-flemings-wartime-mistress/

Monday 30 July, 1945

I. has refused the new job. He feels he must break away.
So Jamaica is on again. I am sure he is right not to let himself
grow old, unhealthy and apoplectic sitting for ever in London
on mysterious committees and having no leisure, no freedom,
no unbuttoning.

1964: Bons baisers de Russie (Good Kisses From Russia) released in France.

1987: The Living Daylights released in Luxembourg.
1989: 007 Vendetta privata (007 Private Vendetta) released in Italy.

/center]

1997: Tomorrow Never Dies films Wai Lin's capture by Carver’s men.

2006: Another fire at Pinewood Studios.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/in_pictures/5229624.stm

2014: Guernsey Post releases a set of stamps and other limited edition items that celebrate Ian Fleming.

More at: https://www.jamesbondlifestyle.com/news/guernsey-post-celebrates-ian-flemings-life-stamps

2019: Abigail Gardner and Ros Jennings in Aging and Popular Music in Europe propose a reclamation of Fleming material through Shirley Bassey and Kanye West.

Aging and Popular Music in Europe, Abigail Gardner and Ros Jennings, 2019.
Chapter 7 - ‘Shine on you crazy diamond/s’

Abstract: This chapter is concerned with Shirley Bassey and Kanye West’s coverage of the song ‘Diamonds Are Forever’ from the perspective of age, inheritance and post-colonial hauntings of race and identity. It presents a new generic Time Space of age that is related to hip-hop and the recycling of older materials. West headlined the iconic Pyramid Stage at the Glastonbury Festival of Contemporary Arts in the summer of 2015. By using Bassey’s voice, and referring to her influence on him and her presence within the contemporary song, West thus pulls into his version, the universality and the non-place that Daub and Kronengold argue for. Bassey’s vocal and performative emphasis of the song narrates an erotic desire for wealth in the form of diamonds. In West’s use of Bassey’s vocal performance in ‘Diamonds from Sierra Leone – Remix’ and ‘Diamonds from Sierra Leone’, West is ‘restorying’ Ian Fleming, giving voice to those Black characters demeaned in the original.

Kanye West - Diamonds From Sierra Leone

2019: Iggy Pop shares new single "James Bond" from his album Free, to be released in September.

Iggy Pop Shares New Single “James Bond”

See the complete article here:

https://northerntransmissions.com/iggy-pop-shares-new-single-james-bond/

30 July 2019

Iggy Pop has unwound a drastically different track from his coming album, Free. James Bond tells a story: ‘I don’t know what she’s up to exactly, but the tables seem to be turning, and she’s taking over. Well, why not? I’ll try anything once.’

“I’ve never had more fun singing a lyric. Faith’s reading is so loaded, and Leron’s production and trumpet along with the band swings like crazy,” says Iggy.

“Iggy Pop’s ‘Free’ is brief, atmospheric and elusive. Amid sustained electronic tones from the guitarist Noveller and ghostly overdubbed Miles Davis-tinged trumpet lines from Leron Thomas, Pop’s voice appears only a few times, intoning, ‘I wanna be free.’ As the title song and opening track of an album due in September, it could lead anywhere.”

Iggy Pop
Free
Tracklisting:
1. Free
2. Loves Missing
3. Sonali
4. James Bond
5. Dirty Sanchez
6. Glow In The Dark
7. Page
8. We Are The People
9. Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night
10. The Dawn

Iggy Pop - James Bond (Official video)

2021: Happy Inceptiversary--the Inception Fandom vs. Bond Fandom annual battle finishes.

Happy Inceptiversary and Happy 007 Fest!
https://inception-vs-bond.tumblr.com/post/625116188880551936/july-30-day-7-inceptiversary

2021: Walking tour Spies, Lies and Double Agents in Cambridge.

Spies, Lies and Double Agents (e)

See the complete article here:

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/spies-lies-and-double-agents-e-tickets-160529186117

A walking tour which unmasks the long tradition of Cambridge spying, from the earliest days of the university to recent times

About this event
A walking tour which unmasks the long tradition of Cambridge spying, from the earliest days of the university to recent times; from Christopher Marlowe to James Blunt, via James Bond. The tour will be led by Green Badge Guides.

Enjoy a spy-filled walk around some of Cambridge's loveliest streets. Discover how the Tudor monarchs made the university their secret-service HQ, and how they exploited codes, ciphers and undercover agents in their determination to reveal plots. Learn how a famous Elizabethan dramatist was exposed as a spy by his college bar bill. And why did Churchill call the Cambridge code-breakers at Bletchley Park, "the geese that laid the golden eggs."? Then there's James Bond, Miss Moneypenny the Big Five, and much more...

Email [email protected] if you would like a tour in Spanish, Russian, French, German Cantonese, Mandarin or Putonghua.

Jul
30
Spies, Lies and Double Agents (e)
£15

Date and time
Fri, 30 July 2021
17:30 – 19:00 BST

Location
Outside Great St Mary's (GSM)
The University Church
Senate House Hill
Cambridge
CB2 3PQ
United Kingdom

2021: From Russia With Love screens at The Drive-In Experience, Ottowa, Canada.

JAMES BOND: FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE (1963) - JULY 30 - Wesley Clover Parks
Fri, Jul 30 at 7:30-10:30 PM
401 Corkstown Rd, Nepean, ON K2H 8T1, Canada

See the complete article here:

https://www.universe.com/events/james-bond-from-russia-with-love-1963-july-30-wesley-clover-parks-tickets-ottawa-Z0R9JY

The Drive-In Experience Ottawa
Price CA$38.21 - CA$58.19

JAMES BOND: FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE (1963) - JULY 30 - Wesley Clover Parks
Fri, Jul 30 at 7:30-10:30 PM
401 Corkstown Rd, Nepean, ON K2H 8T1, Canada

Drive-In, Sit Back and Enjoy "JAMES BOND: FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE (1963)" at The Drive-In Experience WEST, located at RBC Festival Field in Wesley Clover Parks, 401 Corkstown Road.

Tickets are PER VEHICLE | Limit is the legal seating limit of your vehicle
Gates | 7:30pm
Movie Starts | 8:30pm
Rated: PG
Run Time: 1h55mins

Please take the time to read the following Rules & COVID Guidelines

• You may pre order popcorn with your tickets (Select that ticket)
• *THERE WILL BE NO OTHER CONCESSIONS OPEN AT THIS TIME. YOU MAY BRING YOUR OWN FOOD & BEVERAGE SNACKS BUT PLEASE BE RESPECTFUL AND TAKE YOUR GARBAGE HOME*
• Cars will not be permitted to be idling. If a car is seen idling, our security staff will politely ask you to turn off your car.
• You may sit in the bed of your truck or with your rear facing the screen with your trunk open. Please let our parking staff know if you are pulling in forward or backward.
• Management reserves the right to move your vehicle to another spot at any time if it is obstructing the view of multiple vehicles
• If you are going to be sitting in the back of your vehicle with the trunk open, please make sure it doesn’t go higher than the top of your vehicle. If it does, you will be asked to tie it down to not obstruct anyone’s view. (Please bring bungee cords or something similar)
• Washrooms are available.
• Please maintain social distancing at all times.
• You must park your vehicle in the middle of the designated spots, which will ensure proper social distancing measures.
• Parking Large trucks, Vans, SUV's or any other vehicle that obstructs the view of the screen must park in the rear 2 rows. Management reserves the right to designate the parking location of vehicles.
• Cars with daytime running lights usually can be turned off by applying the emergency brake. If they cannot be turned off, please bring with you, blankets, cardboard, duct tape etc... to cover the lights. If you do not have anything to cover the lights, management reserves the right to use its own equipment to cover your lights prior to the movie starting.
• No Smoking is permitted

All management and staff will be following the COVID 19 safety guidelines during all aspects of the Drive-In Experience services, which includes wearing masks and gloves at all times.
· We open rain or shine. Nothing but inclement weather, power outage, or technical failure stops a showing.
· All sales are final and no refunds will be given unless the showing is canceled.
· Alcohol and drug use is NOT permitted and we will remove from the premises.
· No animals will be permitted for the time being.
· Bar-b-q's, grills, fires, or fireworks are NOT permitted.
· The Drive-In Experience and Management assume NO RESPONSIBILITY for Injury, Property Loss, or Damage of any kind.

About the host

The Drive-In Experience Ottawa
The Drive-In Experience Ottawa, launched in 2020 is the brainchild of DNA Live, Ottawa’s premiere festival & event production company. In 2021, we are bringing it back and even better, adding a second location! EAST Location will be at the RCGT Park parking lot and WEST location will be announced soon. You can expect DNA Live to bring a plethora of movie nights and other events once again more this summer; and all from the comfort and safety of your own vehicle! Drive in, sit back and enjoy the show!

MOVIES.
To have first access to new movies rsvp to our newsletter
RSVP

JULY 30 - AUGUST 1 SCHEDULE NOW AVAILABLE
EAST LOCATION - 300 COVENTRY ROAD
JULY 30 - AUGUST 1[/b]

See the complete article here:

https://www.thedriveinottawa.ca/movies

JAMES BOND
FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE (1963)
Friday, July 30
Doors 7:30pm
Movie 8:30pm

2021: Audio drama The City of the Dead comes more widely available, following its 27 July release.

007: The City of the Dead

See the complete article here:

007: The City of the Dead Trailer


Something Evil This Way Comes

RichardTheBruce

July 31st

1944: Maud Russell writes about Ian Fleming in her diary.

Spies, affairs and James Bond... The
secret diary of Ian Fleming's wartime
mistress

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/spies-affairs-james-bond-secret-diary-ian-flemings-wartime-mistress/

Monday 31 July, 1944

I. dined and talked to me about the German new ‘secret’ weapon:
the rocket. Said he thought it wasn’t ready and might never be
ready in time but one couldn’t know and if it started I was to
get out at once. I was to keep a bag packed and leave London
immediately without warning the Admiralty or anyone. I said,
‘What about you?’ He said Winston had decided the govt and
the ministers weren’t to be evacuated. It would look too bad
vis-à-vis the people.

1955: Nick Finlayson is born--Ely, Cambridgeshire, England.
(He dies 21 January 2019 at age 63--Esher, Surrey, England.)

Nick Finlayson

22nd January 2019
The special effects technician who served on 10 Bond films passed away this month
https://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/articles/biography-nick-finlayson

Nick Finlayson

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0278014/

Filmography

Special effects (43 credits)

2019 Spider-Man: Far from Home (senior special effects technician)
2019 Pokémon Detective Pikachu (senior special effects technician)
2019 The Kid Who Would Be King (special effects lead senior technician)
2018 Mary Poppins Returns (senior special effects technician)
2017/I Life (senior special effects technician)
2016 Assassin's Creed (senior special effects technician)
2016 Ben-Hur (senior special effects technician)
2016 The Legend of Tarzan (senior special effects technician)
2014 Fury (senior special effects technician)
2014 Edge of Tomorrow (senior special effects technician)
2013 World War Z (senior special effects technician)
2012 Skyfall (senior effects technician)
2012 Wrath of the Titans (senior special effects technician)
2011 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 2 (senior special effects technician)
2011 Pirates of the Caribbean: On Stranger Tides (senior special effects technician)
2010 Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part 1 (senior special effects technician)

2008 Quantum of Solace (senior special effects technician)
2008 The Dark Knight (senior special effects technician)
2007 Fred Claus (senior special effects technician)
2007 Hannibal Rising (special effects lead technician)
2006 Casino Royale (senior special effects technician)
2005 Batman Begins (special effects senior technician)
2003 Lara Croft Tomb Raider: The Cradle of Life (senior special effects technician)
2002 Die Another Day (workshop supervisor)
2002 Below (senior special effects technician - uncredited)
2001 Lara Croft: Tomb Raider (special effects technician)
2000 102 Dalmatians (special effects senior technician)

1999 The World is Not Enough (special effects workshop supervisor)
1999 The Mummy (senior special effects technician)
1998 Firestorm (senior special effects technician)
1997 Tomorrow Never Dies (special effects crew - as Nicholas Finlayson)
1997 The Fifth Element (special effects technician)
1995 GoldenEye (special effects crew - as Nicholas Finlayson)
1993 Cliffhanger (uncredited)
1992 Far and Away (senior special effects technician - uncredited)
1991 Highlander II: The Quickening (senior special effects technician)
1989 Licence to Kill (special effects technician)
1988 Willow (senior special effects technician)
1987 The Living Daylights (special effects technician - uncredited)
1986 Aliens (senior special effects technician)
1985 A View to a Kill (special effects technician - uncredited)
1982 Pink Floyd: The Wall (aircraft subcontractor)
1980 Hopscotch (special effects assistant - uncredited)

Visual effects (2 credits)

1990 Memphis Belle (modeller and technician: model unit)

1983-1985 Terrahawks (TV Series) (HOD model workshop - 26 episodes)

Art department (1 credit)

1985 Lifeforce (modeller)

Self (7 credits)
2002 The Bond Essentials (TV Special documentary short) - Himself
2002 Die Another Day: Shaken and Stirred on Ice (Video documentary short) - Himself
2002 5th Gear (TV Series documentary) - Himself
- Episode #2.7 (2002) ... Himself
2000 The World Is Not Enough: James Bond Down River (TV Special documentary) - Himself
1999 The Making of 'The World Is Not Enough' (Video documentary short) - Himself (uncredited)
1999 The Bond Cocktail (TV Movie documentary) - Himself
1999 Comme au cinéma (TV Series documentary) - Himself
- Episode dated 18 November 1999 (1999) ... Himself

1960: Ian Fleming begins a second series of articles in The Sunday Times, the first on Hamburg, later to become part of Thrilling Cities published by Jonathan Cape.

1971: Sean Connery and cast film in Amsterdam.

1985: A View to a Kill released in Colombia.
1987: The New York Times reports Richard Maibaum and Michael G. Wilson sought to take the latest film to the origins of Bond, but producer Broccoli disagreed. They did agree on presenting a more serious film.
1987: The Living Daylights released in the US. Daily Variety (4 August) calls its first three day earnings the best ever for the franchise. Also the widest release on 1,728 screens.

/center]

1987: 007 vaaran vyöhykkeellä (Danger Zone) released in Finland.

1987: Rita Kempley reviews The Living Daylights in The Washington Post.

‘The Living Daylights’ (PG)

See the complete article here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/movies/videos/thelivingdaylightspgkempley_a09f96.htm

By Rita Kempley | ashington Post Staff Writer
July 31, 1987

007's come a long way, baby.

Timothy Dalton, an '80s-male Bond, explores monogamy and probably also practices safe sex. In past adventures, we would have known for sure, but this 007 is right on top of things. Either because his consciousness has been raised (unlikely) or because he is afraid of AIDS (more likely), he's taken to faithfulness and the ever so more romantic fade-to-black.

And 007's latest, "The Living Daylights," a snazzy spy thriller, is all the more alluring for its new conservatism. It's right up there with the early Bonds, though not in the league with "Goldfinger." But oh, what a difference. Here, only the villains -- an arms dealer and a KGB double agent -- keep pools full of bikini-bimbos, with moues and runaway libidos. And even the notorious Bond "girls" have changed. They used to have names like characters out of "Cats." Here, love interest Maryam d'Abo is a sensible Czech cellist named Kara Milovy, who enjoys a better bond than Bond-bonders past. You might even call it a relationship.

Dalton, no waffler, develops the best Bond ever. He's as classy as the trademark tuxedo, as sleek as the Aston-Martin. Like Bond's notorious martini, women who encounter his carved-granite good looks are shaken, not stirred. Dalton does not play a pompous, mean-spirited Bond like Sean Connery or a prissy, sissy Bond like Roger Moore. Both were as aggressively heterosexual as pubescent Playboy subscribers.

Calling on a background that includes everything from the Joan Collins' potboiling mini-series "Sins" to a stint with the Royal Shakespeareans, Dalton creates a dashing and endearing secret agent. And unlike the creaky Connery and the mushy Moore in their later years, he looks fit for derring-do.

He fleshes out the caricature that had evolved over the past 25 years. For inspiration, Dalton went back to the original 007 created by writer Ian Fleming, a character who endures, like such British perennials as Sherlock Holmes, for his audacity, e'lan and idiosyncrasies.

"The Living Daylights," which uses a Fleming short story as a springboard, is the 15th in the series produced by Albert (Cubby) Broccoli, the constant force behind the pictures. Directors come and go, but Broccoli remains, lavishing time, attention and megabucks on the formula adventures. "Daylights," directed by John Glen of "For Your Eyes Only," is graciously paced, though overplotted, so some seat-shifting sets in about 30 minutes before the end.

There's the customary globe-trotting -- from Austria to Morocco to Afghanistan -- and those still-spectacular stunts. In the giddiest scene, Kara and James elude the KGB, ingeniously tobogganing to safety aboard the case for her cello, a Stradivarius named Lady Rose. Of course, the instrument still resonates despite the bumps and the bullet holes.

D'Abo, who looks like a French variation on "L.A. Law's" Susan Dey, is an appealing partner, if mild-mannered by Bond standards. She does know when to step into the fray, charging a Soviet air base with a camel-back party of Afghan guerrillas. The screenplay, cowritten by veteran Richard Maibaum and coproducer Michael G. Wilson, keeps up with current events. While in no way as amazing as Ollie's Follies, it is right on target with its focus on arms wheeler-dealers.

Still, the villains aren't what they used to be. They can no longer kill you with their hats. And no one's wearing stainless steel dentures. Villains once sought world domination because they were monomaniacal. This one, played by Joe Don Baker, was expelled from West Point for cheating. He's a redneck arms dealer in league with Gen. Georgi Koskov, a KGB double-crosser played by Jeroen Krabbe. Koskov, a defector assigned to Bond, is nearly shot by Kara, obviously an amateur assassin, before 007 can whisk him to the West. After arriving in Britain, Koskov is kidnaped by one of theirs -- or so it seems. Bond's only lead is Kara, the sniper-cellist, actually a Koskov prote'ge'e, who joins 007 on his glitzy mission.

Gadgets, such as an exploding "ghetto blaster," are supplied by Desmond Llewelyn, who returns as Q. Robert Brown is also back as the tweedy intelligence chief, but the actress who played Bond's secretary has been put out to pasture. Caroline Bliss is a newly minted Miss Moneypenny, pert and professional opposite the new, improved Bond ... still licensed to thrill.

"The Living Daylights" contains very little sex and old-fashioned violence.

1987: Desson Howe reviews The Living Daylights in The Washington Post.

‘The Living Daylights’ (PG)

See the complete article here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/movies/videos/thelivingdaylightspghowe_a0b0dc.htm

By Desson Howe | Washington Post Staff Writer
July 31, 1987

Face it, Connery fans. The Scottish laddie had his last hurrah in "Never Say Never Again." And imitator Roger Moore's Bond appears to have had it, hurrah. Now it's all up to Timothy Dalton, poor bloke.

It doesn't help him that Albert Broccoli's "The Living Daylights" is the 15th Bond film. Nor that 007 is a heroic figure to untold millions. But Dalton, with his athletic sort of Brit-yuppie work ethic and romantic streak, comes out all right.

He's spindly but energetic and enthusiastic. The eyes are scintillating, green and squinty. The accent's as refined as Moore's, but free of aloofness. He doesn't have the hairy-chested exuberance of Connery, but there's a warmth trying to get out. (Are we talking about an actor or a racehorse?)

He needs all the athleticism, energy and enthusiasm he can muster, because Broccoli and Co. (including veteran Bond writer Richard Baibaum and director John "For Your Eyes Only" Glen), perennially determined to top all previous Bonds, put him through the hyperactive motions. "Daylights" is crammed with Bondiana -- gadgetry, Us vs. Them, seedy weapons merchants, Q and M, world travel and double-crossings to go.

And boy, do you know you're in the '80s. Bond crosses paths with an eccentric gunrunner (Joe Don Baker) who plays with dangerous toy soldiers, a Nordic freelance agent who kills with Walkmans and an Afghan freedom fighter with an Oxford accent.

The most obvious sign of the times is that sex is out, out, ouch. These are no longer the Martini-ad 1960s, when girls doffed lingerie at the mere mention of "Bond, James Bond," and when AIDS was still a present participle. Dalton's Bond spends his time chasing one -- count her, one -- female and with romantic zeal rather than with Connery's elegant, almost indolent rakishness. Miss Moneypenny (Caroline Bliss), now a sultry blonde behind librarian's glasses, can't rouse Bond either. And when he parachutes out of the hazy blue practically into the lap of a swimsuit beauty, he says: "I need to use your telephone."

James!!!

Assigned to wipe out an assassin in Czechoslovakia, Bond finds his target is beautiful cellist Kara Milovy, who was bowing his heart earlier at a concert. But Bond shoots to miss and gets caught up in a series of 007 convolutions involving a defecting Czech officer (Jeroen Krabbe'), KGB head General Pushkin (John Rhys-Davies) and all those other guys.

Bond films must be scarce in Czechoslovakia because she shows little interest in the glamorous Brit. But after he persuades Kara her boyfriend ain't the tovarich she thought, she waxes warmer. The movie ends tactfully, or squeamishly, before consummation.

Mattress activity being at an all-time low, let's talk toys. Naturally the Aston Martin is back. It blows holes in a truck and has a set of pop-down skis -- in case it just happens to come across an icy lake. And Q gives James a set of keys that open 90 percent of the world's locks and blow open the ones it can't. (The explosive is triggered, of course, by a wolf whistle). The company's also developing a ghetto blaster "for the Americans," which does more than blast rap music. Toys alone won't save Bond; we know that. He'll have to draw on his variegated talents -- the ability to outski gunfire, fly a plane, pronounce the Afghani for "beautiful," and pick the best restaurants in Karachi.

Maybe it's just as well for the free world Bond no longer plays hanky-panky. Because, with unscrupulous gunrunners, drug dealers and communists rubbing sleazy shoulders the world over, there's a lot of work to be done.

1987: Dave Kehr reviews The Living Daylights in The Chicago Tribune in his piece "Bond Is Back In All His Glory in The Living Daylights".

'BOND IS BACK IN ALL HIS GLORY IN
LIVING DAYLIGHTS`

See the complete article here:

https://www.chicagotribune.com/news/ct-xpm-1987-07-31-8702250988-story.html

Dave Kehr, Movie critic | CHICAGO TRIBUNE
July 31, 1987

As of today, a dark era in the history of mankind draws to a close. There is, finally, a new James Bond.

First there was Sean Connery, and then there were a couple of other guys. Now, there`s Timothy Dalton, a classically trained actor with extensive experience on the London stage and occasional experience in the movies (''The Lion in Winter,'' ''The Doctor and the Devils'').

Unlike his immediate predecessor, Roger Moore, Dalton is a Bond who can talk and a Bond who can move. Although ''The Living Daylights'' doesn`t give him all the room he needs to develop a full personality (the last few Bond films seem to have been designed to hide the star, and old habits are hard to break), he`s off to a good start.

No longer a flabby playboy, Dalton`s Bond is wiry, reserved and intense

--a man who takes his work seriously. And because this Bond is more serious, the film is more serious, too. ''The Living Daylights'' has largely been purged of the cartoonish exaggeration that ruled during the Moore years. The absurdly overscaled spectacle of the late entries in the series has been replaced by the pleasures of solid action, logically developed and cleanly presented.

It`s startling to realize how much of a difference a new Bond can make, given the absolute rigidity the formula has achieved through the years.

It`s more ritual than storytelling, beginning with the pre-credit sequence that leads to a spectacular stunt, developing through the visit to M`s office, the banter with Miss Moneypenny, Q`s demonstration of his latest gadgets; moving into the introduction of the eccentric villain, his murderous henchman and the principal woman-in-danger who becomes Bond`s lover; shifting gears for the Ping-Pong progression through the world`s most glamorous postcard locales; and climaxing with the destruction of a very large set decked out in stainless steel and populated by a hundred or two anonymous figures dressed in jump suits.

''The Living Daylights'' has all of this, except for the Very Large Set, which has been replaced by a Very Large Desert. (The Very Large Sets vanished when production designer Ken Adam left the series; the Bond films have never looked the same since.) Q`s gadgets include a whistling keychain that emits nerve gas to the tune of ''Rule Britannia'' and the latest Aston Martin outfitted with a rocket drive; the villains are a maniacal American arms dealer (Joe Don Baker) and a shifty KGB general (Jeroen Krabbe); the woman in danger is a Czechoslovakian cellist (Maryam d`Abo); and the itinerary includes Gibraltar, Bratislava, Tangier, Vienna and the wilds of Afghanistan.

Still, the plotting this time involves no wild scheme to take over the world but a much more modest effort on behalf of the KGB general to defraud his government of a few million dollars earmarked for arms purchases. This represents a significant credibility gain all by itself, and director John Glen is careful not to squander it.

The action set pieces--they include a car chase through the Czechoslovakian snow country and a midair fist fight that finds the antagonists dangling from the open port of a Russian cargo plane--reflect a shrewd compromise between imagination and marginal plausibility, and they seem much more exciting for the element of real-life danger they contain.

But it`s Dalton who sets the tone here, moving through his role with a cool assurance that masks a character of some complexity. His Bond, like the Bond of Ian Fleming`s original novels, is capable of some astonishing cruelty, as when he forces an uninvolved woman to strip in order to distract the attention of an enemy agent.

But there is also a surprising element of tenderness in his makeup:

Certainly no Bond has ever shown anything like the genuine affection Dalton displays toward his female co-star. A series long devoted to casual womanizing seems to have discovered a hint of romance.

Dalton does seem to be holding himself back, and he`s probably right to do it. After all, this is not a performance meant to end with one film, but designed to extend over a series, and it makes sense not to show everything you`ve got the first time out. In ''The Living Daylights,'' Dalton establishes his claim to the role; in the films that will follow, he`ll have the chance to dig deeper.

''THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS''
***
Directed by John Glen; written by Richard Maibaum and Michael G. Wilson;
photographed by Alec Mills; edited by John Grover and Peter Davies; production designed by Peter Lamont; music by John Barry; produced by Albert R. Broccoli and Michael G. Wilson. An MGM/UA release; opens July 31 at the Esquire and outlying theaters. Running time: 2:10. MPAA rating: PG.

THE CAST
James Bond.............................Timothy Dalton
Kara Milovy............................Maryam d`Abo
Gen. Georgi Koskov.....................Jeroen Krabbe
Brad Whitaker..........................Joe Don Baker
Gen. Leonid Pushkin....................John Rhys-Davies
Kamran Shah............................Art Malik
Necros.................................Andreas Wisniewski

1987: Roger Ebert reviews The Living Daylights in the Chicago Sun-Times.

The Living Daylights

See the complete article here:

https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/the-living-daylights-1987

Roger Ebert | July 31, 1987
**

The raw materials of the James Bond films are so familiar by now that the series can be revived only through an injection of humor. That is, unfortunately, the one area in which the new Bond, Timothy Dalton, seems to be deficient. He's a strong actor, he holds the screen well, he's good in the serious scenes, but he never quite seems to understand that it's all a joke.

The correct tone for the Bond films was established right at the start, with Sean Connery's quizzical eyebrows and sardonic smile. He understood that the Bond character was so preposterous that only lightheartedness could save him. The moment Bond began to act like a real man in a real world, all was lost. Roger Moore understood that, too, but I'm not sure Dalton does.

Dalton is rugged, dark and saturnine, and speaks with a cool authority. We can halfway believe him in some of his scenes. And that's a problem, because the scenes are intended to be preposterous. The best Bond movies always seem to be putting us on, to be supplying the most implausible and dangerous stunts in order to assure us they can't possibly be real. But in "The Living Daylights," there is a scene where Bond and his girlfriend escape danger by sliding down a snow-covered mountain in a cello case, and damned if Dalton doesn't look as if he thinks it's just barely possible.

The plot of the new movie is the usual grab bag of recent headlines and exotic locales. Bond, who is assigned to help a renegade Russian general defect to the West, stumbles across a plot involving a crooked American arms dealer, the war in Afghanistan and a plan to smuggle a half-billion dollars worth of opium. The story takes Bond from London to Prague, from mountains to deserts, from a chase down the slopes of Gibraltar to a fight that takes place while Bond and his enemy are hanging out of an airplane. The usual stuff.

One thing that isn't usual in this movie is Bond's sex life. No doubt because of the AIDS epidemic, Bond is not his usual promiscuous self, and he goes to bed with only one, or perhaps two, women in this whole film (it depends on whether you count the title sequence, where he parachutes onto the boat of a woman in a bikini). This sort of personal restraint is admirable, coming from Bond, but given his past sexual history surely it is the woman, not Bond, who is at risk.

The key female character is Kara (Maryam d'Abo), the Russian cellist, who gets involved in the plot with the Russian general, tries to work against Bond and eventually falls in love with him. As the only "Bond girl" in the movie, d'Abo has her assignment cut out for her, and unfortunately she's not equal to it. She doesn't have the charisma or the mystique to hold the screen with Bond (or Dalton) and is the least interesting love interest in any Bond film.

There's another problem. The Bond films succeed or fail on the basis of their villains, and Joe Don Baker, as the arms-dealing Whitaker, is not one of the great Bond villains. He's a kooky phony general who plays with toy soldiers and never seems truly diabolical. Without a great Bond girl, a great villain or a hero with a sense of humor, "The Living Daylights" belongs somewhere on the lower rungs of the Bond ladder. But there are some nice stunts.

1987: Candice Russell reviews The Living Daylights in the South Florida Sun Sentinel in her piece "Timothy Dalton Puts Class Back in James Bond".

TIMOTHY DALTON PUTS CLASS BACK IN
JAMES BOND

See the complete article here:

https://www.sun-sentinel.com/news/fl-xpm-1987-07-31-8703030271-story.html

CANDICE RUSSELL, Film Writer | SUN-SENTINEL
31 July, 1987

Hail, the new James Bond! Timothy Dalton is the classiest heir to the mantle of England's sexy secret agent since Sean Connery really said never again. He's serious, rather than tongue-in-cheek like Roger Moore, instinctive and appealingly heroic.

Before the opening credit sequence, Bond parachutes into Gibraltar, foils a lethal KGB operative, escapes from an airborne jeep loaded with explosives, and lands on a yacht where a bored, bikini-clad beauty has just complained, "If only I could find a real man."

Yes, that's the James Bond we've come to know and adore for the last 25 years.

A great beginning isn't the only good news from The Living Daylights, No. 16 in one of the screen's most durable series. The action just doesn't stop, including a climactic shoot-out at a Soviet military base that is close to being an embarrassment of riches, such as in the ending of Raiders of the Lost Ark.

During the past 10 years, Bond films were devalued into formulaic outings. They tend to blend together in memory.

The Living Daylights stands alone. It has a convoluted, but not gratuitous, plot that is timely in its references to East-West detente, international weapons dealers, and peculiar trades of opium for arms. And it's clever, as Bond and Czech cellist girlfriend Kara (Maryam d'Abo) flee the bad guys in the snowy mountains by using a cello case as a toboggan.

A high-placed Soviet general named Koskov (played with a conniving glee by Jeroen Krabbe) defects to the West, with Bond's help. Then the Soviets spirit him out of bucolic Great Britain and the search is on. Koskov, who's trying to start an endless shooting match between Soviet and Western spies, is actually in cahoots with an amoral Tangier-based arms dealer named Whitaker (Joe Don Baker).

Ironically, Dalton turned down the part of Bond when Connery first left the series because, "I considered myself too young and Connery too good." Smart enough not to copy the originator and also to eschew the hamminess of Moore that sent 007 into a weird orbit, Dalton makes the part his own. If anything, he underplays, but is never overshadowed by gadgets, gorgeous women or awesome stunt work.

Much has been made about the monogamous taste of Bond this time. He only kisses one woman, d'Abo -- an intriguing blond cross between Isabella Rossellini and Audrey Hepburn -- and they never appear in bed. The sexual implication suffices.

Screen writers Richard Maibaum and Michael G. Wilson put Bond back in his beloved Aston-Martin, give gadget-pusher Q (Desmond Llewelyn) one good scene, and derive a chilling couple of scenes in which Bond goes hand-to-hand with villains, including the blond behemoth Necros (Andreas Wisniewski). Credit director John Glen with the estimable pacing and a sparing but lively sense of humor.

Colorful, vibrant, exotic, The Living Daylights more than delivers an eyeful of entertainment. At a running length just over two hours, the most thrill- seeking Bond fans will get their money's worth.

1987: Sheila Benson reviews The Living Daylights in the Los Angeles Times in her piece "New James Bond at the Same Old Pop-Pop Stand".

MOVIE REVIEW : NEW JAMES BOND AT THE
SAME OLD POP-POP STAND

See the complete article here:

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-1987-07-31-ca-170-story.html

By SHEILA BENSON | July 31, 1987

It was the editor on the phone. “The new Bond movie review.”

“Yes?”

“Where is it??? “

“What do you mean, where is it? Don’t you have it?”

“We don’t have it because you didn’t send it,” the voice said with a certain edge to it.

“Good grief, I suppose I didn’t. I do remember seeing the movie--forgettable title.”

“ ‘The Living Daylights.’ ”

“See what I mean?”

“You couldn’t forget the film--they have a new James Bond.”

“Right, right. So they do. Lovely fellow. Rugged. Smart. Dark. Dalton’s his name--Timothy. Not un-Bond-like, if you can put Sean Connery out of your mind. I never could. But things change, no? Non ? Nyet ? Connery’s on to other things, and we’re . . . still here at the same pop stand. Pop, pop, pop. Boom, boom, boom. Tricky cars. Tricky jeeps. Tricky cellos. KGB, BMT, BMW, BLT. 007, 711, 911. It all begins to slide together. We’ve been doing this a long time, James and I.”

“Twenty-five years,” the editor said, evenly.

“You’re joking! Well then, you see what I mean. And Dalton is splendid, but there it all is again: hurtling cars, parachutes, ski troops, paratroops, troops of toy soldiers, troops of Afghan freedom fighters, missives, missiles, heroin, heroines. This time, you know, the heroine plays the cello.”

“Maryam d’Abo.”

“You saw the movie!”

“I’m an editor. I read the press kit. Go on, surely you remember something more.”

“Well . . . Yo-Yo Ma’s career is still safe, but she certainly is beautiful.” The phone crackled ominously in my hand. I went on hurriedly, “I remember thinking that Europe turns out an awful lot of good actors, only to see them pop up, snarling at James Bond. It must be something like brain drain. It’s Jeroen Krabbe this time. Dutch, but he’s really got that old Klaus Maria Brandauer style. Unafraid to be r-e-a-l-l-y b-i-i-g, if you catch my drift.”

“Anything else?”

“I remember brooding for quite a while about James using a $150,000 Stradivarius cello for a toboggan. I can see that fad sweeping Juilliard around January--'It’s OK, we saw James Bond do it.’ And then afterward, d’Abo played her little heart out on that same cello, with a bullet hole right in it. ‘This is a matter for Yo-Yo Ma'--those were my actual notes. But after that . . . everything just becomes Lego blocks.”

“No cardiac-arrest stunts? No great gadgets? None of the old gang?”

“You could doze through this opener--the real stomach-clutcher doesn’t happen until the last 10 minutes, and this is a 130-minute movie. We won’t speak about the new Moneypenny . . . if they can keep dear old Q, they could have Simonized the real Moneypenny.”

I could feel editorial attention wandering.

“Q’s gadget,” I said suavely, “is an exploding key ring.” Aha! A gasp.

“Are we to infer thrift?”

Editors are ever alert for trends. It’s in their blood.

“Thrift, from a Broccoli production? Good heavens, no! The Aston Martin does all its old tricks: rolls over, fetches, kvetches , spits tacks, inscribes circles in the ice, does obligatory school figures. It’s just a little, you know, tired by now. This key ring thing is kind of cute. James has to whistle to make it work . . . it must be hard to keep your pucker under stress. You suppose Dalton had to show them he could keep his, to get the part?”

The connection got a little weird at this point, so I thought I’d better bite the bullet. So to speak.

“Look, I don’t know how to say this, but after 25 summers of hanging around together . . . after everything he’s taught me, all those golden memories, all those martinis, shaken not stirred.”

The silence was not golden.

“Well?”

“I feel just rotten about this, but I’m afraid I’ve outgrown James. When you talk to him about this--and I know you will--be kind.”

1987: David Sterritt reviews The Living Daylights in the Christian Science Monitor in his piece "James Bond now looks like Timothy Dalton".

James Bond now looks like Timothy Dalton
July 31, 1987
By David Sterritt
NEW YORK

See the complete article here:

https://www.csmonitor.com/1987/0731/lfl31.html

I have mixed feelings about James Bond, but I have to admit that he always puts on a generous show. Exotic locations, extravagant action, and offbeat characters are all constants of the Bond series. Not so constant is James Bond himself. For a while he looked like Sean Connery. Then it was George Lazenby (very briefly), and then Roger Moore.

Now he's taken on yet another face: that of Timothy Dalton, a British actor with much experience on the classical stage. Mr. Dalton does little that I could identify as acting in his first go-round as Agent 007. But he certainly looks the part, and he couldn't be more suave and debonair. Surround him with more than two hours of crash-bang adventure - which is just what director John Glen has done - and you have a package that audiences are sure to gobble up happily.

``The Living Daylights'' begins with a switch on the usual Bond heroics. A powerful Russian is defecting to the West, and Agent 007 is assigned to protect him from possible KGB assassination. Bond spots a Soviet sniper, all right, and it turns out to be - wouldn't you know - an attractive woman. Instead of assassinating the assassin, though, he simply shoots her rifle out of her hand (the way cowboys used to do in westerns) and lets her escape.

Why? Because his instinct told him to, Bond explains. His bosses are furious, thinking he let his quarry go because, well, he never could resist a pretty face. But his instinct was right all along, of course. The defection was a fraud. The assassin is really a potential friend. And Bond's ``license to kill'' hasn't expired - he just doesn't want to use it unless he really has to. Soon he's up to his eyeballs in international intrigue, facing everyone from an American gun-runner to Afghan adventurers.

``The Living Daylights'' has the usual failings of the Bond series, including a macho attitude, a weakness for violence, and a cold-war mentality. When the action moves to Afghanistan, moreover, the screenplay can't decide whether the Afghans are noble anti-Soviet freedom fighters or barbaric dope traffickers. So it gives us some of both.

Over on the plus side, the supporting cast includes such solid performers as Joe Don Baker, inimitable even when he's not in top form, and Art Malik of ``The Jewel in the Crown'' on television. And the womanizing Mr. Bond sticks to one girlfriend this time - who plays classical cello when she isn't polishing her rifle.

I talked with Timothy Dalton recently in New York, during a visit he paid to beat the drum for the movie. He told me that he's a longtime fan of the series and that his favorites are the early pictures with Sean Connery, which he finds more human than the ``technological extravaganzas'' of the Roger Moore era.

``I like those films,'' he says. ``To me they reflected the sense and spirit of Fleming's books, which are terrific adventure-romances.''

Dalton's acting experience includes years on the stage, where he played both modern and classical roles, and films as different as ``The Lion in Winter'' and ``Flash Gordon.'' How does an actor prepare for a role like James Bond, which has a whole history of movies and books behind it?

``You don't pluck a characterization out of thin air,'' says Dalton with an elegant British lilt, ``or do it in abstract, or make decisions that relate to your predecessors' work. You look at the script, and it imposes certain criteria upon you.

``Bond is a literary figure,'' he goes on, ``albeit a popular literary figure. He was born in the pages of Ian Fleming's work. Fleming was his creator. Fleming can tell you all you need to know about him. So the first step is to go those books and read them all and study them. And use your imagination and perception and intelligence to draw out what Fleming was getting at. Then, through yourself, you bring that to the particular necessities of the script you're playing.''

After steeping himself in James Bond novels and movies, Dalton qualifies as a leading expert on Agent 007. What's the essence of James Bond, in his view?

``He's a strange and fascinating paradox,'' Dalton muses. ``Obviously he contains a lot of Ian Fleming himself. It's almost as if Fleming created a man he would have liked to be - a principled, brave, tenacious, almost chivalric adventurer - and filled him with his own sensitivities and ideals and thoughts. Bond is a paradox. He's described as a machine. But he's a sensitive, thoughtful, intelligent machine. That's a contradiction. Machines don't feel. But on every page Fleming is talking about how he feels.''

Dalton says this contradiction - between functioning like a machine and feeling like a human being - is most fascinating when it affects Bond's personal relationships.

``He's a man who, in the nature of his job, cannot possibly have an emotional involvement with somebody,'' says the star. ``On a mission, when you're living in a dangerous and tense world - when your life might end at any given moment - you can't afford that kind of involvement.

``But having pushed Bond to one extreme, Fleming creates in him its opposite: the deep need for love and affection. Two pages down the road of any story, he's met some lady in distress, or a victim or endangered person - and fallen in love with her. So he's got these wonderful contradictions and opposites, which make a very rich and complex man. That, to me, was a terrific discovery.''

According to Dalton, the key to a successful James Bond adventure is keeping the right tension between Bond as a heroic figure and Bond as a living, breathing personality we can all identify with.

``It strikes me that if you hope for audience involvement and identification,'' he says, ``you've got to start with somebody who is human and complex and real. If you want to fly into fantasy, you've got to take off from the ground somewhere. The more you anchor the work in something that's real and human, the more [audiences] will believe the fantasy, the adventure, the excitement. And the more they'll get involved in the humor!''

RichardTheBruce

2007: Goldfinger re-released in the UK.

2010: Tom Mankiewicz dies at age 68--Los Angeles, California.
(Born 1 June 1942--Los Angeles, California.)

Tom Mankiewicz obituary

See the complete article here:

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2010/aug/04/tom-mankiewicz-obituary

Screenwriter from a Hollywood dynasty best known for his work
on James Bond
Ronald Bergan | Wed 4 Aug 2010 13.43 EDT

Roger Moore with Jane Seymour as Solitaire in Live and Let Die (1973),
Moore’s first appearance as 007, with screenwriting by Mankiewicz, below
Photograph: Allstar; Al Seib/Photoshot

For most film buffs, the name Mankiewicz immediately recalls Joseph L, the director and screenwriter of All About Eve (1950). For others, it evokes that of his older brother, Herman J, most celebrated as the writer of the screenplay of Citizen Kane. However, Joseph L's son, Tom Mankiewicz, who has died of cancer aged 68, is cherished by James Bond fans as the screenwriter of Diamonds Are Forever (1971), Live and Let Die (1973) and The Man With the Golden Gun (1974), as well as having worked on rewrites of The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) and Moonraker (1979).

Tom Mankiewicz

At the beginning of his career, Mankiewicz admitted that he probably got work because of his father. "You suddenly started to realise that people were asking you because it was you," he explained. Unlike his father's best films – literate, dialogue-based vehicles – when a director called "action" on a Tom Mankiewicz-scripted movie, he really meant it.

He was born in Los Angeles, where his father was an MGM producer before becoming the Oscar-winning director of Letter to Three Wives (1949) and All About Eve. (His mother, the Austrian-born actor Rose Stradner, killed herself when Tom was 16.) It seemed natural that the boy should follow the family tradition, so he majored in drama at Yale University. Before graduation, aged 18, he worked as production assistant on The Comancheros (1961), a western starring John Wayne. In 1964 he was credited as production associate on The Best Man, Gore Vidal's sharp look at morality in politics.

His first screen credit as a writer was on The Sweet Ride (1968), a pseudo-philosophical movie about three beach bums. It was not a success, nor was the Broadway musical Georgy (1970), for which Mankiewicz's book was based on the 1966 British film Georgy Girl. Nevertheless, the producers Albert R Broccoli and Harry Saltzman hired him for two weeks to doctor the Richard Maibaum script of Diamonds Are Forever. He stayed for six months, receiving a co-screenplay credit.

Differing greatly from the Ian Fleming book of the same name, the script had 007 (Sean Connery) bounding from London to Amsterdam, LA to Las Vegas, on the trail of a huge diamond-smuggling operation, behind which lurks his arch-enemy, Blofeld (not in the novel). Bond has a good fight in an elevator, is pestered by two vicious gay men, and attracted by two beauties named Tiffany Case and Plenty O'Toole.

Connery, who had been enticed back to the role after four years away by a $1m fee, plus a weekly salary of $10,000, had not altered his droll style and sexual allure, although there was some change in his girth. When Roger Moore followed him in the part, Mankiewicz was entrusted to write the screenplay for Moore's first 007, Live and Let Die.

The film, which did well at the box office, proved that Connery was not irreplaceable as Bond. While Mankiewicz stuck to the winning formula – the film had spectacular set pieces, particularly an incredible speedboat chase through the Louisiana bayous – it leaned rather more on the humorous side, honed to Moore's more lightweight personality.

According to Mankiewicz, "the difference between Sean and Roger was that Sean looked dangerous. Sean could sit at a table with a girl at a nightclub and either lean across and kiss her or stick a knife in her under the table and then say, 'Excuse me waiter, I have nothing to cut my meat with.' Whereas Roger could kiss the girl, if he stuck a knife in her it would look nasty because Roger looks like a nice guy."

Although The Man With the Golden Gun, which Mankiewicz and Maibaum adapted from Fleming's last novel, had the usual stunts, exotic locales, a master criminal and sexy women popping up from time to time, it sometimes verged on self-parody. In fact, there is a tongue-in-cheek seam running through most of Mankiewicz's work.

In 1976 three films with Mankiewicz as writer were released: Mother, Jugs & Speed, starring Bill Cosby as a stoned ambulance driver; The Cassandra Crossing, a disaster movie with an all-star cast; and The Eagle Has Landed (based on the Jack Higgins novel), an entertaining but far-fetched thriller with Michael Caine as a German colonel infiltrating an English village in 1943 with the aim of kidnapping Winston Churchill.

In 1977 the director Richard Donner recruited Mankiewicz to work on the script of Superman, for which he received the credit of creative consultant, a fancy name for script doctor. He got the same credit for Superman II (1980), directed by Richard Lester, who added rather too much camp humour to footage that Donner had shot. Mankiewicz claimed to have written most of both pictures. He later helped Donner reconstruct Superman II, restoring all of the original footage that had been altered by the producers.

In between fixing other people's films, he co-wrote the screenplay for Donner's Ladyhawke (1985), a handsome-looking medieval fable of cursed lovers turning into animals. After directing 13 episodes of the TV adventure series Hart to Hart (1979-82), starring Robert Wagner and Stefanie Powers, he directed two movies, Dragnet (1987) and Delirious (1991) – the former being a mildly amusing spoof of Jack Webb's 50s TV series; the latter about a writer (John Candy) trapped in his own soap opera.

Mankiewicz is survived by his brother, Christopher, a producer and actor, and his sister, Alexandra.

• Thomas Francis Mankiewicz, screen-writer and director, born 1 June 1942; died 31 July 2010

2012: Skyfall full trailer seen in theaters plus online.

Javier Bardem's blond Bond villain
unveiled

See the complete article here:

https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-19066966

Entertainment & Arts
31 July 2012

Bardem won an Oscar in 2008 for his role in
No Country for Old Men

A new trailer for the latest James Bond film Skyfall has given fans their first glimpse of Oscar-winning actor Javier Bardem's blond villain in action.

Bardem's character, named Silva, is seen confronting a manacled Bond, played by Daniel Craig, and is later shown disguised as a British policeman.

The trailer features actor Ben Whishaw as "The New Q" and explosive action in various London locales.

It also shows Bond being "killed" in action and M typing up his obituary.

Played by Dame Judi Dench, 007's boss is then seen being chastised by Ralph Fiennes' character Gareth Mallory for losing a disc drive containing details of undercover British agents.

Subsequent scenes depict an explosion at MI6's Thameside HQ and a Tube train plummeting into an underground vault.

The trailer reveals previously unknown plot points, one of which appears to have been drawn from Ian Fleming's novel You Only Live Twice.

The 1964 book concludes with an obituary for Bond written by M after the secret agent is believed to have been killed during a mission in Japan.

The latest trailer comes shortly after Craig's cameo appearance during the Olympic Opening Ceremony in a short film that showed Bond escorting the Queen to the Olympic Stadium.

Audiences in the US were treated to a teaser of the new footage during NBC's telecast of the London 2012 launch.

Daniel Craig's James Bond features in
another newly released Skyfall

Other scenes unveiled on Tuesday include one showing British actress Naomie Harris, in her role as field agent Eve, "shooting" Bond off the roof of a moving train in Turkey.

Skyfall, to be released in the UK on 26 October, marks Craig's third big-screen appearance as Fleming's legendary spy.

The 44-year-old was previously seen in the role in 2006's Casino Royale and Quantum of Solace in 2008.

Spanish actor Bardem won the best supporting actor Oscar in 2008 for his villainous role in No Country for Old Men.

The 43-year-old, who is married to fellow Spaniard Penelope Cruz, was also Oscar-nominated in 2001 and 2011.

2019: The last of five James Bond films screens at Quentin Tarantino's own New Beverly Cinema, Los Angeles.

Five James Bond film screenings at Quentin Tarantino's cinema
By: Mark Cerulli

See the complete article here (includes Luciana Paluzzi's appearance at Thunderball):

https://jamesbond007.se/eng/event/james_bond_films_new_beverly_cinema

Quentin Tarantino’s New Beverly Theater in West Hollywood has been showing rare
35MM IB Technicolor prints of Connery’s classic Bonds at matinees throughout the
month of July. At 6 US dollar a ticket, it’s the one true bargain in LA!

2021: James Bond Bingo at the Town Square Community Center, Green Lake, Wisconsin.

James Bond Bingo

See the complete article here:

https://www.visitgreenlake.com/blog/event/james-bond-bingo/

When:
July 31, 2021 @ 5:00 pm – 8:45 pm
Where:
Town Square Community Center
492 Hill St
Green Lake, WI
54941
Contact:
Fran Hill
9208070008

Join us for the 7th month of the year for James Bond 007 themed Bingo!
Hopefully, you enjoy your bingo shaken, not stirred.

This is fun for the WHOLE family with prizes galore, concessions, and lots of surprises.
It’s a fun party for the young and young at heart!*

Follow us on Facebook for the most up-to-date jackpot info. We play 13 games, plus speedy bingo and progressive black-out final game. ALSO, 50-50 raffle and great door prizes all night long.

* Minors are welcome to play BINGO in Wisconsin but must be accompanied by a parent or guardian.

Bingo Schedule:
Doors and concessions open at 5:00 p.m.
Card sales start at 5:30 p.m.
Games 6:30 – 8:45 p.m.

Concessions include our famous $2 Sheboygan Hot dogs, Beer, Wine, Soda, chips and sweets.
(No carry-ins please)

Town Square Bingo supports the great children, family, and community programming at Town Square Community Center. It’s a WIN-WIN!

RichardTheBruce

August 1st [59 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1930: Lionel Bart is born--Stepney, London, England.
(He dies 3 April 1999 at age 68--Hammersmith, London, England.)

Obituary: Lionel Bart

See the complete article here:

https://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/obituary-lionel-bart-1085282.html

Tom Vallance | Monday 5 April 1999 00:02

IF HE had written only Oliver!, the composer Lionel Bart would have earned an honoured place in the history of British musicals, but he was far from a one-show wonder. His other work included shows such as Fings Ain't Wot They Used T'Be and Maggie May, plus many pop songs including "Living Doll" (Cliff Richard's first No 1 hit), Tommy Steele's "A Handful of Songs", Anthony Newley's "Do You Mind?" and Matt Monro's "From Russia With Love".

He epitomised the start of the Sixties in Britain, which he uniquely captured in song and spirit, and he was one of the few composers to deal uncondescendingly with the working classes, transposing their life styles and vernacular to the musical stage. "Nobody tries to be la-de-da or uppity, there's a cuppa tea for all," sings the Artful Dodger to Oliver, while Fings Ain't Wot They Used T'Be remains a time capsule of a world in which folk talked of their "birds" and their "manor" and dreamed of being able to afford furniture that was "contempery". It was like a musical EastEnders, but far more joyous and celebratory, without the unremitting angst suffered by the inhabitants of Albert Square.

Bart also epitomised the Sixties in a less happy way - like many who flourished in that era he was seduced by sudden success into a world of drink, drugs and hedonism, squandering his money and his youth.

Bart was one of the 11 children of an East End tailor. He was born Lionel Begleiter, in 1930, and he had no formal musical training. He displayed a flair for drawing, however, which brought him at the age of 16 a scholarship to the St Martin's School of Art in London. (His bus journey, which took him each day past St Bartholomew's Hospital, inspired him to adopt Bart as his professional surname.) He worked in a silk-screen printing works and commercial art studios before an attraction to the theatre brought him work at the left-wing Unity Theatre, where he worked as a set painter. He started writing songs in response to a sign asking for musical material for one of the theatre's productions. Unable to write music, he would tap out the melody with one finger and someone else would orchestrate it.

It was a time when popular music was undergoing a drastic transformation due to the influence of such stars as Elvis Presley and Bill Haley, and Bart was one of many musicians and singers (most of them Presley-influenced) who frequented the 2 I's coffee shop in Soho, where he met the rock singer Tommy Steele. With Michael Pratt and Steele, Bart wrote Steele's first hit, "Rock with the Caveman" (1957), and later that year Bart won three Ivor Novello Awards, presented by the Songwriters Guild, for outstanding song of the year ("A Handful of Songs"), best novelty song ("Water, Water") and outstanding film score (The Tommy Steele Story).

Another habitue of the 2 I's was a cherubic youngster named Harry Webb, and when he made his first film, Serious Charge (with his new name Cliff Richard), it was Bart who provided the songs, including "Living Doll", which topped the Hit Parade for eight weeks. (Bart claimed that he wrote the song in six minutes on a Sunday morning.) The same year Bart wrote a complete musical, Wally Pone of Soho, based on Ben Jonson's Volpone, but could not get it produced, but Joan Littlewood, who had been a producer at the Unity and was now running the enterprising Theatre Workshop in Stratford, London, asked him to provide the music and lyrics for a new musical written by a former convict, Frank Norman, Fings Ain't Wot They Used T'Be.

Bart and Norman complemented each other beautifully and produced a brash, funny, unpretentious working-class musical. Blessed with a cast aptly assembled by Littlewood, including Miriam Karlin, Barbara Windsor, James Booth, Yootha Joyce, Toni Palmer and George Sewell (who was to play Bill Sykes in Oliver!), it played to packed houses and eventually moved to the Garrick Theatre in the West End, where it ran for two years. Bart's ingratiating score included an infectious (if derivative) title tune, a Presley-type rock number "Big Time" (recorded by Adam Faith) and a plaintive lament for a prostitute, "Where Do Little Birds Go?", delivered with a show-stopping guilelessness by Windsor, who credited the number with changing her life and career.

Like Norman's libretto, Bart's songs perfectly captured a time of change - of the Wolfenden Report, massage parlours replacing street-corner pick- ups; and a time when "ordinary people" had started going to Paris for the weekend instead of Southend.

Later in 1959 Bart had another success when Lock Up Your Daughters, a musical version of Henry Fielding's Rape Upon Rape, opened at the Mermaid with lyrics by Bart to Laurie Johnson's music. He had also provided songs for Tommy Steele's film Tommy the Toreador and at the end of the year won four Novello Awards - for the year's best-selling song ("Living Doll"), the outstanding score of the year (Lock Up Your Daughters), outstanding novelty song ("Little White Bull") and a special award for "outstanding personal services to British music".

Bart was now on the threshold of the biggest success of his life. Based on a much-loved Dickens novel, and Bart for the first time providing his own libretto as well as music and lyrics, Oliver! seemed far from a certain success - a dozen managements had turned it down - but its first night at the New Theatre (now the Albery) on 30 June 1960 was something that none of us present will ever forget. Of British musicals, only Sandy Wilson's The Boy Friend, which premiered seven years earlier, could be said to have had such a roof-raising, rapturous reception in the last half-century.

The show received 23 curtain-calls, and Bart's score was lauded next day for its richness and variety, from rousing show-stoppers like "Consider Yourself" and "I'd Do Anything" to the character songs such as Fagin's "Pick a Pocket or Two" and "Reviewing the Situation", and Nancy's "It's a Fine Life" and the torchy ballad "As Long As He Needs Me". (Bart later said that, when composing his songs, he always thought of Judy Garland singing them.) It won Novello Awards for outstanding score of the year, outstanding song of the year and best-selling song (the last two both for "As Long As He Needs Me"). Oliver! ran for 2,618 performances in London, and was a hit on Broadway where it opened in 1963 and ran for 774 performances, winning Bart a Tony Award.

Bart was said to be earning pounds 16 a minute from Oliver! in 1960 and his life style reflected his wealth. He entertained vigorously, his friends including Noel Coward, Brian Epstein, Judy Garland, Alma Cogan and Shirley Bassey, and he spent weekends in Mustique with Princess Margaret, who was later, according to Bart, to call him a "silly bugger" for mis-handling his finances. Bart himself would later place some of the blame on his upbringing. "My father gambled," he said, "and there were endless arguments about it. I hated money and had no respect for it. My attitude was to spend it as I got it."

Though there may be some truth in this, Bart's friends attest to his constantly altering the facts of his childhood and frequently taking liberties with the truth. When he was looking for a writer to help ghost his memoirs, several noted authors turned him down, one of them telling me bluntly, "He's such a liar!"

The American composer Richard Rodgers, who had not found a permanent lyricist partner since the death of Oscar Hammerstein, asked Bart to collaborate with him, but Bart refused and for his next show chose a subject close to his heart, the way East Enders coped with air-raids in World War II. Blitz! (Bart had a fondness for exclamation points in his titles) was a gargantuan production which never quite jelled (Bart directed the show) and its score was less inspired than that of Oliver!, though it had a show-stopping children's chorus, "Mums and Dads", and Bart persuaded Vera Lynn to record for the production his cod-wartime ballad "The Day After Tomorrow". Its strongest talking-point was the massive set by Sean Kenny (who had also done sterling work on Oliver!) which literally self- destructed during a bombing raid.

For his old friend Joan Littlewood, Bart next composed a title song and theme music for her film Sparrows Can't Sing (1963) starring Barbara Windsor and James Booth, and he had a hit with the title song for the James Bond film From Russia With Love (1964), recorded by Matt Monro.

Bart wrote the music and lyrics for his next stage musical, Maggie May (1964), but collaborated on the book with Harvey Orkin. Starring Rachel Roberts and Kenneth Haigh, it was a moderate success but produced no major song hits, though Judy Garland recorded four of the songs for an EP and it won the Novello Award as outstanding score of the year and the Critics' Poll as best new British musical.

Bart was by now experimenting with LSD and other drugs and was drinking heavily. By the late Seventies his drinking had brought on diabetes and by the time he managed to quit alcohol it had destroyed one-third of his liver. Much of his income was being dissipated, according to his friends, by his generosity to hangers-on and by the ease with which casual sex partners could rob him. (Though known in the profession to be gay, it was not until the Nineties that Bart described himself as "out at last".) His career reached a low point in 1965 with his musical about Robin Hood which he backed with a fortune of his own money. Twang! was a short-lived disaster and to finance it Bart had rashly sold his rights to Oliver! He later estimated that relinquishing those rights lost him over a million pounds.

In 1968 Carol Reed's film verion of Oliver! opened and was a huge success, winning several Oscars including Best Picture, plus nominations for Ron Moody (the original Fagin repeating his fine performance) and Jack Wild (as the Artful Dodger). Bart's score was kept virtually intact, and the soundtrack album was a best-seller. Columbia, the studio financing the film, had wanted an internationally known star (Peter Sellers) in the lead, but Reed and Bart fought to keep Moody. Their choice of Shirley Bassey to play Nancy was vetoed by the studio, who felt that if Bill Sykes was shown killing a black girl it could offend some audiences.

Four years after Twang! a new show by Bart was produced. Based on the Fellini film La Strada, it was staged on Broadway where it ran for only one night, though Bart never gave up on it and was working on plans for a revival at the time of his death.

He also wrote the score for a television version of Dr Jekyll and Mr Hyde starring Kirk Douglas (never shown in Britain) and an unproduced stage musical, Quasimodo! based on The Hunchback of Notre Dame. In a 1995 interview with The Independent, Bart recalled that he sent some of the script for Quasimodo! to Noel Coward, who said, "Brilliant, dear boy, but were you on drugs when you wrote it? It seems a bit abstract here and there." "I suppose it was," said Bart.

In 1972 Bart declared himself bankrupt - he had debts totalling pounds 73,000. In 1975 he was banned for a year for driving under the influence of drink, and in 1983 banned again for two years. Regarding the changes in the style of musical theatre, he told the musical historian Mark Steyn that he would never have written a through-sung musical because in my case it would be slightly pretentious. I'm not a composer, I just make tunes and sing them, and I sing harmonies, and some of my chord progressions are not logical, but often they work. For Oliver! I thought in terms of people's walks. The Oliver theme was really the Beadle's walk, a kind of dum-de-dum . . . Fagin's music was like a Jewish mother clucking away. But I don't want to get high-falutin' about it. Music is important, fair enough. But just to have some kind of drab tune fitted to even more drab dialogue seems rather pointless to me.

Though Bart's final years were unproductive (a 30-second commercial for the Abbey National Building Society was his most notable achievement of the last decade), and he could be exasperatingly demanding of his friends, he was equable about his change in fortunes - he once had homes in London, New York, Malibu and Tangiers but had been living in a small flat in Acton. Cameron Mackintosh, who successfully revived Oliver! at the London Palladium in 1994 and gave him a percentage of the profits, said,

Of all the people I know in this business who have had ups and downs, Lionel is the least bitter man I have ever come across. He regrets it but, considering that everyone else has made millions out of his creations, he's never been sour, never been vindictive.

Andrew Lloyd Webber said, "Lionel's genius has in my view never been fully recognised by the British establishment. The loss to British musical theatre caused by his untimely death is incalculable."

Tom Vallance

Lionel Begleiter (Lionel Bart), composer, lyricist and playwright: born London 1 August 1930; died London 3 April 1999.

1930: Geoffrey Holder is born--Port of Spain, Trinidad.
(He dies 5 October 2014 at age 84--New York City, New York.)

Geoffrey Holder, Dancer, Actor,
Painter and More, Dies at 84

See the complete article here:

https://www.nytimes.com/2014/10/07/arts/geoffrey-holder-dancer-choreographer-and-man-of-flair-dies-at-84.html

Geoffrey Holder, Dancer, Actor, Painter and More, Dies at 84
By Jennifer Dunning and William McDonald | Oct. 6, 2014

Mr. Holder, the multitalented artist, and ebullient performer died Sunday at 84.
Credit Erin Combs/Toronto Star, via Getty Images

Geoffrey Holder, the dancer, choreographer, actor, composer, designer and painter who used his manifold talents to infuse the arts with the flavor of his native West Indies and to put a singular stamp on the American cultural scene, not least with his outsize personality, died on Sunday in Manhattan. He was 84.

Charles M. Mirotznik, a spokesman for the family, said the cause was complications of pneumonia.

Few cultural figures of the last half of the 20th century were as multifaceted as Mr. Holder, and few had a public presence as unmistakable as his, with his gleaming pate atop a 6-foot-6 frame, full-bodied laugh and bassoon of a voice laced with the lilting cadences of the Caribbean.

Mr. Holder directed a dance troupe from his native Trinidad and Tobago, danced on Broadway and at the Metropolitan Opera and won Tony Awards in 1975 for direction of a musical and costume design for “The Wiz,” a rollicking, all-black version of “The Wizard of Oz.” His choreography was in the repertory of the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater and the Dance Theater of Harlem. He acted onstage and in films and was an accomplished painter, photographer and sculptor whose works have been shown in galleries and museums. He published a cookbook.

Mr. Holder acknowledged that he achieved his widest celebrity as the jolly, white-suited television pitchman for 7Up in the 1970s and ’80s, when in a run of commercials, always in tropical settings, he happily endorsed the soft drink as an “absolutely maaarvelous” alternative to Coca-Cola — or “the Uncola,” as the ads put it.

Long afterward, white suit or no, he would stop pedestrian traffic and draw stares at restaurants. He even good-naturedly alluded to the TV spots in accepting his Tony for directing, using their signature line “Just try making something like that out of a cola nut.”

Geoffrey Lamont Holder was born into a middle-class family on Aug. 1, 1930, in Port of Spain, Trinidad and Tobago, the youngest of five children of Louise de Frense and Arthur Holder, who had immigrated from Barbados. Geoffrey attended Queen’s Royal College, an elite secondary school in Trinidad. There he struggled with a stammer that plagued him into early adulthood.

“At school, when I got up to read, the teacher would say, ‘Next,’ because the boys would laugh,” he said in an oral history interview.

Growing up, Mr. Holder came under the wing of his talented older brother, Arthur Aldwyn Holder, known to everyone by his childhood nickname, Boscoe. Boscoe Holder taught Geoffrey painting and dancing and recruited him to join a small, folkloric dance troupe he had formed, the Holder Dancing Company. Boscoe was 16; Geoffrey, 7.

Geoffrey Holder’s career mirrored that of his brother in many ways. Boscoe Holder, too, went on to become a celebrated dancer, choreographer, musician, painter and designer, and he, too, left Trinidad, in the late 1940s, for England, where he performed on television and onstage.

His brother’s departure put Geoffrey Holder in charge of the dance company, as its director and lead performer, and he took it to New York City in 1954, invited by the choreographer Agnes de Mille, who had seen the troupe perform two years before in St. Thomas, in the Virgin Islands. She arranged an audition for the impresario Sol Hurok. To pay for the troupe’s passage, Mr. Holder, already an established young painter, sold 20 of his paintings.

After dropping his bags at an uncle’s apartment in Brooklyn, he fell in love with the city.

“It was a period when all the girls looked like Janet Leigh and Elizabeth Taylor, with crinoline petticoats and starched hair,” he told The New York Times in 1985. “The songs of that period were the themes from ‘The Moulin Rouge’ and ‘Limelight,’ and it was so marvelous to hear the music in the streets and see the stylish ladies tripping down Fifth Avenue. Gorgeous black women, Irish women — all of them lovely and all of them going somewhere.”

Mr. Holder had the good fortune to arrive in New York at a time of relative popularity for all-black Broadway productions as well as black dance, both modern and folk. Calypso music was also gaining a foothold, thanks largely to Harry Belafonte.

Mr. Holder at the opening of the Broadway musical “The Lion King” in 1997 accompanied by his wife,
the dancer Carmen de Lavallade. He made his own Broadway debut in 1954.
Credit Nancy Siesel/The New York Times

For a while Mr. Holder taught classes at the Katherine Dunham School, and he was a principal dancer for the Metropolitan Opera Ballet from 1956 to 1958. He continued to dance and direct the Holder dance company until 1960, when it disbanded. In the meantime, at a dance recital, he caught the attention of the producer Arnold Saint-Subber, who was putting together a show with a Caribbean theme.

Thus did Mr. Holder make his Broadway debut on Dec. 30, 1954, as a featured dancer in “House of Flowers,” a haunting, perfumed evocation of West Indian bordello life, with music by Harold Arlen and a book by Truman Capote, based on his novella of the same name. Directed by Peter Brook at the Alvin Theater, it starred Diahann Carroll and Pearl Bailey, and among its dancers was a ravishingly pretty young woman named Carmen de Lavallade. She and Mr. Holder married in 1955, had a son, Léo, and sometimes shared the stage. Both wife and son survive him. Boscoe Holder died in 2007.

One character Mr. Holder played in the musical was the top-hatted Baron Samedi, the guardian of the cemetery and the spirit of death, sex and resurrection in Haitian Voodoo culture. Mr. Holder relished Samedi: he played him again in the 1973 James Bond film, “Live and Let Die” (the first of the Bond franchise to star Roger Moore), and featured him in his choreography — in his “Banda” dance from the musical “House of Flowers,” and in “Banda,” a further exploration of folk themes that had its premiere in 1982.

His Voodoo villain in “Live and Let Die” was of a piece with much of his sporadic film career: with his striking looks and West Indian-inflected voice, producers tended to cast Mr. Holder in roles deemed exotic. In “Doctor Dolittle” (1967), he was a giant native who ruled a floating island as William Shakespeare (the 10th). In Woody Allen’s “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex * but Were Afraid to Ask” (1972), he played a sorcerer. In “Annie” (1982), he was the Indian servant Punjab. (An exception was the 1992 romantic comedy “Boomerang,” in which he played a randy director of commercials working for Eddie Murphy’s playboy advertising executive.)

Mr. Holder was multitasking before the term gained currency. In 1957, he landed a notable acting role playing the hapless servant Lucky in an all-black Broadway revival of Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot,” directed by Herbert Berghof. The show, just seven months after the play’s original Broadway production, closed after only six performances because of a union dispute, but the role, with its rambling, signature 700-word monologue, lifted Mr. Holder’s acting career.

That same year, he choreographed and danced in a revival of the George and Ira Gershwin musical “Rosalie” in Central Park. And he received a Guggenheim fellowship in painting.

Painting was a constant for him. Whether life was hectic or jobs were scarce, he could usually be found in the SoHo loft he shared with Ms. de Lavallade, absorbed in work that drew on folk tales and often delivered biting social commentary. On canvases throughout the studio, sensuous nudes jostled for space with elegantly dressed women, ghostly swimmers nestled beside black Virgin Marys, bulky strippers seemed to burst out of their skins, and mysterious figures peered out of tropical forests.

His work was shown at the Corcoran Gallery in Washington and at the Guggenheim Museum in New York. And then there was his photography, and his sculpture.

His visual creativity extended to costume designs, “The Wiz” being just one showcase. Another was John Taras’s 1982 production of “The Firebird” for the Dance Theater of Harlem, in which the Russian fairy tale was relocated to a tropical forest. Mr. Holder designed both the sets and the costumes, one of which was a blend of 30 or 40 colors. He earned another Tony nomination for best costume design for the 1978 Broadway musical “Timbuktu!,” an all-black show based on the musical “Kismet.” He also directed and choreographed “Timbuktu!”

Mr. Holder’s dance designs were equally bold. Reviewing a 1999 revival of “Banda” by the Dance Theater of Harlem, Anna Kisselgoff wrote in The Times, “Mr. Holder is a terrific showman, and his mix of Afro-Caribbean rituals, modern dance and even ballet’s pirouettes is potent and dazzling.”

Other Holder dance classics were “Prodigal Prince” (1971), a dreamlike re-creation of the life and work of Hector Hyppolite, the Haitian folk painter, for which he also composed the musical score; and “Dougla” (1974), an evocation of a mixed-race Caribbean wedding. (Dougla refers to people who are of African and Indian descent.)

In 1959, he published a book on Caribbean folklore, Black Gods, Green Islands, written with Tom Harshman and illustrated by Mr. Holder; in 1973, he produced Geoffrey Holder’s Caribbean Cookbook. He himself was the subject of books and documentaries, including “Carmen & Geoffrey” (2009), by Linda Atkinson and Nick Doob.

Mr. Holder said his artistic life was governed by a simple credo, shaped by his own experience as a West Indian child who had yet to see the world.

“I create for that innocent little boy in the balcony who has come to the theater for the first time,” he told Dance magazine in 2010. “He wants to see magic, so I want to give him magic. He sees things that his father couldn’t see.”

Correction: Oct. 6, 2014
An earlier version of this obituary misstated Mr. Holder’s age. He was 84, not 83. (His date of birth was correctly given as Aug. 1, 1930.) It also misstated his middle name. It was Lamont, not Richard.
Correction: Oct. 6, 2014

An earlier version of a picture caption with this obituary misstated Mr. Holder's surname as Holden.
Correction: Oct. 14, 2014

An obituary last Tuesday about the dancer, choreographer and actor Geoffrey Holder misstated his tenure as a principal dancer for the Metropolitan Opera Ballet. It was from 1956 to 1958, not 1955 and 1956. The obituary also misstated the number of siblings Mr. Holder had. He was the youngest of five children, not “one of four children.”
A version of this article appears in print on Oct. 7, 2014, Section A, Page 19 of the New York edition with the headline: Geoffrey Holder, Multitalented Artist, Dies at 84. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

Geoffrey Holder
Filmography
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0390305/

Actor (31 credits)
2008 Butterfield (Short) - Mr. Emory
2008 The Little Wizard: Guardian of the Magic Crystals - Narrator
2005 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory - Narrator (voice)
2005 Charlie and the Chocolate Factory (Video Game) - The Narrator (voice)
2002-2003 Cyberchase (TV Series) - Master Pi
- Double Trouble (2003) ... Master Pi (voice)
- Problem Solving in Shangri-La (2002) ... Master Pi (voice)
1997-2002 Bear in the Big Blue House (TV Series) - Ray the Sun (Total 41 episodes)
2002 Bear in the Big Blue House LIVE! - Surprise Party (Video) - Ray (voice)

1999 Goosed - Dr. Bowman
1998 Chance or Coincidence - Owner of Soutine's Bar
1995 Hell: A Cyberpunk Thriller (Video Game) - Jean St. Mouchoir (voice)
1992 Boomerang - Nelson

1987 Where Confucius Meets the New Wave - Narrator
1987 Ghost of a Chance (TV Movie) - Johnson
1986 John Grin's Christmas (TV Movie) - Ghost of Christmas Future
- 1983 Great Performances (TV Series) - Cheshire Cat
- Alice in Wonderland (1983) ... Cheshire Cat
1982 Annie - Punjab
1980 ABC Weekend Specials (TV Series) - Jupiter
- The Gold Bug (1980) ... Jupiter
-
1976 Swashbuckler - Cudjo
1975 The Noah - Friday
1973 Live and Let Die - Baron Samedi
1973 The Man Without a Country (TV Movie) - Slave on ship
1972 Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex * But Were Afraid to Ask - Sorcerer
1970 It Takes a Thief (TV Series) - Paul Trion
- Nice Girls Marry Stockbrokers (1970) ... Paul Trion

1968 Krakatoa: East of Java - Sailor
1967-1968 Tarzan (TV Series) - Mayko / Zwengi
- A Gun for Jai (1968) ... Mayko
- The Pride of the Lioness (1967) ... Zwengi
1967 Doctor Dolittle - William Shakespeare X
1967 Androcles and the Lion (TV Movie) - Lion

1959 Porgy and Bess - Dancer (uncredited)
1958 The DuPont Show of the Month (TV Series) - Genie
- Cole Porter's 'Aladdin' (1958) ... Genie
1957 Carib Gold - Voodoo Dancer (as Geoffery Holder)
1957 The United States Steel Hour (TV Series) - Calypso Singer
- The Bottle Imp (1957) ... Calypso Singer

1942: Giancarlo Giannini is born--La Spezia, Liguria, Italy.

1965: Samuel Alexander "Sam" Mendes, CBE, is born--Reading, Berkshire, England.

1970: Robert Brownjohn dies at age 44--London, England.
(Born 8 August 1925--Newark, New Jersey.)

Robert Brownjohn
American, 1925–1970

See the complete article here:

https://www.moma.org/artists/816?locale=en

While best known for his title sequences for the James Bond films From Russia with Love and Goldfinger, Robert Brownjohn had a short but influential career, which integrated design, advertising, film, photography, and music. A major figure in the New York advertising and design scene of the late 1950s, he later moved to London, where he was at the epicenter of the burgeoning music, art, and fashion scene of London’s “swinging ’60s.”

Born in New Jersey to British parents, Brownjohn later moved to Chicago, where during the mid-1940s he studied under former Bauhaus teacher Laszlo Moholy-Nagy at the Chicago Institute of Design. He quickly caught the attention of his teachers, who later brought him on as an instructor at the school. After moving to New York in 1951, he spent five years as a freelance designer for clients including George Nelson and Bob Cato. In 1956, he formed a partnership with Ivan Chermayeff, a designer and son of the modernist architect Serge Chermayeff (with designer Tom Geismar joining a year later). Brownjohn, Chermayeff & Geismar quickly grew into one of the most innovative design and advertising firms in New York. Brownjohn’s many personal problems, caused primarily by the heroin addiction that later claimed his life, ultimately soured his New York relationships, precipitating his move to London in 1960.

In London, Brownjohn rapidly established himself as a designer of note. While working for the firm McCann Erickson, he designed the opening credits for the second James Bond film, From Russia with Love, his first foray into film. The following year he directed the film titles for Goldfinger. For both title sequences, he employed a surprising and attention-grabbing approach in which the credit texts and scenes from the films were projected onto scantily clad women, initiating the long-running Bond film tradition of elaborate title sequences featuring seductive women. Brownjohn’s treatment of type as dynamic, abstract forms in the title sequences illustrated both his mastery of graphic design and the enduring influence of Moholy-Nagy’s use of type and photography. His combination of sexually suggestive images and wry humor was a fitting accompaniment to the James Bond mythos. The broad acclaim he received for the Bond film titles led to more film and commercial work for clients ranging from Pirelli to Midland Bank to the Rolling Stones. Though he continued to produce original and challenging work, in the latter half of the 1960s, his life became increasingly unstable. He was moving from one partnership to another until he died in 1970, at the untimely age of 44.

Introduction by Paul Galloway, Collection Specialist, Department of Architecture and Design, 2016

Robert Brownjohn (1925–1970)
Miscellaneous Crew | Actor | Art Director
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0115226/
Filmography

Miscellaneous Crew (6 credits)

1969 Michael Kohlhaas - Der Rebell (titles)
1967 The Night of the Generals (title sequence designer)
1966 The Tortoise and the Hare (Short) (title designer)
1966 Where the Spies Are (title designer)
1964 Goldfinger (titles designed by)
1963 From Russia with Love (titles designed by)

Actor (1 credit)

1969 Otley - Paul

Art director (1 credit)

1963 A... is for Apple (Short)

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1979: Moonraker released in Colombia.
1979: 太空城 鐵金剛勇破 (Tiě jīngāng yǒng pò tàikōng chéng; Iron King Space city) released in Hong Kong.

https://talkcinema.wordpress.com/2017/08/16/大堂海報：手作版與原裝版/



http://playitagain.info/site/1979/moonraker/

[img][/img]

https://www.bilibili.com/video/av12518630/

1984: A View to a Kill principal photography kicks off at Pinewood with Roger Moore.

1990: Hodder & Stoughton publish John Gardner's Bond novel Brokenclaw.

Brokenclaw

BROKENCLAW is John Gardner's
ninth novel featuring Ian Fleming's
James Bond.

Bond is bored sitting at his desk,
pushing paper, and feels that M has let
him down, has left him to rot. When M
suggests that he take a holiday, Bond is
displeased but, in the California hills,
he catches sight of a man who intrigues
him immediately. His name is
Brokenclaw Lee.

When Bond discovers that the
enigmatic Brokenclaw heads a vast
conglomerate of underworld
operations, he wonders if M's idea that
he should go on holiday was the clear-
cut proposal it seemed. What has
happened to the five scientists whose
highly sensitive, secret work is crucial
to the security of the American state?
Why are Bond's investigations
compelling American agents to handle
him as though he were a common
criminal?

As ever, Bond finds a worthy partner in
a beautiful female agent -- Chi-Chi.
This time, however, he has the support
of the indomitable Ed Rushia of the
CIA. Just how much help will these two
be able to give Bond when he is pitted
against one of America's most powerful
villains?

BROKENCLAW is an intriguing and
stimulating thriller which will delight
old and new fans of Bond. It takes our
hero through the slimiest parts of San
Francisco to Brokenclaw's lair, a puzzle
house crammed with technological
devices, to a spellbinding ending in the
heartland of the American Indians.

John Gardner has written eight James
Bond books: Licence Renewed, For
Special Services, Icebreaker, Role of
Honour, Nobody Lives Forever, No Deals
for Mr Bond, Scorpius, Licence to Kill,
and, in 1989, Win, Lose or Die. All
these titles are available in Coronet
paperback.

RichardTheBruce

1991: This month Eclipse Comics releases Permission to Die #2.
Mike Grell, Dameon Willich and Mark Jones, artists. Mike Grell, writer.

Permission to Die #2

https://www.mycomicshop.com/search?TID=135651

Story and cover by Mike Grell. Part 2 of 3. Art by Mike Grell, Dameon Willich and Mark Jones. Refusing to return to London after his mission has been compromised, James Bond uses all of his knowledge to get Edaine Gayla out from behind the Iron Curtain. He is sure of success until he learns that one of the worlds deadliest assassins is on their trail. 48 pages. Full color.

1992: This month Marvel Comics releases James Bond Jr #8 "Wave Goodbye to the USA".
Mario Capaldi, artist. Featuring Odd Job and Walker D. Plank.

James Bond Jr #8 "Wave Goodbye to the USA"

https://comicvine.gamespot.com/james-bond-jr-8-wave-goodbye-to-the-usa/4000-36055/

Creators
Colin Fawcett - inker
Mario Capaldi - penciler
Sophie Heath - colorist
Stuart Bartlett - letterer

Characters
Captain Walker D. Plank
Goldfinger
Gordo Leiter
James Bond Jr
Odd Job
Tracey Milbanks

1992: This month Dark Horse Comics releases James Bond 007: Serpent's Tooth #2.
Paul Gulacy, artist. Doug Moench, writer.

James Bond 007: Serpent's Tooth #2

https://www.darkhorse.com/Comics/92-104/James-Bond-007-Serpents-Tooth-2

Beautiful girls and a maniacal villain who wants to change the face of the planet are all in a day's work for James Bond. The second part of this thrilling three-part story pits Bond against a savage South American jungle's most dangerous game -- a hungry dinosaur! Written by Doug Moench (Batman: Red Rain), with art by Paul Gulacy (Terminator: Secondary Objectives) and color by Steve Oliff (John Byrne's 2112), James Bond 007: Serpent's Tooth delivers Bond the way only Dark Horse can!

Creators
Writer: Doug Moench
Artist: Paul Gulacy
Letterer: Pat Brosseau
Colorist: Steve Oliff
Editor: Jerry Prosser
Cover Artist: Paul Gulacy

Genre: Action/Adventure
Publication Date: August 01, 1992
Format: FC

https://www.comicsroyale.com/dark-horse/r97ubeqpmg192vlwmr6jijqiryeu6r


https://comics.ha.com/itm/original-comic-art/panel-pages/paul-gulacy-james-bond-007-serpent-s-tooth-2-page-28-original-art-dark-horse-acme-comics-1992-/a/121930-17086.s

1993: Dark Horse Comics cancels A Silent Armageddon #3, which would have released this month.

https://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/comics/asa.php3

Cancelled Issues - Official Synopsis
Issue #3 - A deadly computer virus demonstrates its lethal potential through automatic teller machines, hospital equipment, and prison cell locks in New York City. James Bond and Terri are determined to find out whether the Omega computer program is responsible for the mayhem, but the son of an old nemesis is even more determined to see Bond dead!

https://www.comicsroyale.com/dark-horse/cslpf7lonvt9q7jxvy1pd53jjvywuo

https://www.comicsroyale.com/goldeneyetopps-comics#/a-silent-armageddon/

A Silent Armageddon - Unreleased Issue Synopses and Artwork

Simon Jowett’s Bond story was never completed which is a shame because it’s an interesting tale with beautiful painted artwork by John M. Burns, but delays in said artwork meant that readers were left with a cliffhanger and a story was lost to the ether.

According to Jowett, issue #3 was completed, artwork and all, and submitted but never saw publication. If you have information or access to this comic then we Bond fans would love to see it so feel free to contact me!

In this gallery you’ll find issue synopses for the unfinished arc and cover artwork tests by the very talented Burns. And although issue #3 is still a mystery, thanks to friend of the site Colin Brown we have pencils and layouts for the unpublished issue #4!

For more Bond action by Jowett, you can track down the thankfully completed two-issue series James Bond 007: Shattered Helix, featuring art by David Jackson and David Lloyd. For more fine artwork by John Burns, check out the John M. Burns Art Facebook page!

2013: Cover reveal for William Boyd's Bond novel SOLO to be published by Random House.

2015: 007 Walk of Fame opens at Piz Gloria.

007 Walk of fame on the Schilthorn

See the complete article here:

https://myswitzerland.com/en-us/007-walk-of-fame-on-the-schilthorn.html

Secret Agent 007 is about to leave new traces on the Schilthorn, when Schilthorn Cableway opens the 007 Walk of Fame on 1 August 2015. This new attraction – a world first – will be inaugurated in the presence of stars and contributors to «On Her Majesty's Secret Service».

Personalitites from the world of Bond movies will be immortalized at the Schilthorn summit. Each protagonist will feature on an individual information plaque, displaying their photograph, signature and hand imprint in weathering steel, a personal message about the film's impact on their careers, and anecdotes and impressions of their time in Mürren and on the Schilthorn. These plaques will form a short circular trail that runs from the summit building to the Piz Gloria View vantage point back.

Guests:
George Lazenby (James Bond 007)
Terence Mountain (Raphael)
Sylvana Henriques (The Jamaican Girl)
John Glen (Regisseur)
Catherina von Schell (Nancy)
Jenny Hanley (The Irish Girl)
Stunt double Vic Armstrong (has doubled for all Bond actors with the exception of Daniel Craig)

Public Opening
1 August 2015

https://schilthorn.ch/17/en/007_Walk_of_Fame

2021: Waterfront Cinema in Greenock, Scotland, screens A View to a Kill. Then again Monday and Tuesday.
2021: Snape Maltings Concert Hall in Suffolk, England has a sold out Film Music Night performance with the Royal Philharmonic Concert Orchestra, singer Jacinta Whyte, conductor David Arnold.

Film music night with the RPCO
Sun 1 Aug 7:30pm

https://snapemaltings.co.uk/whats-on/royal-philharmonic-concert-orchestra/

RichardTheBruce

August 2nd [58 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]


1910: Jack Whittingham is born--Scarborough, North Yorkshire, England.
(He dies 3 July 1972 at age 61--Valletta, Malta.)

Tuesday, July 01, 2008

The Name’s Whittingham, Jack Whittingham

See the complete article here:

http://therapsheet.blogspot.com/2008/07/names-whittingham-jack-whittingham.html

EDITED BY J. KINGSTON PIERCE

With Sebastian Faulks’ Devil May Care sitting pretty atop British bestseller lists, espionage fiction seems to be all the rage. There is, however, another book, also featuring iconic British secret agent James Bond, that’s had an evolution almost as complex as one of Ian Fleming’s plots. That book is of course the revised second edition of Robert Sellers’ The Battle for Bond, a controversial work detailing the legal wrangling over the rights to Thunderball (1961).

The first edition, which contained a foreword by Raymond Benson (who was the last Bond writer prior to Faulks), was withdrawn from sale shortly after its 2007 release due to legal action from the Fleming family and estate. There a few copies of this collector’s item knocking around, but you’ll need a big checkbook to secure one. If you haven’t done so yet, though, I am pleased to report that Sellers and the independent publisher Tomahawk Press have finally released the second edition, sans the sections that caused the Fleming estate to complain. This revision features a foreword Len Deighton, who concentrates in his essay on long-ago charges of plagiarism leveled against author Fleming. This is a topic that should be familiar those of you who pay attention to the Rap Sheet, since we recalled the case in an obituary of Kevin McClory, the Thunderball collaborator who died in 2006. That case’s resolution included a provision stipulating that all future editions of the novel Thunderball include the writing credit “based on a screen treatment by Kevin McClory, Jack Whittingham, and Ian Fleming.”

Very little has been written about the relatively enigmatic Whittingham. But earlier this week the London Times carried a longish report focusing on his daughter, Sylvan Whittingham Mason, who apparently provided much of the background mosaic for Seller’s book. As writer Giles Hattersley explains:

Like a latterday Ms. Moneypenny, she holds the secrets of James Bond. Her name is Whittingham. Sylvan Whittingham.

Is she Ian Fleming’s daughter? God, no. Fleming’s name is anathema here. Her father was Jack Whittingham, a celebrated screenwriter of the 1950s and 1960s. It was Jack, she claims, who gave us Bond as we know him.

In 1959, Whittingham’s father had been brought in by the film producer Kevin McClory to work on an original screenplay based on Fleming’s famous secret agent. (Fleming had had an earlier bash at writing his own, but forgot to put any action in it.)

The problem of how to film Bond had rumbled on for years. What passed for steely cool in the books would come off as charmless froideur on screen. But man-about-town Jack turned out to be the fire to Fleming’s ice. In a tobacco-stained study at his Surrey home, the dashing, hard-drinking ladies’ man produced a thrilling tale called Thunderball. And he injected Fleming’s uptight gentleman spy with quippy humour, arch sexuality and plenty of action. Rather like Jack, in fact.

“I always say that Daddy was an honourable man,” says Whittingham, now 64, in a voice that seems to come courtesy of Diana Rigg. “Except when it came to women, of course.” She smiles.

“But he was a marvellous writer and they’d had real trouble with Fleming’s novels. The violent, sadistic, colder, misogynistic Bond of the books didn’t work on the big screen. The audience, back then, didn’t want it. There was no humour, no charm. Daddy turned Bond into the suave hero they needed.”

This is a fascinating article, really, detailing the playboy similarities between Bond, Fleming, and Wittingham. In the Times, Mason quite clearly credits her father (who died in 1972) with molding 007 into the man who could support a successful long-running film franchise.

... Jack had been toughened by a Bond-like life of fast cars and faster women. Born the son of a Yorkshire wool merchant, he had oozed confidence as a young man and made a splash with the ladies when he went up to Oxford.

“He met Betty Offield there, heir to the Wrigley’s gum fortune,” says Sylvan. “They fell in love and she invited him over to America to stay. They used to go shark-fishing off her island in California. Later, he bought a solitaire diamond ring and went to Chicago to propose--but by the time he got there, she’d fallen for somebody else.

“In a bar, drowning his sorrows, he met a female gangster called Texas Guinan--a glamorous blonde--who took him on. She sent him all over town with deliveries for her, probably drugs. He became her pet for a while, before he sold the ring so he could afford to get home.”

After a stint in Iceland during the war--where he was permanently sloshed and would often fall down on parade--Jack returned to England and his wife, Margot, whom he had married in 1942. He was never faithful. “My mother was stunningly beautiful, with a frightened-rabbit look in her eyes, which were violet. She was a lost soul: mental problems, breakdowns, depression,” Sylvan says.

Posted by Ali Karim at 11:53 AM

1949: Madeline Smith is born--Garfield, Sussex, England.

1961: First flight of the Wallis WA-116 Agile, a British autogyro.

http://www.jamesbondlifestyle.com/product/little-nellie-wallis-wa-116-agile-series-1-gyroplane

1974: The Man With the Golden Gun films the final game of cat and mouse in Scaramanga's funhouse.
1976: The scheduled date for The Spy Who Loved Me to begin filming, after Kevin McClory's failed legal attempts to block that production and receive rights to Bond material beyond just remaking Thunderball.

1982: Octopussy lead actress Maud Adams tells the Los Angeles Times she screen tested with James Brolin.

2012: Vintage Publishing releases eight Fleming Bond novels in paperback.

2016: Funny or Die releases James Bond: Secret Pokémon Go Agent.

2017: Dynamite Entertainment releases James Bond comic Black Box #6 of 6 available in print and online.
Rapha Lobosco, artist. Benjamin Percy, writer.

JAMES BOND #6

https://www.dynamite.com/htmlfiles/viewProduct.html?CAT=DF-James_Bond_Black_Box
Cover A: Dominic Reardon
Cover B: Jason Masters
Cover C: Patrick Zircher
Writer: Benjamin Percy
Art: Rapha Lobosco
Genre: Action/Adventure, Media Tie-In
Publication Date: August 2017
Format: Comic Book
Page Count: 32 Pages
ON SALE DATE: 8/2

James Bond #6, "Blinded"

In the action-packed finale of the Black Box story arc, James Bond descends into the secret headquarters of Saga Genji -- deep below the Fukushima nuclear reactor -- where he finds himself lost in a labyrinth of dark tunnels and political deceptions. He must overcome both his cyber terrorist adversaries and American and British allies to destroy the black box of vulnerable data that threatens to upend the world.

2020: The Simple Things celebrates scrambled eggs and James Bond.

Photography: Clare Winfield

Eggs: scrambled, not stirred

See the complete article here:

https://www.thesimplethings.com/blog/007-scrambled-eggs

August 2, 2020
Why scrambled eggs were nearly the undoing of James Bond but are still the best breakfast

It was Fay Weldon who originally advised us all to 'Go To Work on an Egg’ for the Egg Marketing Board in the 1950s. And it seems James Bond took her at her word.

If you expected Bond’s favourite dish to be something a little sexier, think again; Britain’s most famous spy liked nothing more than a plate of scrambled eggs and was regularly depicted getting stuck into a plate of them, with bacon, or kidneys… always with a fancy tipple. In fact, there are only three of the Ian Fleming books in which they don't appear (if you’re interested, they are From Russia With Love, The Man with the Golden Gun and You Only Live Twice). It must be pointed out that 007 does eat eggs in all those books, too, just not scrambled.

They made so many appearances in Live and Let Die that a proof reader pointed out to him that Bond’s scrambled egg habit was so impressive it may be his undoing; for any enemy on his tail would only have to nip into a restaurant and ask if an Englishman eating scrambled eggs had been in. He eventually edited a few instances of scrambled eggs out of the second draft, but Bond’s penchant for his favourite breakfast was, in general, unswerving.

In his short story "007 in New York", Fleming included a recipe for ‘Scrambled Eggs James Bond’, which you might like to try for brunch this weekend. It serves four.

Scrambled Eggs James Bond
12 fresh eggs
Salt and pepper
5-6 oz. of fresh butter

Break the eggs into a bowl. Beat thoroughly with a fork and season well. In a small copper (or heavy bottomed saucepan) melt 4oz of the butter. When melted, pour in the eggs and cook over a very low heat, whisking continuously with a small egg whisk.

While the eggs are slightly more moist than you would wish for eating, remove the pan from heat, add rest of butter and continue whisking for half a minute, adding the while finely chopped chives or fines herbes. Serve on hot buttered toast in individual copper dishes (for appearance only) with pink champagne (Taittinger) and low music.

It’s a certainly a classic recipe, but if you’re looking for something a little different, don’t miss our feature on second breakfasts on page 34 of our August issue. It includes a recipe for the Indian Scrambled Eggs with Naan (above), as well as homemade beans on toast, bay-roasted grapes and ricotta on toast and a delicious frittata, all taken from Home Bird: Simple Low-Waste Recipes for the Family and Friends by Megan Davies (Ryland Peters and Small) with photography by Clare Winfield.

https://www.thejamesbonddossier.com/james-bond-food.htm

2021: Spy School begins today and runs through Friday at the Birmingham Repertory Theater, England.

Spy School 2021

See the complete article here:

https://www.whatsonlive.co.uk/birmingham/event/the-rep/spy-school-2021/271070

Until Fri 6 Aug View Venues, Dates & Times

Main Info
If your youngsters have shown any interest in James Bond and Her Majesty’s Secret Service, then you should definitely make it your mission to get them enrolled in this week-long immersive theatre adventure.

Spy School is this month returning for a sixth year, operating in line with Covid restrictions and focusing as usual on saving the world! And with strange signs appearing across the globe and a mysterious villain on the loose, this year’s field operatives will certainly have their work cut out for them! The event is suitable for children aged between seven and 12.

Mon 2 Aug - Fri 6 Aug
The REP, Birmingham
check website - £75 upwards

RichardTheBruce

August 3rd [57 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1937: Steven Berkoff is born--Stepney, London, England.

1977: The Spy Who Loved Me released in the US.

US Lobby Cards

1981: Warner Brothers releases "For Your Eyes Only" as a 7" single.

B-side instrumental.

1987: Jay Boyar reviews The Living Daylights in the Orlando Sentinel.

THIS NEW BOND KNOWS THE TRICKS
OF THE 007 TRADE

See the complete article here:

https://www.orlandosentinel.com/news/os-xpm-1987-08-03-0180450014-story.html

Jay Boyar, Sentinel Movie Critic
August 3, 1987

Timothy Dalton has the eyes of a fox, the moves of a leopard and the dimples of a . . . well, let's just say he's got lots of dimples. Making his impressive debut as James Bond in The Living Daylights, he wears the legend lightly but doesn't clown around.

That old 007 humor is still present in the series' newest episode: How grim can a film be that features exploding milk bottles, a couch that swallows a person, and a ghetto blaster that literally lives up to its name? Why, at one point the hero and heroine escape from enemy agents by riding a cello case down a snowy slope.

Dalton shows a serious side that's been missing from the role since Sean Connery's earliest 007 days. And as a whole, the new picture is less of a special-effects affair than most of Roger Moore's Bond films.

There's no shortage of action in The Living Daylights, but the movie adds up to a real adventure. Besides, the action scenes even have quiet moments: A lyrical skydiving passage early on suggests that the film will have a bit of texture.

Director John Glen and screenwriters Richard Maibaum and Michael G. Wilson are all veterans of the 25-year-old series. Glen and Maibaum go back to the Connery films, and it shows. In The Living Daylights, they tell a tale of arms deals and defections, classical musicians and drug runners, romance and intrigue.

It's all a little too complicated to explain here; in fact, it's all a little too complicated, period. But if the plot threads tangle from time to time, if too much depends on coincidence, and if the story runs on about 20 minutes too long, there are more than enough good things in this film to justify a trip to the theater.

The look of the movie is bright and vivid -- and the "credits" sequence is no exception. As scantily clad women gyrate to the film's theme music, they look strangely wraith-like. Perhaps they are ghosts of earlier Bond girls, reappearing here to cheer on their successor.

If so their encouragement seems to have worked: Maryam d'Abo plays the role of Czech cellist Kara Milovy with charm and sensitivity. She matches up well with Dalton, too. (They've both got the same sort of angular profiles.) Even the late Ian Fleming, who started this whole Bond business with his novels, might have approved of her.

Other major players in this 15th Bond film (or 17th, depending on whether you include the anomalous Casino Royale and Never Say Never Again) include Joe Don Baker as a half-mad arms dealer, John Rhys-Davies as a KGB boss, Jeroen Krabbe as the double-dealing General Koskov, Andreas Wisniewski as a chameleon-like terrorist and Art Malik as an Afghan leader.

The supporting cast features Desmond Llewelyn, returning as gadgeteer Q, and Robert Brown, returning as M, head of the British Secret Service. Caroline Bliss, who assumes the role of the ever-adoring Miss Moneypenny, is amusing in her very brief appearance. When she looks at Bond, she seems to be thinking, "Let's have a look at the rest of those dimples."

Series-mastermind Albert "Cubby" Broccoli would do well to give us more of this Moneypenny in the future. And whatever Broccoli does, let's hope he holds onto his new Bond for a while.

Remember the name: Dalton, Timothy Dalton. Accept no substitutes.

1989: Licence to Kill released in Iceland.

2004: A US District Court decides the copyright infringement case involving "The World Is Not Enough".

‘The World Is Not Enough’ US court – copyright infringement case

See the complete article here:

https://www.garbagediscobox.com/2004/08/the-world-is-not-enough-us-court-copyright-infringement-case/

August 3, 2004

Appeal from the United States District Court
for the Middle District of Tennessee at Nashville.
No. 01-00158—William J. Haynes, Jr., District Judge.
Argued: June 9, 2004
Decided and Filed: August 3, 2004
Before: MARTIN and SUTTON, Circuit Judges; HOLSCHUH, District Judge.(*)
________________
COUNSEL

ARGUED: W. Gary Blackburn, BLACKBURN & McCUNE, Nashville, Tennessee, Adam Siegler, THE SIEGLER LAW GROUP, Beverly Hills, California, for Appellants. Timothy L. Warnock, BOWEN, RILEY, WARNOCK & JACOBSON, Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellees. ON BRIEF: W. Gary Blackburn, BLACKBURN & McCUNE, Nashville, Tennessee, Adam Siegler, THE SIEGLER LAW GROUP, Beverly Hills, California, for Appellants. Timothy L. Warnock, Jay S. Bowen, BOWEN, RILEY, WARNOCK & JACOBSON, Nashville, Tennessee, for Appellees.
_________________
OPINION
________________
SUTTON, Circuit Judge. Plaintiffs Frank P. Fogerty and Nathan Crow appeal the district court’s order granting summary judgment and awarding attorneys’ fees to defendants (collectively, “MGM”) in this copyright infringement case. As we agree with the district court that plaintiffs have not presented a sustainable theory of relief, we affirm that ruling. As we disagree with the district court’s award of attorneys’ fees, we reverse that ruling.

I.

Michael Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, the current producers of the James Bond films and principals of Eon Productions, Ltd., sought a composer to write the musical score for the nineteenth Bond film—“The World Is Not Enough.” In September 1998, Wilson and Broccoli selected David Arnold, a London-based composer, a Grammy award winner for the musical score for “Independence Day,” and the author of the end theme song for the Bond film “Tomorrow Never Dies.” Arnold maintains a private recording studio in London, where he composed the theme song and gave it the same name as the film. In writing the song, Arnold collaborated with lyricist Don Black, who also lives in London and who has written the lyrics to the theme songs for four previous Bond films. Arnold and Black met several times in November and December of 1998 to discuss the lyrics for “The World Is Not Enough,” and they exchanged phone calls, faxes and e-mails during that time in collaborating on the song.

Arnold also contacted Shirley Manson, the Scottish-born lead singer for the rock-group “Garbage,” and asked her to record the song. She agreed.

Between late October and November of 1998, Arnold played the melody of “The World Is Not Enough” over the phone to his personal assistant Trish Hillis, before whom he often informally auditioned his songs. According to Arnold, he “strung some la-la’s together, and all of a sudden the [song] came to life, and [he] thought [that was] probably it.” JA 229. On December 26, 1998, Arnold again played “The World Is Not Enough” for Hillis, this time on a piano at his London home. When Arnold played the music for Hillis, he had completed the song and lyrics, save for the bridge—a brief transition of approximately eight bars in the middle of the song. In December 1998, Arnold also played the melody for Geoff Foster and Isabel Griffiths, employees of Air Studios, on a grand piano in the studio’s main hall.

In early January 1999, Arnold completed the song and created a “demo” recording of it on his computer at his private recording studio. Arnold’s computer shows January 6, 1999 as the last day he modified the demo recording.

At roughly this time, Arnold played “The World Is Not Enough” for Michael Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, the producers of the upcoming film. They liked the song. On January 8, 1999, Arnold traveled to Pinewood Studios in England and played the song for Michael Apted, the director of “The World Is Not Enough,” who “was extremely pleased with [the song].” JA 233.

Arnold next asked Trish Hillis to deliver a copy of the demo to Shirley Manson, who (as noted) had agreed to record the song. On January 19, Hillis’s phone log shows that she contacted Ian Wesley, the general manager of Mushroom Records, Garbage’s record label. Wesley told Hillis that Manson was staying at the Royal Garden Hotel in London and to deliver the recording to the hotel at 10 a.m. the next day. On January 20, after Hillis arrived at the Royal Garden Hotel, she called Harold Kohl, Garbage’s tour manager, who told her to leave the recording at the front desk. A bill from the Royal Garden Hotel indicates that Shirley Manson stayed there on January 20, 1999, and Manson later recalled receiving the song from Kohl in January 1999 while staying at the hotel.

Arnold next sent a recording of the song to his American agent, Vas Vangelos, who lives in Los Angeles. An invoice shows that Air Studios billed Eon Productions for a shipment to Vangelos on February 2, 1999. Michael Sandoval, then an executive vice president at MGM, requested a copy of “The World Is Not Enough” from Vangelos. Sandoval received “The World Is Not Enough” on February 4, 1999, and he played the song for other MGM executives. No one apparently liked the song initially because it was a ballad and because they had hoped for a theme song with a different tempo.

On the same day (February 4, 1999), Nathan Crow visited Michael Sandoval at MGM and delivered a recording of his song “This Game We Play,” which he had co-written with Frank P. Fogerty. According to Crow, Sandoval liked the song, suggested that he might consider it for the 1999 film “The Thomas Crown Affair” and kept a copy of the recording. Arnold’s “The World Is Not Enough,” it turns out, shares an identical four-note sequence with Crow’s “This Game We Play.”

Before Manson recorded the commercial version of “The World Is Not Enough,” MGM contacted Arnold in March of 1999 and suggested that a “three-note motif” in “The World Is Not Enough” was too similar to a motif in earlier Bond theme songs. Arnold agreed to remove the three-note sequence, which all agree is unrelated to the four-note sequence that “This Game We Play” and “The World Is Not Enough” have in common.

In June and August of 1999, Shirley Manson and her band recorded “The World Is Not Enough.” Manson requested one lyrical change in the song because the line—“I know when to kiss and I know when to kill”—did not meet her tastes. JA 228. Arnold and Black changed the lyrics, and she completed the recording.

II.

Convinced that Arnold and MGM had copied the four-note sequence from “This Game We Play” in composing “The World Is Not Enough,” Fogerty and Crow filed a copyright infringement action in the United States District Court for the Middle District of Tennessee. The parties conducted discovery, and MGM moved for summary judgment, claiming that the undisputed facts showed that Arnold independently created “The World Is Not Enough.”

The district court granted MGM’s motion, concluding that Arnold had independently written the tune to the song:

Defendants and composers of [“The World Is Not Enough”] did not have access to [“This Game We Play”] [through] any of the avenues postulated by Plaintiffs because a review of the record indicates that the melody and significant portions of [“The World Is Not Enough”] . . . were completed prior to the dates that any alleged access by Defendants to [“This Game We Play”] could have occurred.

D. Ct. Op. at 17 (Mar. 14, 2003). The district court also rejected plaintiffs’ alternative claim that the two songs are “strikingly similar,” an independent theory of liability that warrants relief even when the plaintiff cannot prove access. Id. at 19–20. “There is no evidence adduced by Plaintiffs,” the court concluded, “to support the proposition that the two works are so strikingly similar that copying is the only plausible explanation of the similarities.” Id. at 20.

In the aftermath of this ruling, MGM moved for attorneys’ fees under § 505 of the Copyright Act, 17 U.S.C. § 505, and for nontaxable costs under Federal Rule of Civil Procedure 54(d). Alleging that plaintiffs’ claims were “objectively unreasonable,” MGM sought $170,519 in attorneys’ fees and $11,647.60 in non-taxable costs. The district court granted MGM’s motion for attorneys’ fees “in the interests of justice and in furtherance of the objectives of the Copyright Act.” D. Ct. Op. at 8 (June 17, 2003). “Plaintiffs[’] claims were objectively unreasonable,” the district court observed, “in that Plaintiffs pursued litigation despite multiple third-party declarations establishing independent creation of [“The World Is Not Enough”] before any of the Defendants had access to Plaintiffs’ original work,” and “Plaintiffs offered no direct evidence to support one of the two basic elements of copyright infringement.” Id. at 8–9. The district court, however, “conclude[d] that a 30% reduction in the billed hours . . . is appropriate . . . in light of the overstaffing of this litigation, the redundant billing, and vague entries on the firm’s invoices,” id. at 15, and awarded MGM $85,507.16 in attorneys’ fees, id. at 19. Holding that fees for “(1) legal research; (2) federal express charges; (3) messenger service; (4) phone/telecopy; (5) postage; (6) out of town travel; and (7) copies” were not allowable, the district court denied MGM’s request for nontaxable costs of $11,647.60. Id. at 20. For routine taxable costs, the district court awarded $4,847.58. Id. at 23.

III.

Summary judgment is appropriate when “the pleadings, depositions, answers to interrogatories, and admissions on file, together with the affidavits, if any, show that there is no genuine issue as to any material fact and that the moving party is entitled to judgment as a matter of law.” Fed. R. Civ. P. 56(c). “Where the record taken as a whole could not lead a rational trier of fact to find for the non-moving party,” the Supreme Court has held, “there is no genuine issue for trial.” Matsushita Elec. Indus. Co. v. Zenith Radio Corp., 475 U.S. 574, 587 (1986) (quotation omitted). A district court’s summary-judgment decision receives de novo review. See Farhat v. Jopke, 370 F.3d 580, 587 (6th Cir. 2004).

The Copyright Act gives copyright owners exclusive rights to reproduce, prepare derivative works from, distribute, and publicly perform or display a copyrighted work. See 17 U.S.C. § 106. To the ends of protecting these rights, the Act allows “[t]he legal or beneficial owner of an exclusive right under a copyright . . . to institute an action for any infringement of that particular right.” 17 U.S.C. § 501(b). A claim of copyright infringement requires proof of “(1) ownership of a valid copyright, and (2) copying of constituent elements of the work that are original.” Feist Publ’ns, Inc. v. Rural Tel. Serv. Co., 499 U.S. 340, 361 (1991); see also Ellis v. Diffie, 177 F.3d 503, 506 (6th Cir. 1999).

Because claimants rarely have direct evidence of copying, they typically try to establish an inference of copying by showing “(1) access to the allegedly-infringed work by the defendant(s) and (2) a substantial similarity between the two works at issue.” Ellis, 177 F.3d at 506. “Access,” we have held, “is essentially hearing or having a reasonable opportunity to hear the plaintiff[s’] work and thus having the opportunity to copy” and “may not be inferred through mere speculation or conjecture.” Id. (quotations omitted). The “substantial similarity” analysis first requires a filtering of the unprotectable aspects of the protected work, then asks whether an “ordinary observer” would perceive the original and the alleged copy as substantially similar. See Kohus v. Mariol, 328 F.3d 848, 855–57 (6th Cir. 2003). Once a plaintiff establishes access and substantial similarity, the defendant may rebut the presumption of copying by showing independent creation of the allegedly infringing work. Ellis, 177 F.3d at 507; see also Susan Wakeen Doll Co. v. Ashton Drake Galleries, 272 F.3d 441, 450 (7th Cir. 2001). Lastly, even without proof of access, a plaintiff still may prevail by showing a “striking similarity [between the works], precluding all possible conclusion but that the work was copied.” Murray Hill Publ’ns, Inc. v. Twentieth Century Fox Film Corp., 361 F.3d 312, 325 (6th Cir. 2004).

In applying these principles to this case, the parties share considerable common ground. MGM does not dispute that Fogerty and Crow own a valid copyright in “This Game We Play,” and plaintiffs concede that they failed to produce direct evidence of copying. For purposes of this appeal, the parties also agree that Fogerty and Crow proved that MGM had access to their work after February 4, 1999, and that the two songs are substantially, but not strikingly, similar.

The question under these circumstances is whether David Arnold independently created “The World Is Not Enough” before February 4, 1999, and whether the undisputed evidence establishes that fact. We believe it does.

Fogerty and Crow concede that David Arnold did not have access to “This Game We Play” until Crow delivered a recording of the song to Michael Sandoval at MGM on February 4, 1999. Before that date, deposition testimony and personal calendar entries show that David Arnold and Don Black collaborated on “The World Is Not Enough” in November and December 1998. Arnold performed the song twice for his personal assistant Trish Hillis between October and December of 1998. He also performed the song for Geoff Foster and Isabel Griffiths of Air Studios in December 1998, and the film producers Barbara Broccoli and Michael Wilson heard the song in early January 1999. Arnold also made a demo recording of the song, and his personal computer at Air Studios indicates that he last modified the recording on January 6, 1999. The next day, Arnold delivered a copy of the song to Pinewood Studios where the film’s director, Michael Apted, listened to the song.

Arnold and Hillis also testified that Hillis delivered a copy of the recording to the Royal Garden Hotel in London where Shirley Manson was staying. Hillis produced her phone log showing that she made several calls concerning the delivery on January 19, 1999, and her personal calendar indicated that she planned to go there on January 20 to deliver Arnold’s song. MGM also produced a hotel receipt indicating that Shirley Manson stayed at the Royal Garden Hotel on January 20. Hillis testified in her deposition that she left the recording at the hotel desk for Harold Kohl, Garbage’s tour manager, and Manson recalled receiving the recording from Kohl at the hotel.

Aside from a lyrical change to the song (the removal of one line to accommodate Shirley Manson) and one change to the score (the removal of the “three-note motif” to accommodate the MGM executives), the witnesses that testified or gave declarations agree that the song they heard before February 4, 1999 did not otherwise change after that date. In the face of this evidence that Arnold and Black independently created “The World Is Not Enough” before MGM first had access to “This Game We Play” on February 4, 1999, plaintiffs raise a series of arguments designed to show that they nonetheless should be able to present their claim to a jury. Each is unconvincing.

First, they suggest that they can respond to this evidence simply by claiming that a jury might choose to disregard it or might find it unpersuasive. That is not true. See Cox v. Ky. Dep’t of Transp. 53 F.3d 146, 150 (6th Cir. 1995) (“[A] nonmoving party may not avoid a properly supported motion for summary judgment by simply arguing that it relies solely or in part upon credibility considerations . . . . nstead, the nonmoving party must present affirmative evidence to defeat a properly supported motion for summary judgment.”); Curl v. Int’l Bus. Machs. Corp., 517 F.2d 212, 214 (5th Cir. 1975) (“[T]he party opposing summary judgment must be able to point to some facts which may or will entitle him to judgment, or refute the proof of the moving party in some material portion, and . . . the opposing party may not merely recite the incantation, ‘Credibility,’ and have a trial on the hope that a jury may disbelieve factually uncontested proof.”) (quotation omitted); Eaton v. Nat’l Broad. Co., 972 F. Supp. 1019, 1024 (E.D. Va. 1997) (“[A] copyright plaintiff cannot base her opposition to summary judgment entirely on the hope that a fact finder will disbelieve the persons who have submitted affidavits on issues of access.”); cf. Matsushita, 475 U.S. at 586 (“When the moving party has carried its burden under Rule 56(c), its opponent must do more than simply show that there is some metaphysical doubt as to the material facts.”) (footnote omitted).

Second, in the absence of affirmative evidence rebutting MGM’s pre-access chain of events, plaintiffs claim that inconsistencies in MGM’s evidence by themselves create a genuine issue of material fact. They note, for example, that MGM executives disliked “The World Is Not Enough” but liked “This Game We Play” in early February 1999. The different reactions, plaintiffs urge, show that the two songs were not substantially similar on February 4, 1999, and show that Arnold must have copied “This Game We Play” after February 4, 1999 because the songs are substantially similar today. Too many competing inferences, however, separate this premise from plaintiffs’ proposed conclusion. Fogerty and Crow neglect to mention that MGM executives listened to each song for different reasons—in Arnold’s case to determine if the song would work for the new Bond film, in plaintiffs’ case to see if their song would work for another film. Because the MGM executives listened to each song in different musical, artistic and commercial contexts—with one solicited for the Bond movie and the other unsolicited and at most considered for another film—this theory of infringement is too speculative to warrant a jury trial on its own.

Fogerty and Crow next scrutinize Arnold’s and Black’s testimony. Arnold’s declaration indicates that he made “an initial demonstration recording” of the “The World Is Not Enough” on January 6, 1999. Black’s declaration, however, indicates that he made a recording with Arnold in November or December 1998. Neither version of events, however, places creation of the demo recording after February 4, 1999. A factfinder could believe Arnold; it could believe Black; or it could believe parts of each individual’s testimony. But it could not rationally come to the conclusion that the recording was made after February 4, 1999, especially in light of plaintiffs’ inability to refute the delivery of a recording of the song to Manson at the Royal Garden Hotel on January 20, 1999.

Fogerty and Crow point to one other alleged discrepancy between Arnold’s and Black’s testimony that deserves mention. Posturing as someone working with James Horner, the composer of the “Titanic” sound track, Crow contacted Don Black by phone and asked whether Black would be interested in writing the song lyrics for the film “Oceans 11.” During the tape-recorded conversation, Crow asked Black questions about “The World Is Not Enough,” including when he received the song to write the lyrics. Black, who later explained that he was trying to impress someone whom he believed to be a major composer, indicated that he received the song approximately two months before the movie’s release date, which was December 1999. As Crow admitted (after the phone call), “the entire thing [was] deceptive . . . [and] intentional[],” JA 310, because he was trying “to trick them into telling [him] the truth,” JA 311.

The Federal Rules of Civil Procedure do not provide for this form of discovery. And it is not clear whether the Federal Rules of Evidence would permit the admission of such a phone call. But even assuming the admissibility of this evidence and even assuming that Fogerty and Crow would unveil this antic to a jury, the statement at issue—that Black (the lyricist) purportedly received the music to the song just two months before its release—does not establish a cognizable cause of action. In order to credit this statement, a jury would have to believe that Black wrote the lyrics to “The World Is Not Enough” in October 1999—two months after Garbage finished commercially recording the song. No rational trier of fact could rely on this statement in finding for Fogerty and Crow.

Plaintiffs next point to several letters written by Trish Hillis to individuals seeking to collaborate with David Arnold while he composed the musical score for “The World Is Not Enough.” The nub of these letters is that Arnold continued working on the musical score for the entire movie after the February 4, 1999 date of access. Absent from the letters, however, is any reference to the theme song, which is all that is at issue here. The most potent letter, dated April 16, 1999, reads: “[Arnold] has also been commissioned to write both [the theme and end] songs, which were finished a few weeks ago.” JA 594. At most, however, this statement shows that both songs (as opposed to only “The World Is Not Enough”) were not complete until after February 4, 1999, which does not create a fact dispute that the theme song had not been completed before that date.

Shirley Manson’s testimony also contains several inconsistencies, none of which casts doubt on MGM’s claim of independent creation. Manson and Arnold failed to recall consistently the details of when Manson first heard the song and when she and Arnold first communicated after she heard the song. In his declaration, Arnold claimed that he spoke with Manson on the phone January 20, 1999 (the day Hillis delivered the song to the Royal Garden Hotel) and that she loved the song. In Arnold’s deposition, he said that he received an e-mail from Manson on an unknown date. Manson essentially could not recall when she first listened to the demo recording and had “no idea” if she listened to it prior to February 4, 1999. JA 215. But these inconsistencies do not alter the unrefuted evidence that Hillis left a copy of the song for Manson at the Royal Garden Hotel on January 20, 1999, and that it was this copy of the song that Manson eventually heard. In this setting, the district court’s decision to disregard the inconsistencies in Manson’s other testimony does not amount to an improper weighing of the evidence. See Street v. J.C. Bradford & Co., 886 F.2d 1472, 1480 (6th Cir.1989) (“The trial court has at least some discretion [at summary judgment] to determine whether [plaintiffs’] claim is ‘implausible.’”).

Crow also made a false-pretenses phone call to Shirley Manson, much like the one he made to Don Black. During the call, Manson indicated that she first received the song in August of 1999. While Manson’s band did not finish commercially recording the song until that date, the parties do not dispute that the first recording session of the song occurred in June 1999. In other words, to believe plaintiffs’ interpretation of Manson’s statement, a jury would have to conclude that Manson first heard “The World Is Not Enough” two months after she began recording the song. No rational jury would accept that sequence of events.

Fogerty and Crow next take aim at the declarations of Wilson and Broccoli. In their declarations, Wilson and Broccoli noted that “[a]side from some minor lyrical changes, the song David played us in his attic room that day was the same song we ultimately recorded for the film,” but failed to mention that Arnold later removed the “three-note motif” that the initial recording of the music shared with earlier Bond songs. This oversight, according to plaintiffs, makes the declarations unreliable. We are not persuaded. The change was a minor one; it had nothing to do with the four-note sequence that parallels “This Game We Play”; and it does not alter the fact that Arnold played “The World Is Not Enough” for others (including Wilson and Broccoli in early January 1999) well before the date of access.

The dates of the contracts between Arnold, Black and MGM also have little value. True, each written contract went into effect after February 4, 1999. But the undisputed evidence shows that Wilson and Broccoli selected David Arnold to write the musical score for “The World Is Not Enough” in September 1998. And in his own deposition, Crow acknowledges that on February 4, 1999, when he met with Sandoval of MGM, Sandoval told him that Arnold had a “lock on this,” JA 299, “that Mr. Arnold had been hired to write an original score for the film,” JA 298, and that “Mr. Sandoval made it very clear that Mr. Arnold had been hired to write the score,” id.

Plaintiffs also point to the fact that Arnold never produced the demo recording that he made on January 6, 1999. Arnold testified that his computer at Air Studios showed that he last modified the recording on January 6, 1999, but offered no explanation as to why he could not produce a recording. According to Fogerty and Crow, “a party having control of information bearing upon a disputed issue may be given the burden of bringing it forward and suffering an adverse inference from [the] failure to do so.” Appellant Br. at 21. Here, however, MGM is the party, not David Arnold, and it did produce an original copy of the demo recording from Don Black. Plaintiffs do not refute the authenticity of Black’s copy of the song, and at all events never explain why they did not seek discovery of Arnold’s computer to determine if the January 6th demo could still be retrieved.

Fogerty and Crow, lastly, question the reliability of MGM’s declarations based on the “excessive hours spent” in drafting them. Appellant Br. at 22. MGM’s attorneys “spent approximately 80 hours drafting and revising these declarations,” plaintiffs argue, and “t does not take 80 hours to write a few pages of the truth.” Id. at 22–23. But this argument does not prove that the affidavits are false or even suggest as much. Whether the scrivener of the affidavits was quite deliberate, was inefficient or merely was confronted with a voluminous record, extensive time in drafting affidavits (or even excessive time in drafting them) does not indicate that they are false.

IV.

Plaintiffs next argue that even if it was appropriate to grant summary judgment, the district court erred in awarding fees to MGM. We agree.

Section 505 of the Copyright Act provides:

In any civil action under this title, the court in its discretion may allow the recovery of full costs by or against any party other than the United States or an officer thereof. Except as otherwise provided by this title, the court may also award a reasonable attorney’s fee to the prevailing party as part of the costs.

17 U.S.C. § 505. Under this provision, a district court may “impose attorney[s’] fees in frivolous and objectively unreasonable lawsuits.” Murray Hill Publ’ns, Inc. v. ABC Communications, Inc., 264 F.3d 622, 639 (6th Cir. 2001). A district court’s decision to award attorneys’ fees should be based on such factors as “[the] frivolousness of the claim,” the “motivation” of the claimant, the “reasonableness” of the claim and the goal of “deterr[ing]” frivolous claims. Coles v. Wonder, 283 F.3d 798, 804 (6th Cir. 2002). We review a district court’s decision to grant or deny fees for an abuse of discretion. ABC Communications, Inc., 264 F.3d at 639.

While plaintiffs’ claim ultimately proved meritless, that does not make it “objectively unreasonable” as a matter of law or fact. See id. at 639–40 (reversing an award of attorneys’ fees under 17 U.S.C. § 505 because “at the time [the] litigation was before the district court, the law on certain relevant aspects of [the] lawsuit was unsettled”); cf. Protective Life Ins. Co. v. Dignity Viatical Settlement Partners, L.P., 171 F.3d 52, 58 (1st Cir. 1999) (“The mere fact that a claim ultimately proves unavailing, without more, cannot support the imposition of Rule 11 sanctions.”). At the time Fogerty and Crow filed their complaint, they knew only that Crow delivered “This Game We Play” to Michael Sandoval and, ten months later, MGM used a very similar song as the theme song for “The World Is Not Enough.” Nowhere does MGM contend that filing a complaint on this basis was objectively unreasonable. See Matthew Bender & Co. v. West Publ’g Co., 240 F.3d 116, 122 (2d Cir. 2001) (“[T]he imposition of a fee award against a copyright holder with an objectively reasonable litigation position will generally not promote the purposes of the Copyright Act.”).

As discovery progressed, other facts surfaced that legitimately prompted plaintiffs to pursue their claim. They obtained an expert opinion that the two songs were substantially similar; they learned—quite remarkably—that Crow delivered his song to an MGM executive (Sandoval) on the same day that Arnold delivered his song to Sandoval; they learned that Arnold could not produce a demo of the January 6, 1999 version of the song; and they learned of inconsistencies in Manson’s and Arnold’s recollections of when Manson first heard “The World Is Not Enough” and communicated her comments to Arnold. All told, this evidence gave plaintiffs objectively legitimate reasons for pursuing discovery in the case and for seeing the case through to summary judgment.

The two reasons given by the district court for awarding fees do not alter this conclusion. The court first noted that “Plaintiffs[’] claims were objectively unreasonable in that Plaintiffs pursued litigation despite multiple third-party declarations establishing independent creation of [“The World Is Not Enough”] before any of the Defendants had access to Plaintiffs’ original work.” D. Ct. Op. at 8 (June 17, 2003). But the declarations contained several inconsistencies and all of them were submitted by individuals with a personal and professional stake in the answer to whether David Arnold copied a song that he represented as original. While those inconsistencies proved immaterial, plaintiffs were entitled to depose the individuals and determine whether their recollections of the facts collectively made sense.

The second factor offered by the district court is no more persuasive: “Plaintiffs offered no direct evidence to support one of the two basic elements of copyright infringement.” Id. at 8–9. This ambiguous reference points to one of two things. Either plaintiffs failed to produce direct evidence of copying or plaintiffs failed to provide evidence of access (they did provide an expert’s opinion that the songs were substantially similar). As to the former explanation, direct evidence of copying is a rarity and accordingly the failure to provide such evidence by itself never supplies an independent basis for awarding attorneys’ fees. See Ellis, 177 F.3d at 506 (“Direct evidence of copying is rare, so frequently the plaintiff will attempt to establish an inference of copying [with indirect evidence].”); see also Segrets, Inc. v. Gillman Knitwear Co., 207 F.3d 56, 61 (1st Cir. 2000); Arica Inst., Inc. v. Palmer, 970 F.2d 1067, 1072 (2d Cir. 1992); Narell v. Freeman, 872 F.2d 907, 910 (9th Cir. 1989).

As to the latter explanation, it was not until after the completion of discovery that the district court could have reached the conclusion that plaintiffs failed to provide evidence of access. See Williamson v. United States Dep’t of Agric., 815 F.2d 368, 373 (5th Cir. 1987) (“f discovery could uncover one or more substantial fact issues, appellant was entitled to reasonable discovery to do so.”). Prior to that, as noted, plaintiffs had several concerns that reasonably prompted them to continue discovery. Indeed, the most important depositions in the case—those of Arnold, Black, Manson and Hillis—took place approximately one month before MGM filed its successful motion for summary judgment. Fogerty and Crow reasonably believed that these depositions might bear fruit, a conclusion that the district court apparently reached as well when it denied MGM’s first motion for summary judgment and request for a stay of discovery, both of which were filed before plaintiffs took these depositions. D. Ct. Order (Jan. 20, 2002).

V.

For these reasons, we affirm the district court’s grant of summary judgment and reverse its award of attorneys’ fees.

Footnotes
*The Honorable John D. Holschuh, United States District Judge for the Southern District of Ohio, sitting by designation.

source: findlaw.com

RichardTheBruce

2007: John Edmund Gardner dies at age 80--Basingstoke, Hampshire, England.
(Born 20 November 1926--Seaton Delaval, Northumberland, England.)

John Gardner
Prolific thriller writer behind the revival of James Bond and Professor Moriarty

See the complete article here:

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2007/nov/02/guardianobituaries.booksobituaries

Mike Ripley - 3 Nov 2007 19.53 EDT

John Gardner, who has died aged 80, was the consummate thriller writer, producing more than 50 novels. But he owed his reputation to James Bond. His early success came with send-ups of the Bond genre, and he was to find greater fame, if not satisfaction, in reinventing Agent 007 almost 20 years after the death of the secret agent's creator, Ian Fleming.

Born in Seaton Delaval, then in Northumberland, Gardner was the only child of an Anglican priest - the family moved south when his father became chaplain at St Mary's, Wantage, Berkshire, where Gardner attended King Alfred's school. During the second world war, he joined the Home Guard aged only 14. He then served in the Fleet Air Arm in 1944 and the Royal Marine commandos in the Middle and Far East. After the war, he read theology at St John's College, Cambridge, and entered the Anglican priesthood, but after five years and a crisis of faith, he turned to journalism as drama critic of the Stratford-upon-Avon Herald, and to drink.

By the age of 33, he realised that his intake of gin qualified him as an alcoholic. As part of his therapy, he wrote Spin the Bottle (1963), a memoir about his relationship with alcohol. He claimed never to have touched booze since 1959, and the memoir - his only non-fiction book - launched him on a writing career.

Gardner's first novel, The Liquidator, a spoof of the Bond books, was published in 1964, the year of Fleming's death. The anti-hero, Boysie Oakes, had one drawback as a licensed-to-kill man of action: he was a coward who hated violence and sub-contracted parts of his missions to an assassin.

The book was filmed by Jack Cardiff, with Rod Taylor in the Oakes role and Eric Sykes as the hit man. Gardner was unimpressed with the result, but he was far less complimentary about Michael Winner's 1973 film The Stone Killer, starring Charles Bronson, adapted from his novel, A Complete State of Death (not one of the Oakes series), which he wrote in 1969 under the pen name Derek Torry.

Seven more Oakes books followed, including Amber Nine (1966), in which the villain turned out to be Hitler's long-lost daughter. By 1974, though, Gardner was ready for a change and launched a new series based on the diaries of Professor James Moriarty, the nemesis of Sherlock Holmes. He intended a trilogy, but after the appearance of The Return of Moriarty (1974) and The Revenge of Moriarty (1975), he could not agree a publishing deal for a third book, and, in any case, Bond was about to intervene once more.

While living in tax exile in Ireland, Gardner was approached by crime novelist and president of the Detection Club Harry Keating, on behalf of the Fleming estate. The proposition was to reinvent the Bond books for the late 1970s. Gardner, by now the author of 17 novels and two collections of short stories, was at first reluctant to commit. But in the end he convinced himself he could "round out" the character.

Licence Renewed (1976) was the first in a franchise which lasted 20 years. There was a media frenzy at the return to the page of a more politically correct Bond - and an outcry that 007 was now driving a Saab 900 Turbo.

Although they brought him wealth and a worldwide audience, Gardner never seemed comfortable with the Bond franchise, though he remained proud of one title, The Man From Barbarossa. Within three years, he had launched a series of five much grittier, hardboiled espionage thrillers, starting with The Nostradamus Traitor (1979) starring "Big" Herbie Kruger, a character shaped by the second world war - as Gardner had been.

Gardner wrote more Bond books than Fleming - a total of 16, two based on the films Licensed [sic] to Kill (1989) and GoldenEye (1995) - but in the same period, he also produced the Kruger books, another trilogy of spy stories and six stand-alone thrillers.

Gardner moved to America in 1989, but ill-health forced him to relinquish the Bond franchise to Raymond Benson in 1996. Medical bills for treating cancer of the oesophagus forced his return to England in reduced circumstances, only to suffer further when his wife of more than 40 years, Margaret, died suddenly the following year.

Now living quietly in an almshouse in Basingstoke, he turned to his own memories of wartime Britain for his final series of thrillers, featuring Detective Sergeant Suzie Mountford. The first, Bottled Spider, was published in 2002. The leading character was based on Gardner's youthful romance with a nurse named Patricia Mountford, who, some 50 years after their last meeting, contacted him after reading about her namesake. The couple enjoyed a romantic reunion.

In the field of espionage fiction, Gardner lacked the intellectual complexities of John le Carré or the stylistic innovations of Len Deighton or Anthony Price, but he was a prolific and reliable deliverer to a thrill-seeking audience. Harsher critics have suggested he fed off the creations of others. He always knew that Bond would overshadow everything, and longed to be remembered as more than the man who brought back 007. In that, despite 52 novels, he probably failed.

The fifth Suzie Mountford book, No Human Enemy, has just been published. The third Moriarty book, The Redemption of Moriarty, completed shortly before Gardner's death, will be published posthumously. He is survived by the son and daughter of his marriage, Simon and Alexis; Miranda, the daughter of his relationship with Susan Wright; and Patricia Mountford, to whom he was engaged.

· John Edmund Gardner, writer, born November 20 1926; died August 3 2007

John Gardner (British Writer)

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/John_Gardner_(British_writer)

Works

Autobiography

Spin the Bottle (1964)

Boysie Oakes novels
The Liquidator (1964)
Understrike (1965)
Amber Nine (1966)
Madrigal (1967)
Founder Member (1969)
Traitor's Exit (1970)
The Airline Pirates (1970) - published in the US as Air Apparent
A Killer for a Song (1975)

Two Boysie Oakes short stories appear in The Assassination File (A Handful of Rice, Corkscrew).
Two Boysie Oakes short stories appear in Hideaway (Boysie Oakes and The Explosive Device, Sunset At Paleokastritsa).

Derek Torry novels
A Complete State of Death (1969) - reissued in the US as The Stone Killer
The Corner Men (1974)

Professor Moriarty novels
The Return of Moriarty (1974)
The Revenge of Moriarty (1975)
Moriarty (2008)

Herbie Kruger novels
The Nostradamus Traitor (1979)
The Garden of Weapons (1980)
The Quiet Dogs (1982)
Maestro (1993)
Confessor (1995)

Herbie Kruger also appears in The Secret Houses and The Secret Families.

The Railton family novels
The Secret Generations (1985)
The Secret Houses (1988)
The Secret Families (1989)

James Bond novels
Licence Renewed (1981)
For Special Services (1982)
Icebreaker (1983)
Role of Honour (1984)
Nobody Lives for Ever (1986)
No Deals, Mr. Bond (1987)
Scorpius (1988)
Win, Lose or Die (1989)
Licence to Kill (1989) – novelization of a film script
Brokenclaw (1990)
The Man from Barbarossa (1991)
Death is Forever (1992)
Never Send Flowers (1993)
SeaFire (1994)
GoldenEye (1995) – novelization of a film script
Cold (1996) – published in the US as Cold Fall

Detective Sergeant Suzie Mountford novels
Bottled Spider (2002)
The Streets of Town (2003)
Angels Dining at the Ritz (2004)
Troubled Midnight (2005)
No Human Enemy (2007)

Other novels
The Censor (1970)
Every Night's a Bullfight (1971) (Published in the US in a bowdlerized edition as Every Night's a Festival in 1972.)
To Run a Little Faster (1976)
The Werewolf Trace (1977)
The Dancing Dodo (1978)
Golgotha (1980) - (Published in the US as The Last Trump)
The Director (1982) (A re-working of his 1971 novel Every Night's a Bullfight.)
Flamingo (1983)
Blood of the Fathers (1992) (as by "Edmund McCoy". Later published under his own name in 2004.)
Day of Absolution (2000)

Short story collections
Hideaway (1968) (Contains two Boysie Oakes stories.)
The Assassination File (1974) (Contains two Boysie Oakes stories.)

2017: Raymond Benson denies Bond 25 speculation involving his novel.

James Bond Author Shoots Down Shatterhand
Rumors
Author Raymond Benson claims his novel Never Dream of Dying is not being used as the
bases for James Bond 25.

See the complete article here:

https://movieweb.com/james-bond-25-rumors-never-dream-of-dying-book/

Ryan Scott — August 3, 2017

After the recent announcement that James Bond 25 is going to arrive in theaters on November 8, 2017, some secondary reports have tried to fill in some of the other information we need about the movie, since we know little else. A recent report from the Mirror suggested that the upcoming James Bond was going to be partially based on Raymond Benson's novel Never Dream of Dying and they even claimed to have spoken to the author directly about it. Now he has set the record straight and denied these reports.

As reported by fan site MI6 H, Raymond Benson, who wrote several James Bond novels including v, released a statement on his Facebook page shortly after the new rumors about James Bond 25 started circulating. As he tells it, there is no truth to the movie being based on his novel and he didn't speak with the Mirror. Here's what he had to say about it.

"Some of you may have seen an article
published by U.K.'s The Mirror yesterday
that claims that the next Bond movie will
be based on my novel Never Dream of
Dying . I know nothing of this, but as I
have not spoken with any Mirror
journalists at all, I can only assume that
the article is a piece of fabrication. It
would, of course, be wonderful if it were
true."

So there you have it. There were some other issues with Mirror's recent report as well. They stated that Never Dream of Dying came out in 1999 when it was in fact published in 2001. The novel in question sees 007 squaring off with a blind villain, which sounds like a cool idea and something that would be pretty unique heading into James Bond 25. Raymond Benson doesn't actually have any involvement in the production of the new movie, so he can't say definitively that the novel isn't being used in some way by writers Neil Purvis and Robert Wade. But this does cast a lot of doubt over the credibility of Mirror's report.

The recent report from Mirror also suggested that James Bond 25 is going under the working title of Shatterhand and that it will be shooting in Croatia. We've heard previously about the possibility of the production shooting in Croatia, so that could still prove to be true. But everything else from this report is more than likely not true based on Raymond Benson's comments.

As for what we do know about James Bond 25, it is all but confirmed officially that Daniel Craig is going to return, but Eon Productions and MGM have yet to make a formal announcement. Currently, there is no director, but Denis Villeneuve (Blade Runner 2049), David Mackenzie (Hell or High Water) and Yann Demange ('71) are said to be on the studio's shortlist, with Demange reportedly the frontrunner for the job. With production likely to start relatively soon on James Bond 25, we should be getting some more official details shortly. At least for now, we can rule some of these recent rumors out.

2021: Times News Express gives detail to a James Bond board game promised for 2022.

The first James Bond board game of
this generation turns players into
supervillains

See the complete article here:

Chloe M | 3 August 2021

James Bond has largely been absent from the modern board game revolution, but that’s about to change with SPECTRE: The Board Game from Modiphius Entertainment. The catch is you won’t be playing 007 or any other MI6 agent. Instead, you will choose between classic Bond villains such as Ernst Stavro Blofeld (You Only Live Twice), Rosa Klebb (From Russia, with Love), and Raoul Silva (Skyfall).

Modiphius Entertainment has established itself as a strong design studio in the tabletop industry. It has released hit titles such as the miniatures game Fallout: Wasteland Warfare and the role-playing game Star Trek Adventures. It also has Dune and Homeworld RPGs on the way.

SPECTRE: The Board Game has you and up to three of your most villainous friends competing to become Number 1 of the Special Executive for Counter-intelligence, Terrorism, Revenge, and Extortion (SPECTRE), the sinister organization in constant opposition to James Bond throughout the series and the namesake of the 2015 film.

The team behind this title is impressive. One half is the French design studio Kaedama, consisting of Antoine Bauza, Corentin Lebrat, Ludovic Maublanc, and Théo Rivière. The other half is the Modiphius group of Stefano Guerriero, Javier Angeriz-Caburrasi, and Juan Echernique. Among these designers’ credits are classics such as 7 Wonders, Hanabi, and Cash ’n Guns.

In SPECTRE: The Board Game you will pursue various schemes by placing your villain and enforcer pawns on action spaces. While there is an array of common locations on the central board, each unique villain sheet has its own set of spaces you can trigger. Some begin restricted at the outset of play and will be unlocked over the course of the game. The actions themselves are derived from the various movies but are also reimagined to co-exist and enrich the experience at the heart of the design.

While 007 is not the center of the game, he will foil your schemes and hinder your progress as you attempt to complete secret plans and bring your evil machinations to light. The secret agent moves about the board based on a die roll, blocking actions and forcing strategic flexibility. But he can also pay a visit to the villains. When this occurs players must reveal one of their secret plans to the other villains at the table. This cleverly references the series tradition of the antagonists spilling the beans on their master plan before actually executing it.

Bond cannot totally derail your headway, however, as utter defeat is impossible. There is a clear philosophy of refraining from aggressively damaging your accomplishments or inflicting overly negative progression. This allows for a larger focus on the internal struggles of the criminal organization as the most prominent villains vie for the coveted position at the top.

According to Modiphius co-founder Chris Birch, SPECTRE: The Board Game is also highly interactive.

“When a player takes a spot on the board prior to other players, they block them from taking that spot (either with their villain or their henchman pawns), which could hinder the strategy of any players taking their turn afterwards,” Birch told Polygon via email. “Furthermore, some scheme actions could involve stealing resources from your opponent — Blofeld’s ‘Racket’ — or even removing other player’s agents from the board — Silva’s ‘Takeover’.”

He also points out that completing all of your schemes is not necessary as there are multiple paths to victory.

“Different strategies can be pursued in order to become Number 1,” Birch said. “Completing the schemes is just one of them, but not the only one. We leave it to the player to discover their favourite strategy, and to have the chance to adapt to an ever-changing landscape.”

A James Bond game would also be incomplete without a large suite of toys. The game features a wide range of recognizable weapons and locations from the films. Of particular interest is the ability to assemble devices, constructing menacing machinery like a superlaser as a strategic consideration.

"A James Bond game would also be incomplete without a large suite of toys"

Combine those material pursuits with the social elements of spying on your peers or executing blackmail, and the game seeks to create an atmosphere of nefarious immersion. This isn’t simply about accomplishing a small task list of goals, it’s about establishing a criminal empire and gaining immense power.

One of the most exciting prospects for this game is the fundamental twist of the classic Bond villain actually succeeding. While this has never occurred on screen, players embark on a re-imagining of these vintage moments where they are empowered to corrode the foundations of society. The idea of besting the iconic MI6 agent is a novel objective and turns the recurrent themes of the franchise on their head.

SPECTRE: The Board Game will be coming to retail in spring 2022.

RichardTheBruce

August 4th [56 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1901: Louis Armstrong is born--New Orleans, Louisiana.
(He dies 6 July 1971 at age 69--New York City, New York.)

Louis Armstrong

See the complete article here:

https://www.louisarmstronghouse.org/biography/

Biography
Louis Armstrong was born in New Orleans, Louisiana on August 4, 1901. He was raised by his mother Mayann in a neighborhood so dangerous it was called “The Battlefield.” He only had a fifth-grade education, dropping out of school early to go to work. An early job working for the Jewish Karnofsky family allowed Armstrong to make enough money to purchase his first cornet.

On New Year’s Eve 1912, he was arrested and sent to the Colored Waif’s Home for Boys. There, under the tutelage of Peter Davis, he learned how to properly play the cornet, eventually becoming the leader of the Waif’s Home Brass Band. Released from the Waif’s Home in 1914, Armstrong set his sights on becoming a professional musician. Mentored by the city’s top cornetist, Joe “King” Oliver, Armstrong soon became one of the most in-demand cornetists in town, eventually working steadily on Mississippi riverboats.

In 1922, King Oliver sent for Armstrong to join his band in Chicago. Armstrong and Oliver became the talk of the town with their intricate two-cornet breaks and started making records together in 1923. By that point, Armstrong began dating the pianist in the band, Lillian Hardin. In 1924, Armstrong married Hardin, who urged Armstrong to leave Oliver and try to make it on his own. A year in New York with Fletcher Henderson and His Orchestra proved unsatisfying so Armstrong returned to Chicago in 1925 and began making records under his own name for the first time.

Hotter Than That
The records by Louis Armstrong and His Five–and later, Hot Seven–are the most influential in jazz. Armstrong’s improvised solos transformed jazz from an ensemble-based music into a soloist’s art, while his expressive vocals incorporated innovative bursts of scat singing and an underlying swing feel. By the end of the decade, the popularity of the Hot Fives and Sevens was enough to send Armstrong back to New York, where he appeared in the popular Broadway revue, “Hot Chocolates.” He soon began touring and never really stopped until his death in 1971.

The 1930s also found Armstrong achieving great popularity on radio, in films, and with his recordings. He performed in Europe for the first time in 1932 and returned in 1933, staying for over a year because of a damaged lip. Back in America in 1935, Armstrong hired Joe Glaser as his manager and began fronting a big band, recording pop songs for Decca, and appearing regularly in movies. He began touring the country in the 1940s.

Ambassador Satch
In 1947, the waning popularity of the big bands forced Armstrong to begin fronting a small group, Louis Armstrong and His All Stars. Personnel changed over the years but this remained Armstrong’s main performing vehicle for the rest of his career. He had a string of pop hits beginning in 1949 and started making regular overseas tours, where his popularity was so great, he was dubbed “Ambassador Satch.”

In America, Armstrong had been a great Civil Rights pioneer for his race, breaking down numerous barriers as a young man. In the 1950s, he was sometimes criticized for his onstage persona and called an “Uncle Tom” but he silenced critics by speaking out against the government’s handling of the “Little Rock Nine” high school integration crisis in 1957.

Armstrong continued touring the world and making records with songs like “Blueberry Hill” (1949), “Mack the Knife” (1955) and “Hello, Dolly! (1964),” the latter knocking the Beatles off the top of the pop charts at the height of Beatlemania.

Good Evening Everybody

The many years of constant touring eventually wore down Armstrong, who had his first heart attack in 1959 and returned to intensive care at Beth Israel Hospital for heart and kidney trouble in 1968. Doctors advised him not to play but Armstrong continued to practice every day in his Corona, Queens home, where he had lived with his fourth wife, Lucille, since 1943. He returned to performing in 1970 but it was too much, too soon and he passed away in his sleep on July 6, 1971, a few months after his final engagement at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City.

King Oliver's Creole Jazz Band (first recording for Louis Armstrong), Gennett Studios, Richmond, Indiana, 1923.

And his last.

1960: In a letter to artist Richard Chopping, Ian Fleming requests his services for 200 guineas.

"I will ask [the publisher] to produce an elegant
skeleton hand and an elegant Queen of Hearts.
As to the dagger, I really have no strong views.
I had thought of the ordinary flick knife as used
by teenagers on people like you and me, but if
you have a nice dagger in mind please let us use it.
The title of the book will be Thunderball.
It is immensely long, immensely dull and only
your jacket can save it!"

1967: You Only Live Twice released in Ireland.
1969: John Barry signs on to score On Her Majesty's Secret Service.

1983: Chris Celichowski reviews Octopussy in Pointer Magazine.

https://epapers.uwsp.edu/pointers/1983/1983Aug4.pdf

1988: Licence to Kill films Q assisting OO7 to board the Wavekrest.

2001: Pierce Brosnan weds Keely Shaye Smith at Ballintubber Abbey, County Mayo, Ireland.

2008: Sony Ericsson reveals its James Bond themed C902 phone and Pocket Gamer.

Sony Ericsson unveils James Bond themed C902 phone
Complete with preloaded spying game

See the complete article here:

http://www.pocketgamer.co.uk/r/Mobile/Sony+Ericsson+C902/news.asp?c=8175

Product: Sony Ericsson C902 | Manufacturer: Sony Ericsson
by Stuart Dredge

Getting excited about upcoming James Bond flick Quantum of Solace yet? We're still boggling at the rubbish name, to be honest.

But anyway, Sony Ericsson is excited, because its C902 handset will feature in the film, possibly during a scene where Bond whiles away several hours in a Haitian jail cell by playing Tower Bloxx Deluxe. Or not.

To celebrate, the company is launching a limited-edition silver edition of the phone, with all manner of 007 branding and content.

That includes the official James Bond: Top Agent game, as well as the new film's trailer, video interviews with its stars, and wallpapers and screensavers.

It's the second Sony Ericsson Bond mobile, following 2006's silver K800i model. The C902 is more focused on photography than gaming, but Sony Ericsson's track record means it'll be good for the latter, too.

The Bond edition goes on sale in November, when the film comes out. If you're wondering why the photo above isn't silver, well, SE hasn't released a shot of the new one yet.

2017: ITV promotes Daniel Craig in Casino Royale but airs the 1967 version, disappointing many.

ITV4 has James Bond fans shaken and stirred
by airing the wrong Casino Royale

Somebody at MI6 is getting fired...
By Justin Harp | 04/08/2017

http://www.digitalspy.com/tv/james-bond-007/news/a834825/itv4-airs-wrong-james-bond-film-casino-royale/

Dragonpol

RichardTheBruce wrote: »

2017: ITV promotes Daniel Craig in Casino Royale but airs the 1967 version, disappointing many.

ITV4 has James Bond fans shaken and stirred
by airing the wrong Casino Royale

Somebody at MI6 is getting fired...
By Justin Harp | 04/08/2017

http://www.digitalspy.com/tv/james-bond-007/news/a834825/itv4-airs-wrong-james-bond-film-casino-royale/

MI6? More like somebody at ITV is getting fired...

RichardTheBruce

August 5th [55 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1906: John Marcellus Huston is born--Nevada, Missouri.
(He dies 28 August 1987 an Irish citizen--Middletown, Rhode Island.)

John Huston
American director, writer, and actor

https://www.britannica.com/biography/John-Huston
Written By: Michael Barson
Last Updated: Aug 1, 2019 See Article History

John Huston, in full John Marcellus Huston, (born August 5, 1906, Nevada, Missouri, U.S—died August 28, 1987, Middletown, Rhode Island), American motion-picture director, writer, and actor whose taut dramas were among the most popular Hollywood films from the early 1940s to the mid-1980s. Many of his films were literary adaptations or tough action tales with an existential spin. Indeed, his own life—in which Huston starred as a boxer, painter, horseman, gadabout, rebel, and international ladies’ man (who married six times)—was at least as engaging as many of his movies.

Early work
Huston was born in a small town in Missouri that his grandfather claimed to have won in a poker game. Huston’s father, Walter Huston, had given up stage acting for work as a civil engineer that took his family to Texas and Indiana before he decided to return to acting in 1909. Within a few years Huston’s parents were divorced, and he spent his childhood moving between his father, who initially returned to vaudeville, and his mother, Reah, who worked as a journalist and taught him to both ride and bet on horses. Although he suffered from kidney disease and an enlarged heart, Huston overcame a frail, often bedridden youth to become so robust a teenager that he was the amateur lightweight boxing champion of California (with a distinctive broken nose to show for it). After briefly studying painting in Los Angeles, Huston moved to New York City in 1924 to become an actor and performed with the Provincetown Players in Greenwich Village. In 1925, while vacationing in Mexico, he became an honorary member of the Mexican cavalry.

Returning to New York in 1929, Huston took a job as a reporter at the New York Graphic, where his mother was then working. He also began writing and publishing short stories, most notably “Fool,” which appeared in the literary magazine The American Mercury. In 1931 Huston went to Hollywood. After a false start as a contract writer with Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer (MGM), he moved to Universal, contributing to the screenplays of a pair of films starring his father, A House Divided (1931) and Law and Order (1932). During this period of hard drinking and carousing, a car that Huston was driving hit and killed a pedestrian. Consumed with guilt, he moved to London, where he intended to write for the British studio Gaumont but instead lived a ne’er-do-well existence. After a stint in Paris painting, he returned to the United States.

In 1934 Huston played the lead in the Chicago Works Progress Administration production of Robert E. Sherwood’s play Abe Lincoln in Illinois. By 1937 Huston was back in Hollywood, where Warner Brothers signed him to a screenwriting contract. This time his career was on track. Huston collaborated on the scripts for William Wyler’s Jezebel (1938), Anatole Litvak’s The Amazing Dr. Clitterhouse (1938), and William Dieterle’s Juárez (1939) before directing his father in A Passage to Bali on Broadway in 1940.

Films of the 1940s
Huston then cowrote three exceptional films: Dr. Ehrlich’s Magic Bullet (1940) for Dieterle, High Sierra (1941) for Raoul Walsh, and Sergeant York for Howard Hawks, the last of which earned Huston his first Academy Award nomination, for best original screenplay in 1941.

That year Huston was also nominated for an Academy Award in another screenwriting category for his adaptation of Dashiell Hammett’s detective mystery The Maltese Falcon (1941), which was Huston’s first film as a director—perhaps the most-impressive debut in Hollywood during the 1940s. The Maltese Falcon had already been filmed by Warner Brothers in 1931 and 1936, but Huston’s proto-film noir had the advantage of Huston as the screenwriter, Humphrey Bogart as the amoral private eye Sam Spade, Mary Astor as the immoral Brigid O’Shaughnessey, and Sydney Greenstreet and Peter Lorre as a pair of lovable cutthroats. It was nominated for the Academy Award for best picture.

After directing the melodrama In This Our Life (1942), Huston was unable to complete his next project, the high-seas espionage tale Across the Pacific (1942), because he was drafted. For the U.S. Army’s Pictorial Service, Huston directed and narrated the renowned World War II documentaries Report from the Aleutians (1943), The Battle of San Pietro (1945), and Let There Be Light, the last a disturbing study of emotionally unstable veterans in a Long Island hospital that was so powerful that it was not given a public release until the early 1980s. Huston was discharged from the army in 1945 with the rank of major and awarded the Legion of Merit for making his films under perilous battle conditions.

Back in the United States, he worked on the scripts for Robert Siodmak’s The Killers and Orson Welles’s The Stranger (both 1946). Huston also directed Jean-Paul Sartre’s No Exit on Broadway in 1946. In 1947, as the House Un-American Activities Committee (HUAC) geared up for its initial wave of hearings into the Hollywood community’s past or present communist affiliations, Huston joined with director William Wyler and screenwriter Philip Dunne in establishing the Committee for the First Amendment. Huston was part of a delegation of industry liberals—including Bogart and Lauren Bacall—who flew to Washington, D.C., to support those witnesses who had taken a confrontational stand when called to testify before the HUAC. Like other members of the delegation, however, Huston was put off by the aggressive belligerence of the “unfriendly” witnesses who would become known as the Hollywood Ten, though he remained disgusted by the proceedings as a whole.

The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948) was Huston’s return to motion-picture directing in Hollywood. Adapted by Huston from an obscure novel by the mysterious, reclusive writer B. Traven and shot on location in Mexico, it starred Bogart in the decidedly unheroic role of a paranoid prospector, Fred C. Dobbs. As good as Bogart was in depicting Dobbs’s descent into madness, most critics believed that he was out-acted by Walter Huston as the grizzled, sagacious Howard, who tries in vain to keep greed from consuming the little treasure-seeking band. (This was the first time that Huston had cast his father in a major role, though he had appeared in unbilled cameos in The Maltese Falcon and In This Our Life.) Although The Treasure of the Sierra Madre would become one of Huston’s greatest critical triumphs and continues to be widely considered one of the best films of its time, it was a box-office disaster, perhaps because of its grim ending and the daring casting of Bogart against type. Still, the film was nominated for an Academy Award for best picture, Huston won the awards for best director and best screenplay, and his father was named best supporting actor.

Humphrey Bogart (centre) and Walter Huston (right) in The Treasure of the Sierra Madre (1948).
Courtesy of Warner Brothers, Inc.

Bogart, Bacall, Edward G. Robinson, Lionel Barrymore, and Claire Trevor starred in Huston’s next film, Key Largo (1948), a suspenseful adaptation of a Maxwell Anderson play that is regarded as a classic film noir. With a screenplay by Huston and Richard Brooks, it is set in a small hotel in the Florida Keys that is taken over by a gangster (Robinson) who has made a clandestine return from deportation to Cuba. Trevor won the Academy Award for best supporting actress for her portrayal of the gangster’s mistress. Cuba was then the setting for We Were Strangers (1949), an atmospheric account of revolutionaries’ attempt to overthrow the government, which starred Jennifer Jones and John Garfield.

Films of the 1950s
Huston thought of himself as a writer-director and almost always had a hand in the screenplays for his films, though he preferred working in collaboration with other writers. A lover of literature from the time he learned to read at age three, he drew the stories for his films primarily from novels and plays. The Asphalt Jungle (1950) was based on the hard-boiled crime novel of the same name by W.R. Burnett, who had provided the source novels for High Sierra and Mervyn LeRoy’s Little Caesar (1931). Sam Jaffe, Sterling Hayden, and James Whitmore starred in that caper film noir as a gang plotting the multimillion-dollar robbery of a jewelry exchange. A thrilling exercise in fatalism, The Asphalt Jungle was one of Huston’s most expertly structured films and earned him and cowriter Ben Maddow an Academy Award nomination for their screenplay.

Huston was less fortunate with his 1951 adaptation of Stephen Crane’s literary classic The Red Badge of Courage. Real-life World War II hero Audie Murphy starred in this story of a young Union soldier who deserts his company during the American Civil War. With the Korean War raging, MGM executives felt that the film’s antiwar message was too blatant and cut The Red Badge of Courage down to 69 minutes. (The undoctored version was among Huston’s favourites of his films.) Nevertheless, what remained, including some magnificently staged battle scenes, was impressive enough to have been called a minor masterpiece by Lillian Ross of The New Yorker magazine; she published the book Picture (1952), which chronicled the film’s making.

Much of Huston’s next film, The African Queen (1951), was shot on location in Uganda and Belgian Congo (now the Democratic Republic of the Congo). Novelist and pioneering film critic James Agee worked with Huston on the adaptation of C.S. Forester’s popular novel (as did the uncredited John Collier and Peter Viertel). The performances delivered by Bogart and Katharine Hepburn were among their most memorable, as drunken boat captain Charlie Allnut and as Rosie Sayer, the impossibly prim spinster who convinces him to take her on his rattletrap steamer down the Congo River to civilization at the outset of World War I. This splendid romance-comedy-adventure has remained one of the most popular Hollywood movies of all time. Huston was again nominated for Academy Awards for best director and best screenplay; Bogart won the award for best actor.

In 1952 Huston traveled to France to shoot Moulin Rouge (1952), a gorgeously mounted, sentimental biography of Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec (played José Ferrer), the crippled artist who became the toast of Montmartre for his lively artworks. Moulin Rouge was nominated for the Academy Award for best picture, and Huston was nominated for best director, the fourth time in five years that he had been nominated for that award. He would have to wait 33 years before the Academy nominated him again, as he entered the extended hit-or-miss phase of his career.

Written with Truman Capote and cofinanced by Bogart’s Santana production company, Beat the Devil (1954) was filmed in Italy. A delightful spoof of The Maltese Falcon, it featured Bogart, Lorre, Jennifer Jones, Robert Morley, and Gina Lollobrigida as a motley shipboard assembly of adventurers, frauds, and con artists trying to locate a uranium mine while enduring a variety of comic disasters. Capote later said that they made up the story as they went along, an irreverent approach perhaps better suited to sensibilities in the 21st century than to those of the 1950s. Beat the Devil was a box-office disaster and precipitated a split between Bogart (who called the film “a mess”) and Huston after many years of fruitful collaboration.

Moby Dick (1956), Huston’s epic adaptation of Herman Melville’s novel, was shot in Ireland, where Huston had gone to live in 1952, largely because he had become disgusted by the political climate of the United States during the McCarthy era. Although some critics found the stolid Gregory Peck badly suited to the role of the fiery, obsessed Captain Ahab, Huston and Ray Bradbury captured much of the poetry of Melville in their script, and the sea storm and whaling sequences were impressively staged. Heaven Knows, Mr. Allison (1957), a much quieter affair, starred Robert Mitchum and Deborah Kerr as a marine and a nun stranded on a Pacific island during World War II. Kerr received an Academy Award nomination for best actress, and Huston’s and John Lee Mahin’s screenplay was also nominated.

Huston began working on David O. Selznick’s remake of A Farewell to Arms (1957) but departed the production to instead direct the undistinguished period film The Barbarian and the Geisha (1958). Filmed in French Equatorial Africa with Errol Flynn and Trevor Howard, The Roots of Heaven (1958) followed and drew mixed reviews.

Films of the 1960s
Something of a return to form for Huston, The Unforgiven (1960) starred Audrey Hepburn in the only western role of her career, as a Native American who has been raised by a Texas settler family. The troubled history of the making of Huston’s next film, The Misfits (1961), became a staple of Hollywood lore. Playwright Arthur Miller adapted his own short story for that very different kind of western as a vehicle for Marilyn Monroe (his wife, though their marriage was collapsing). Clark Gable, Montgomery Clift, and Eli Wallach portrayed aging modern-day cowboys who capture wild horses and sell them to be slaughtered for dog food. Monroe played a divorced former stripper who questions the wranglers’ morality as she falls for one of them (Gable). With her personal life in a tailspin, Monroe reportedly drove Huston to distraction during the filming, showing up on the set late, under the influence of drugs or alcohol, and blowing her lines. This was her last completed role before her death in August 1962. Moreover, eight days after shooting was completed on the film, Gable died of a heart attack.

Huston himself narrated the somber Freud (1962), in which Clift (in one his last roles) played the founder of psychoanalysis, Sigmund Freud. The playful mystery The List of Adrian Messenger (1963) featured a roster of big-name stars (including Mitchum, Frank Sinatra, Burt Lancaster, Kirk Douglas, and Tony Curtis) who were all but unrecognizable under layers of makeup. Their performances were less memorable, however, than Huston’s portrayal the same year of a Roman Catholic cardinal in another film, Otto Preminger’s The Cardinal. That performance earned Huston an Academy Award nomination as best supporting actor and started a new parallel career for him as an actor.

Huston’s The Night of the Iguana (1964), shot in Puerto Vallarta, Mexico, offered another all-star cast (Kerr, Richard Burton, Ava Gardner, and Sue Lyon) in an adaptation of Tennessee Williams’s play of the same name that was steeped in psychoses, thwarted desires, and carnal confusion. Huston then decided to make The Bible: In the Beginning... (1966); however, the nearly three hours of Old Testament melodramatics he offered were little appreciated by audiences and critics (though Huston himself turned in an estimable performance as Noah). Huston’s 1967 film version of Carson McCullers’s 1941 novella Reflections in a Golden Eye was a commercial failure but has come to be more widely appreciated with the passage of time. Marlon Brando gave one of his uniquely odd performances as a repressed homosexual army officer whose Southern belle wife (Elizabeth Taylor) becomes involved with another officer (Brian Keith).

In 1967 Huston acted in and was one of five directors who had a hand in guiding Casino Royale, a parody of Ian Fleming’s first James Bond thriller. His string of lacklustre films continued with A Walk with Love and Death (1969), a forgettable medieval drama that is most-notable today for having provided daughter Anjelica Huston with her first lead role in a movie; Sinful Davey (1969), with John Hurt; and the Cold War thriller The Kremlin Letter (1970).

Last films
Fat City, an adaptation of Leonard Gardner’s novel about small-time boxers, significantly reversed Huston’s fortunes as a director and was one of 1972’s most-acclaimed motion pictures. Here Huston had a chance to draw upon his experiences as a boxer in California five decades earlier, and he deftly teased out the downbeat story’s essence. Stacy Keach played a washed-up boxer in Stockton, Susan Tryrell earned an Academy Award nomination as best supporting actress for her portrayal of his drink-besotted girlfriend, and Jeff Bridges was terrific as a younger fighter with a less-than-promising future.

Huston’s follow-up was the revisionist western The Life and Times of Judge Roy Bean (1973), a loose biography of the notorious self-appointed hanging judge Roy Bean, which featured Paul Newman in the title role, an irreverent screenplay by John Milius, and a supporting cast that included Anthony Perkins, Ava Gardner, and Huston himself. Newman starred again in the Walter Hill-scripted espionage thriller The Mackintosh Man (1973). Then Huston managed to set a new acting standard for himself in Roman Polanski’s classic film noir Chinatown (1974) as the loathsome, evil Noah Cross.

For decades Huston had thought about making The Man Who Would Be King (1975). In the 1950s he had wanted Bogart and Gable to play the intrepid explorers at the centre of Rudyard Kipling’s short story; in the 1960s he had envisioned Richard Burton and Peter O’Toole as the leads. In the event, Sean Connery and Michael Caine, two of the biggest stars of the 1970s, got the roles and traveled to Morocco, which stood in for the story’s Afghanistan locale. Both Connery, as the swaggering Danny, who is taken for a god and comes to believe it himself, and Caine, as his slightly dim sidekick Peachy, gave marvelous performances. Although the film was not particularly successful at the box office and received respectful but restrained reviews, it proved to be a morality tale of unusual resonance and came to be regarded as among Huston’s finest films.

Four years passed before Huston was able to bring to the screen another favourite project, Wise Blood (1979). Brad Dourif played a fanatical Southern evangelist in this adaptation of Flannery O’Connor’s darkly comic novel of the same name. Huston’s next film, the low-budget Hitchcockian thriller Phobia (1981), was arguably the nadir of his directorial career. Much better received was the World War II drama Victory (1981), which featured Caine, Sylvester Stallone, and football (soccer) great Pelé as Allied prisoners of war who engineer an escape from the Parisian stadium in which their team of prisoners is playing a German all-star team. Huston’s uneven big-budget adaptation of the Broadway hit Annie (1982) was his one and only musical. Filmed in Mexico, Under the Volcano (1984) was a valiant but ultimately failed attempt to capture Malcolm Lowry’s difficult novel.

Far more satisfying was Prizzi’s Honor (1985), a stylized version of Richard Condon’s novel (adapted by Condon and Janet Roach) about the Mafia. Jack Nicholson delivered what many critics considered to be among his best performances as mob hit man Charley Partanna. He falls for a woman (Kathleen Turner) who turns out not only to share his profession but to become his target. The film was nominated for the Academy Award for best picture, Huston for best director, and Nicholson for best actor, while Anjelica Huston won the award for best supporting actress for her portrayal of Charley’s mistress. Throughout the 1970s and early ’80s Huston continued to act periodically in others’ films, perhaps most notably in Winter Kills (1979), a thriller based on another Condon novel.

In 1987 Huston joined Anjelica and his oldest son, Tony Huston, to make what would be his final movie, The Dead (Anjelica acted in it, and Tony was nominated for an Academy Award for his screenplay). Based on the short story “The Dead” from James Joyce’s Dubliners, the film focused on a holiday party hosted by a pair of elderly sisters and their niece in turn-of-the-20th-century Dublin. Poignant, stately, and expertly acted, The Dead was just completed when the ailing Huston (who directed the film from a wheelchair, breathing from an oxygen tank) died at age 81. More than a few critics saw The Dead as a fitting epitaph for this prodigiously gifted storyteller.

Michael Barson

John Huston (I) (1906–1987)

Actor | Director | Writer
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0001379/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

Casino Royale (1967)

1963: Ian Fleming appears on BBC Radio’s Desert Island Discs. His choice: War and Peace.

07 May 2017
Desert Island Discs: the 40 greatest guests

27 of 40
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/radio/what-to-listen-to/desert-island-discs-40-greatest-guests/ian-fleming/

Ian Fleming (August 5, 1963)

Sadly, only a 10 minute fragment of the James Bond
author's 1963 appearances on the series remains; but we do
know that his -- characteristically cryptic -- choice of book
was a German-language edition of Leo Tolstoy's War and
Peace. A coded message to the real spooks at MI5,
perhaps?

Listen to Ian Fleming on Desert Island Discs
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p009y5b3

1976: The Spy Who Loved Me starts production and Richard Kiel tests Jaws' bite.

1977: Ruth Batchelor reviews The Spy Who Love Me in the Los Angeles Free Press.

https://www.jstor.org/stable/community.28040257?seq=9#metadata_info_tab_contents

1981: Solo per i tuoi occhi (Only For Your Eyes) released in Italy.

1983: Octopussy released in Austria and Switzerland.
1983: James Bond 007 - Octopussy released in West Germany.

1987: I skuddlinjen (In the Firing Line) released in Norway.

Semic Comic 1987

Black and white reprint 1992
https://www.comicsroyale.com/semicpressadaptations#/the-living-daylights/black-white/

2015: News reports say Pierce Brosnan is stopped by airport security for possessing a knife in Burlington, Vermont.

2021: A number of theaters in the Caribbean screen A View to a Kill.

https://themoviesaruba.com/renaissance/movie/a-view-to-a-kill
https://themoviescuracao.com/punda/movie/a-view-to-a-kill
https://themoviescuracao.com/otrobanda/movie/a-view-to-a-kill

2021: A Time Square exhibit showcases film costumes including James Bond and No Time To Die. Today starts an eight week schedule.

Times Square Costume Exhibit To Showcase Stage, TV &
Film Outfits, Benefit Beleaguered Industry

See the complete article here:

https://deadline.com/2021/07/times-square-showstoppers-costume-exhibit-broadway-television-film-cher-hamilton-james-bond-1234787976/

By Greg Evans | Associate Editor/Broadway Critic | @GregEvans5
July 8, 2021

EXCLUSIVE: A new Times Square exhibit showing off dazzling costumes from numerous Broadway productions, including, to name a few, The Cher Show, Wicked and Dear Evan Hansen, TV series (The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Saturday Night Live), and films (Respect, No Time To Die) will open for an eight-week engagement next month.

Presented by the recently formed Costume Industry Coalition – a group founded to advocate for the survival of New York City’s pandemic-hit custom costume industry – the exhibit Showstoppers! Spectacular Costumes from Stage & Screen will open August 5 at a now-closed Modell’s sporting goods storefront in the heart of Manhattan’s theater district.

Located at 234 West 42nd Street, the transformed, 20,000-square-foot exhibition space has been designed by the international exhibition firm Thinc Design as an immersive, multi-media maze featuring more than 100 of the industry’s “most beautiful and complex garments.” Guests will get to see the costumes up close, with costume makers and experts on-site to demonstrate their techniques and skills.

Confirmed displays from Broadway, Off Broadway and national tours include costumes from A Soldier’s Play, Aladdin, Chicago, Come From Away, The Cher Show, Dear Evan Hansen, Frozen, Golden Child, Harry Potter and the Cursed Child, The Lion King, Moulin Rouge! The Musical, Mrs. Doubtfire, The Phantom of the Opera, Six and Wicked.

TV shows confirmed include The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel, Dickinson and Saturday Night Live, and confirmed films are Aretha Franklin biopic Respect and the upcoming James Bond installment No Time to Die. Other industries, companies and groups showing costumes will include American Ballet Theatre, New York City Ballet, the Martha Graham Dance Company, San Francisco Ballet, Disney World, Norwegian Cruise Lines, Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey circus, Broadway Bares and opera companies.

All proceeds from the exhibit, which runs through Sept. 26, will raise money for the Costume Industry Coalition Recovery Fund.

“We’ve been overwhelmed with the amount of support we have received since we launched the Costume Industry Coalition in June of last year,” said Brian Blythe of John Kristiansen New York, Inc. and a founding member of the coalition. “While so many parts of the entertainment industry are announcing reopening plans, the majority of our members continue to feel the impact of being mostly dormant for more than a year.

“The generosity of our partners, donors and clients – who are lending us over 100 amazing costumes – will not only be a wonderful way to raise money for our Recovery Fund, but will help showcase our talented workforce of costuming experts.”

Showstoppers! Spectacular Costumes from Stage & Screen is being produced by the Costume Industry Coalition and Artisans Guild of America, in partnership with Madison International Realty, Kaplen Brothers Fund, No Guarantees, Kevin Duda Productions and Thinc Design. Tickets are on sale now and are available at ShowstoppersNYC.com.

https://twitter.com/ShowstoppersNY/status/1417252261634396160

RichardTheBruce

August 6th [54 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1938: Robert Dix dies at age 80-Tucson, Arizona.
(Born 8 May 1938--Los Angeles, California.)

Robert Dix (I) (1935–2018)

Actor | Writer | Second Unit Director or Assistant Director
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0228718/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_3

1962: Jamaica transitions from British colony to independent country.

1962: Michelle Yeoh is born--Ipoh, Perak, Malaysia.

1970: Al servicio secreto de Su Majestad (To the Secret Service of His Majesty) released in Mexico.

1973: 鐵金剛勇破 黑魔黨 (Tiě jīngāng yǒng pò hēi mó dǎng; Iron King Mafia, or Iron King Breaks the Black Devil) released in Hong Kong.
1977: Title song "Nobody Does It Better" charts in the UK, eventually reaching number 7.

1981: 鐵金剛勇破 海龍幫 Tiě jīngāng yǒng pò hǎilóng bāng); Iron King Hailong Gang, or Iron King Breaks the Sea Dragon Gang) released in Hong Kong.

1981: James Bond 007 - In tödlicher Mission (James Bond 007 - In a deadly mission) released in Germany.

1984: A View to a Kill begins principle photography at Pinewood Studios, Iver Heath, Buckinghamshire, England.
1986: Licence withdrawn--producer Albert R. Broccoli withdraws the Bond role offer from Pierce Brosnan.

2012: Marvin Frederick Hamlisch dies at age 68--Westwood, Los Angeles, California.
(Born 2 June 1944--New York City, New York.)

Marvin Hamlisch, Whose Notes Struck Gold, Dies at 68

https://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/08/arts/music/marvin-hamlisch-composer-dies-at-68.html
By ROB HOERBURGER | AUG. 7, 2012

Marvin Hamlisch, the Pulitzer Prize-winning composer who imbued his movie and Broadway scores with pizazz and panache and often found his songs in the upper reaches of the pop charts, died on Monday in Los Angeles. He was 68 and lived in New York.

He collapsed on Monday after a brief illness, a family friend said.

For a few years starting in 1973, Mr. Hamlisch spent practically as much time accepting awards for his compositions as he did writing them. He is one of a handful of artists to win every major creative prize, some of them numerous times, including an Oscar for “The Way We Were” (1973, shared with the lyricists Marilyn and Alan Bergman), a Grammy as best new artist (1974), and a Tony and a Pulitzer for “A Chorus Line” (1975, shared with the lyricist Edward Kleban, the director Michael Bennett and the book writers James Kirkwood Jr. and Nicholas Dante).

All told, he won three Oscars, four Emmys and four Grammys. His omnipresence on awards and talk shows made him one of the last in a line of celebrity composers that included Henry Mancini, Burt Bacharach and Stephen Sondheim. Mr. Hamlisch, bespectacled and somewhat gawky, could often appear to be the stereotypical music school nerd — in fact, at 7 he was the youngest student to be accepted to the Juilliard School at the time — but his appearance belied his intelligence and ability to banter easily with the likes of Johnny Carson and Merv Griffin. His melodies were sure-footed and sometimes swashbuckling. “One,” from “A Chorus Line,” with its punchy, brassy lines, distills the essence of the Broadway showstopper.

Marvin Hamlisch

“A Chorus Line,” a backstage musical in which Broadway dancers told their personal stories, started as a series of taped workshops, then evolved into a show that opened at the Public Theater in 1975 and moved to Broadway later that year. It ran for 6,137 performances, the most of any Broadway musical until it was surpassed by “Cats.”

“I have to keep reminding myself that ‘A Chorus Line’ was initially considered weird and off the wall,” Mr. Hamlisch told The New York Times in 1983. “You mustn’t underestimate an audience’s intelligence.” The lyricist Alan Jay Lerner called “A Chorus Line” “the great show business story of our time.”

Mr. Hamlisch had a long association with Barbra Streisand that began when, at 19, he became a rehearsal pianist for her show “Funny Girl.” Yet he told Current Biography in 1976 that Ms. Streisand was reluctant to record what became the pair’s greatest collaboration, “The Way We Were,” the theme from the 1973 movie of the same name in which Ms. Streisand starred with Robert Redford.

A rehearsal of “A Chorus Line,” with music by Marvin Hamlisch, from 1975.
Credit Martha Swope

“I had to beg her to sing it,” he said. “She thought it was too simple.”

Mr. Hamlisch prevailed, though, and the song became a No. 1 pop single, an Oscar winner and a signature song for Ms. Streisand. They continued to work together across the decades; Mr. Hamlisch was the musical director for her 1994 tour and again found himself accepting an award for his work, this time an Emmy.

Ms. Streisand said in a statement through her publicist that the world will always remember Mr. Hamlisch’s music, but that it was “his brilliantly quick mind, his generosity and delicious sense of humor that made him a delight to be around.”

Mr. Hamlisch had his second-biggest pop hit with “Nobody Does It Better,” the theme from the James Bond film “The Spy Who Loved Me,” written with the lyricist Carole Bayer Sager. Carly Simon’s recording of the song reached No. 2 in 1977. Thom Yorke, the lead singer of the band Radiohead, which has performed the song in concert more recently, called it “the sexiest song ever written.”

Mr. Hamlisch with Barbra Streisand.
Credit Alex J. Berliner/Cedars-Sinai Medical Center, via Associated Press

Yet for all Mr. Hamlisch’s pop success — he and Ms. Bayer Sager also wrote a No. 1 soul hit for Aretha Franklin, “Break It to Me Gently” — his first love was writing for theater and the movies. His score for “The Sting,” which adapted the ragtime music of Scott Joplin, made him a household ubiquity in 1973.

Despite the acclaim he often said he thought his background scores were underappreciated. He said he would love for an audience to “see a movie once without the music” to appreciate how the experience changed. He would go on to write more than 40 movie scores.

Marvin Frederick Hamlisch was born June 2, 1944, in New York . His father, Max, was an accordionist, and at age 5 Mr. Hamlisch was reproducing on the piano songs he heard on the radio; Juilliard soon followed. According to his wife, Terre Blair, he was being groomed as “the next Horowitz,” but when all the doors were closed and everyone was gone he would play show tunes. He performed some concerts and recitals as a teenager at Town Hall and other Manhattan auditoriums, but soon gave up on the idea of being a full-time performer.

A scene from the final performance of the Broadway musical "A Chorus Line" in 1990. Marvin Hamlisch won a Tony Award for his score to the show.
Credit Sara Krulwich/The New York Times

“Before every recital, I would violently throw up, lose weight, the veins on my hands would stand out,” he told Current Biography.

He had no such reaction, though, when his song “Sunshine, Lollipops and Rainbows,” with lyrics by Howard Liebling, became a Top 20 hit in 1965 for Lesley Gore, when Mr. Hamlisch was 21. The movie producer Sam Spiegel heard him playing piano a few years later at a party and as a result Mr. Hamlisch scored his first film, “The Swimmer.”

Mr. Hamlisch soon moved to Los Angeles, and the successes snowballed. But he remained a New Yorker through and through. He once said he liked New York because it was the one place “where you’re allowed to wear a tie.”

Marvin Hamlisch, right, at the piano with the lyricist Howard Ashman in 1986.
Credit Nancy Kaye/Associated Press

Mr. Hamlisch is survived by Ms. Blair, a television broadcaster and producer, whom he married in 1989. His sister, Terry Liebling, a Hollywood casting director and the wife of his former collaborator Howard Liebling, died in 2001.

After “A Chorus Line,” Mr. Hamlisch scored another Broadway hit, “They’re Playing Our Song,” based on his relationship with Ms. Bayer Sager (who wrote the lyrics), in 1979. It ran for 1,082 performances. After that, the accolades subsided but the work didn’t. He worked with various lyricists on subesequent musicals, including “Jean Seberg” (1983), which was staged in London but never reached Broadway, and “Smile” (1986), which did reach Broadway but had a very brief run. His most steady work continued to come from the movies. He wrote the background scores for “Ordinary People,” “Sophie’s Choice” and, most recently, “The Informant.” His later theater scores included “The Goodbye Girl” (1993), “Sweet Smell of Success” (2002) and “Imaginary Friends” (2002). He had also completed the scores for an HBO movie based on the life of Liberace, “Behind the Candelabra,” and for a musical based on the Jerry Lewis film “The Nutty Professor,” which opened in Nashville last month.

According to his official Web site, Mr. Hamlisch held the title of pops conductor for the Pittsburgh Symphony Orchestra, the Milwaukee Symphony Orchestra, the Dallas Symphony Orchestra and others.

In more recent years, Mr. Hamlisch became an ambassador for music, traveling the country and performing and giving talks at schools. He often criticized the cuts in arts education.

“I don’t think the American government gets it,” he said during an interview at the Orange County High School of the Arts in Santa Ana, Calif. “I don’t think they understand it’s as important as math and science. It rounds you out as a person. I think it gives you a love of certain things. You don’t have to become the next great composer. It’s just nice to have heard certain things or to have seen certain things. It’s part of being a human being.”

Despite all his honors, Mr. Hamlisch was always most focused on, and most excited about, his newest project. Ms. Blair said. And, she said, he was always appreciative of his gift: “He used to say, ‘It’s easy to write things that are so self-conscious that they become pretentious, that have a lot of noise. It’s very hard to write a simple melody.’ ”

Marvin Hamlisch
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Marvin_Hamlisch

Work

Symphony

Hamlisch was the primary conductor for the Pittsburgh Pops from 1995 until his death.

The Dallas Symphony Orchestra performed a rare Hamlisch classical symphonic suite titled Anatomy of Peace (Symphonic Suite in one Movement For Full Orchestra/Chorus/Child Vocal Soloist) on November 19, 1991. It was also performed at Carnegie Hall in 1993, and in Paris in 1994 to commemorate D-Day. The work was recorded by the Dallas Symphony Orchestra in 1992. The Anatomy of Peace was a book by Emery Reves which expressed the world-federalist sentiments shared by Albert Einstein and many others in the late 1940s, in the period immediately following World War II.

Theatre

Seesaw (1973) [Dance Arrangements]
A Chorus Line (Pulitzer Prize for Drama & Tony Award for Best Score) (1975)
They're Playing Our Song (1978)
Jean Seberg (1983)
Smile (1986)
The Goodbye Girl (1993)
Sweet Smell of Success (2002)
Imaginary Friends (2002)
The Nutty Professor (2012)

Film

The Swimmer (1968)
Take the Money and Run (1969)
The April Fools (1969)

Move (1970)
Flap (1970)
Something Big (1971)
Kotch (1971)
Bananas (1971)
The War Between Men and Women (1972)
The World's Greatest Athlete (1973)
Save the Tiger (1973)
The Way We Were (1973)
The Sting (1973)
The Prisoner of Second Avenue (1975)
The Spy Who Loved Me (1977)
The Absent-Minded Waiter (1977)
Same Time, Next Year (1978)
Ice Castles (1978)
Starting Over (1979)
Chapter Two (1979)

Seems Like Old Times (1980)
Ordinary People (1980)
Gilda Live (1980)
Sophie's Choice (1982)
Henry The Horse: Original Motion Picture Soundtrack (1982)
I Ought to Be in Pictures (1982)
Romantic Comedy (1983)
A Streetcar Named Desire (1984)
D.A.R.Y.L. (1985)
A Chorus Line (1985)
When the Time Comes (1987)
Three Men and a Baby (1987)
The Return of the Six Million Dollar Man and the Bionic Woman (1987)
Sam Found Out: A Triple Play (1988)
Little Nikita (1988)
David (1988)
The January Man (1989)
Shirley Valentine (1989)
The Experts (1989)

Women and Men: Stories of Seduction (1990)
Switched at Birth (1991)
Missing Pieces (1991)
Frankie and Johnny (1991)
Seasons of the Heart (1994)
The Mirror Has Two Faces (1996)

How to Lose a Guy in 10 Days (2003)
The Informant! (2009)
Behind the Candelabra (2013)

x

2021: The Melrose Rooftop Theater screens Casino Royale in West Hollywood. Three-course dinner option.

Aug
06
Casino Royale
by Melrose Rooftop Theatre

See the complete article here:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/casino-royale-tickets-161008648201

A unique outdoor cinema experience nestled in the heart of West
Hollywood's fashion and design precinct.

About this event
This is a movie night you will not want to miss! Get cozy in your bean bag chair to watch an all-time favorite. Begin with dinner in our EP restaurant and follow with a signature LP cocktail to start your movie on a peaceful summer night in the Hills!
#MelroseRooftopTheatre

The Melrose Rooftop Theatre is attached to the property occupied by E.P. & L.P. and the entry is via the lobby at 603 N La Cienega Boulevard, West Hollywood.

The Experience:
The cinema utilizes wireless technology with individual headsets provided to guests to maximize the cinema experience. Each headset will be provided with individual covers & are cleaned after every use and before every use.

Relax and enjoy our views of the Hollywood hills while sipping a cocktail & watching your favorite movie.

The Movie:
After receiving a license to kill, British Secret Service agent James Bond (Daniel Craig) heads to Madagascar, where he uncovers a link to Le Chiffre (Mads Mikkelsen), a man who finances terrorist organizations. Learning that Le Chiffre plans to raise money in a high-stakes poker game, MI6 sends Bond to play against him, gambling that their newest "00" operative will topple the man's organization.

Date and time
Fri, August 6, 2021
8:00 PM – 11:00 PM PDT
$28 – $49

FAQs:
Ages 21+
Theatre opens at 7.30pm, Movie starts at 8:30pm
Dinner + Movie tickets are reserved seating.
General Admission seating is first come first serve.

Dinner is served in our award winning E.P. Restaurant where you will enjoy a three course meal prior to the screening. There are vegetarian options present on the menu and please let us know of any allergies!

2021: Red Flag presents a burlesque show with The Bond-Bons performing James Bond music in St. Louis, Missouri. Special guest RYDYR.

Red Flag
THE BOND-BONS

See the complete article here:

https://www.etix.com/ticket/p/7777136/the-bondbons--stlouis-red-flag

August 6, 2021 8:00 PM
Doors Open: 7:00 PM

More Information
THE BOND-BONS, featuring the music of James Bond. With Special Guest RYDYR.
(This is a Burlesque show and is 21 & Up ONLY).
Doors open at 7pm, Show starts at 8pm.

Number of Tickets
Limit 10 tickets per order.
GENERAL ADMISSION: $18.00 *

* Does not include convenience or handling fees.

RichardTheBruce

August 7th [53 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1914: Ted Moore is born--Western Cape, South Africa.
(He dies 1987 at age 72--Surrey, England.)

Ted Moore

See the complete article here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ted_Moore

Born 7 August 1914, Benoni, Gauteng, South Africa
Died 1987 (aged 72–73), Surrey, England, U.K.
Nationality South African, British
Occupation Cinematographer, camera operator
Years active 1939–1982

Ted Moore, BSC (7 August 1914 – 1987) was a South African-British cinematographer known for his work on seven of the James Bond films in the 1960s and early 1970s. He won the Academy Award for Best Cinematography for his work on Fred Zinnemann's A Man for All Seasons, and two BAFTA Awards for Best Cinematography for A Man for All Seasons and From Russia with Love.

Biography

Born in South Africa, Moore moved to Great Britain at the age of sixteen, where he served in the Royal Air Force during World War II. During the war he joined the film unit and began honing his craft.

After serving as a camera operator on such films as The African Queen, The Red Beret, Hell Below Zero, and The Black Knight, he was given the cinematography job for 1956's High Flight, set among a familiar scene for Moore, the Royal Air Force.

He worked on a number of films for Irving Allen and Albert R. Broccoli's Warwick Films, including Cockleshell Heroes, Zarak, Johnny Nobody and No Time to Die, as well as their more high-minded 1960 production The Trials of Oscar Wilde.

In 1962 Broccoli and director Terence Young chose him as the cinematographer for an adaptation of Ian Fleming's Dr. No. Moore would go on to make another six Bond films; From Russia with Love (for which he won a BAFTA award), Goldfinger, Thunderball, Diamonds Are Forever, Live and Let Die, and portions of The Man with the Golden Gun, on which he was replaced due to illness by Oswald Morris.

In addition, Moore won a BAFTA and an Oscar for his camerawork for 1967's Best Picture, A Man for All Seasons, becoming the first South African to win an Academy Award. He also worked on the 1962 cult classic The Day of the Triffids, The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie, The Golden Voyage of Sinbad, Orca, and Clash of the Titans.

Moore died in 1987.

Filmography

April in Portugal (1954)
A Prize of Gold (1955)
The Gamma People (1955)
Odongo (1956)
Zarak (1957)
Interpol (1957)
How to Murder a Rich Uncle (1957)
High Flight (1957)
No Time to Die (1958)
The Man Inside (1958)
Idol on Parade (1959)
The Bandit of Zhobe (1959)
Killers of Kilimanjaro (1959)

Jazz Boat (1960)
Let's Get Married (1960)
The Trials of Oscar Wilde (1960)
In the Nick (1960)
Johnny Nobody (1961)
The Hellions (1961)
Mix Me a Person (1962)
Dr. No (1962)
The Day of the Triffids (1962)
Nine Hours to Rama (1963)
Call Me Bwana (1963)
From Russia with Love (1963)
Goldfinger (1964)
The Amorous Adventures of Moll Flanders (1965)
Thunderball (1965)
A Man for All Seasons (1966)
The Last Safari (1967)
Prudence and the Pill (1968)
Shalako (1968)
The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie (1969)
The Chairman (1969) (uncredited)

Country Dance (1970)
She'll Follow You Anywhere (1971)
Diamonds Are Forever (1971)
Psychomania (1973)
Live and Let Die (1973)
The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1974)
The Story of Jacob and Joseph (1974) (television film)
The Man with the Golden Gun (1974)
Sinbad and the Eye of the Tiger (1977)
Orca (1977)
Dominique (1978)

The Martian Chronicles (1980) (miniseries; 3 episodes)
Clash of the Titans (1981)
Priest of Love (1981)

Awards and nominations

Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences
- Best Cinematography
- - A Man for All Seasons (won)

British Academy of Film and Television Arts
- Best Cinematography
- - From Russia with Love (won)
- - A Man for All Seasons (won)

British Society of Cinematographers
- Best Cinematography
- - From Russia with Love (won)

1969: Roger Moore and Claudie Lange appear in Cine Revue Magazine promoting their film Crossplot.

1974: The Man With the Golden Gun films OO7 offering Lazar a chance to speak (or else forever hold his piece).
1977: Christopher Wood's novelization James Bond and The Spy Who Loved Me spends a week at number 6, London Times paperback bestsellers list.

Major Anya Amasova had scored well in
the course of 'sex as a weapon', although
the SMERSH report had noted a risk of
emotional attachments. James Bond was
as wary of her presence in Cairo as he was
charmed by her proud self-assured beauty.
Where did the Russians find such women?
But Bond was not an agent to be dis-
tracted from his mission: someone had
learned to plot the course of nuclear
submarines and, impossible as it sounded,
M told him in London that the 370-foot
nuclear-powered H.M.S. Ranger was
'missing'.

Not since Dr No and Auric Goldfinger
has Bond locked wits with an opponent so
dedicated to his private obsession or
shielded by such deadly cunning as
Sigmund Stromberg. His double-O prefix
meant that Bond was used to death, but
what Stromberg's killer could do with
his two rows of stainless steel teeth was an
obscenity.

Christopher Wood wrote this novel
under licence from Glidrose, which owns
Ian Fleming copyrights, from the script
he and Richard Maibaum had produced
for the latest Albert R. Broccoli Bond
film. The story is entirely different from
Fleming's original The Spy Who Loved Me,
only the title retaining any link between
the film and that earlier book.

Jonathan Cape hardcover 1997, jacket cover by Bill Botten.



Panther Paperback

1978: Roger Moore and Lois Chiles are photographed in Paris, a week before filming of Moonraker begins.

1979: Simon Kassianides is born--Athens, Greece.

1981: For Your Eyes Only released in Austria.
1986: EON names Timothy Dalton the fourth James Bond. Filming shifts to late September.

Timothy Dalton Chosen As New James Bond

See the complete article here:

https://www.nytimes.com/1986/08/07/movies/timothy-dalton-chosen-as-new-james-bond.html

Reuters AUG. 7, 1986

The British actor Timothy Dalton has been named to replace Roger Moore as James Bond in the 25th anniversary film about Ian Fleming's dashing secret agent, producer Albert Broccoli said today.

Mr. Dalton, 38 years old, a Shakespearean actor who has also appeared in 11 films and on television, will be the fifth actor to portray Agent 007 in the popular series when shooting of ''The Living Daylights'' begins in London late next month.

The other leading candidate to take over the role of James Bond, who along with Mr. Moore has been played by Sean Connery, George Lazenby and David Niven, was the Irish-born actor Pierce Brosnan. They said Mr. Brosnan was unable to win release from his contract as television's romantic private detective ''Remington Steele.'' The series was renewed by NBC two months after it had been canceled, and filming for the new season has already begun.

''The Living Daylights'' will be directed by John Glen for United Artists at Pinewood Studios, with locations set for Austria, Morocco and Gibraltar.

Mr. Dalton, who was born in Wales and whose physique and accent fit the fictional mold of Mr. Fleming's dashing hero, was trained at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Arts and then became a member of the National Youth Theater.

2019: Aston Martin Rapide S AMR spotted in Monaco.

Aston Martin Rapide S AMR
https://www.autogespot.com/aston-martin-rapide-s-amr/2019/08/07

Spotdetails
Spotter carspotterjvdl
Spotted in Monaco, Monaco
Date 2019-08-07 01:00

Auto details
Topspeed 330 km/u
Acceleration 0-100 km/u 4.40 s
Power 603 pk
Torque 630 Nm @ 4000 tpm
Weight 1990 kg

2021: The Prince Charles Cinema screens a 35mm print of The World Is Not Enough.

THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH

See the complete article here:

https://princecharlescinema.com/PrinceCharlesCinema.dll/Seasons?e=341

THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH
129 mins | rated (12)

Directed by Michael Apted
Starring Pierce Brosnan, Sophie Marceau, Robert Carlyle
UK (1999)

Bond (Pierce Brosnan) must race to defuse an international power struggle with the world's oil supply hanging in the balance. Elektra King (Sophie Marceau), is the daughter of a murdered oil tycoon whom Bond is assigned to protect. The villain is Renard (Robert Carlyle), who has a bullet lodged in his brain rendering him unable to feel pain. Also featuring nuclear weapons expert Dr. Christmas Jones (Denise Richards).

Saturday 7 Aug 2021
5:30 PM | 35mm

2021: Free James Bond Walking Tour, London.

Free James Bond Walking Tour
Sat, 7 Aug 2021 15:30 - 17:30 BST

See the complete article here:

https://www.eventbrite.com/checkout-external?eid=164371169593

General Admission | Free | 1

Order summary
1 x General Admission | £0.00
Total | £0.00

RichardTheBruce

August 8th [52 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1917: Earl Cameron is born--Pembroke Parish, Bermuda.
(He dies 3 July 2020 at age 102--Kenilworth, Warwickshire, England.)

Earl Cameron (actor)

See the complete article here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earl_Cameron

Earl Cameron
CBE


Cameron in 2017

Born Earlston J. Cameron, 8 August 1917, Pembroke, Bermuda
Died 3 July 2020 (aged 102)
Occupation Actor
Years active 1951–2013
Spouse(s) Audrey J. P. Godowski
(m. 1959; died 1994)
[1][2]
Barbara Cameron (m. 1994)

Earlston J. Cameron, CBE (8 August 1917 – 3 July 2020), known as Earl Cameron, was a British actor, born in Bermuda and a long-time resident in England. Along with Cy Grant, he is known as one of the first black actors to break the "colour bar" in the United Kingdom.

With his appearance in 1951's Pool of London, Cameron became one of the first black actors to take up a starring role in a British film after Paul Robeson, Nina Mae McKinney and Elisabeth Welch in the 1930s.

According to Screenonline, "Earl Cameron brought a breath of fresh air to the British film industry's stuffy depictions of race relations. Often cast as a sensitive outsider, Cameron gave his characters a grace and moral authority that often surpassed the films' compromised liberal agendas." He also had repeated appearances on many British science fiction programmes of the 1960s, including Doctor Who, The Prisoner, and The Andromeda Breakthrough.

Early career
Cameron was born in Pembroke, Bermuda. As a young man, he joined the British Merchant Navy, and sailed mostly between New York and South America.

When the Second World War broke out he found himself stranded in London, arriving on the ship The Eastern Prince on 29 October 1939. As he himself put it in an interview: "I arrived in London on 29 October 1939. I got involved with a young lady and you know the rest. The ship left without me, and the girl walked out too."

In 1941, a friend named Harry Crossman gave Cameron a ticket to see a revival of Chu Chin Chow at the Palace Theatre. Crossman and five other black actors had bit parts in the West End production. Cameron, who was working at the kitchen of the Strand Corner House at the time, was fed up with menial jobs and asked Crossman if he could get him on the show. At first he told Cameron that all of the parts were cast, but two or three weeks later, when one of the actors did not show up, Crossman arranged a meeting with the director Robert Atkins, who cast Cameron on the spot.

According to Cameron, he had a less difficult time than other black actors because his Bermudian accent sounded American to British ears. For example, the following year, he landed a speaking role as Joseph, the chauffeur in the American play The Petrified Forest by Robert E. Sherwood.

In 1945 and 1946 he took on the role of one of the Dukes in the singing trio "The Duchess and Two Dukes", which toured with the Entertainments National Service Association (ENSA) to play to British armed forces personnel in India in 1945, and the Netherlands in 1946. In 1946 Cameron returned to Bermuda for five months but decided to return to work as an actor in the UK. He then took a job on the London stage as an understudy in the play Deep Are the Roots. Written by Arnaud d'Usseau and James Gow, this play was staged at the Wyndham's Theatre in London for six months (featuring Gordon Heath) and then went on tour. It was during this tour that Cameron first met, and worked alongside, Patrick McGoohan during a production of that play in Coventry. (In 2012, Cameron participated alongside local actors in Bermuda in a reading of Deep Are the Roots, which the Bermuda Sun described as a play "dear to Earl's heart, for it not only gave him his first break in the West End as Britain's first black actor, but he also met his first wife when he travelled on tour with the production."

He understudied in Deep are the Roots with fellow understudy Ida Shepley, a well known singer. As Cameron was having problems with his diction at the time she introduced him to a very good voice coach named Amanda Ira Aldridge. Miss Aldridge was the daughter of Ira Aldridge, a legendary black Shakespearian American actor of the 19th century. Cameron's breakthrough acting role was in Pool of London, a 1951 film directed by Basil Dearden, set in post-war London involving racial prejudice, romance and a diamond robbery. He won much critical acclaim for his role in the film, which is considered "the first major role for a black actor in a British mainstream film".

Film career
His next major film role following his work in Pool of London was in the 1955 film Simba. In this drama about the Mau Mau uprising in Kenya, Cameron played the role of Peter Karanja, a doctor trying to reconcile his admiration for Western civilisation with his Kikuyu heritage. That same year Cameron played the Mau Mau general Jeroge in Safari.

From the 1950s to the present day, Cameron has had major parts in many films, including: The Heart Within (1957), in which he played a character Victor Conway in a crime movie again set in the London docklands; and Sapphire (1959) in which he played Dr Robbins, the brother of a murdered girl; and The Message (1976) – the story of the Prophet Muhammad, where he played the King of Abyssinia.

Other film appearances have included: Tarzan the Magnificent (1960), in which he played Tate; Flame in the Streets (1961), in which he played Gabriel Gomez; Tarzan's Three Challenges (1963), in which he played Mang; Guns at Batasi (1964), in which he played Captain Abraham; and Battle Beneath the Earth (1967), in which he played Sergeant Seth Hawkins; A Warm December (1973), in which he acted with Sidney Poitier and played the part of an African ambassador to the UK.

Cameron was strongly considered for the role of Quarrel in Dr. No (1962) by both director Terence Young and co-producer Albert R. Broccoli, whom he knew from his Warwick Films work; however, Harry Saltzman did not think him suitable for the role and cast American John Kitzmiller. They asked Cameron back to the James Bond series for Thunderball (1965), in which he played Bond's Caribbean assistant Pinder. Cameron also acted alongside Thunderball lead Sean Connery in Cuba, in which he played Colonel Levya.

His most recent film appearances include a major role in The Interpreter (2005), playing the fictitious dictator Edmond Zuwanie. Cameron's performance was universally praised. The Baltimore Sun wrote: "Earl Cameron is magnificent as the slimy old fraud of a dictator..." and Rolling Stone described his appearance as "subtle and menacing". Philip French in The Observer referred to "that fine Caribbean actor Earl Cameron". In 2006 he appeared in a cameo as a portrait artist in the film The Queen (directed by Stephen Frears), alongside Helen Mirren. In 2010 he appeared as "Elderly Bald Man" in the film Inception. In 2013 he appeared as "Grandad" in the short film Up on the Roof.

TV career
Cameron has had roles in a wide range of TV shows but one of his earliest major roles was a starring part in the BBC 1960 TV drama The Dark Man, in which he played a West Indian cab driver in the UK. The show examined the reactions and prejudices he faced in his work. In 1956 he had a smaller part in another BBC drama exploring racism in the workplace, A Man From The Sun, in which he appeared as community leader Joseph Brent, the cast also featuring Errol John, Cy Grant, Colin Douglas and Nadia Cattouse.

Cameron appeared in a range of popular television shows including series Danger Man (Secret Agent in the US) alongside series star Patrick McGoohan. Cameron worked with McGoohan again in 1967 when he appeared in the TV series The Prisoner as the Haitian supervisor in the episode "The Schizoid Man".

His other television work includes Emergency – Ward 10, The Zoo Gang, Crown Court (two different stories, each three episodes long, in 1973), Jackanory (a BBC children's series in which he read five of the Brer Rabbit stories in 1971), Dixon of Dock Green, Doctor Who – The Tenth Planet (the first Black Actor to portray an astronaut on any film or TV series in the world), Neverwhere, Waking the Dead, Kavanagh QC, Babyfather, EastEnders (a small role as a Mr Lambert), Dalziel and Pascoe, and Lovejoy.

He also appeared in a number of other one-off TV dramas, including: Television Playhouse (1957); A World Inside BBC (1962); ITV Play of the Week (two stories – The Gentle Assassin (1962) and I Can Walk Where I Like Can't I? (1964); the BBC's Wind Versus Polygamy (1968); ITV's A Fear of Strangers (1964), in which he played Ramsay, a black saxophonist and small-time criminal who is detained by the police on suspicion of murder and is also racially abused by a Chief Inspector Dyke (played by Stanley Baker); Festival: the Respectful Prostitute (1964); ITV Play of the Week – The Death of Bessie Smith (1965); Theatre 625: The Minister (1965); The Great Kandinsky (1994); and two episodes of Thirty-Minute Theatre (Anything You Say 1969 and another in 1971). In 1996 he appeared on BBC2 as The Abbott in Neverwhere, an urban fantasy television series by Neil Gaiman.

Following the death of Olaf Pooley on 14 July 2015, Cameron became the oldest living actor to have appeared in Doctor Who, and on 8 August 2017 he became the third "Doctor Who" actor to reach the age of 100 (after Zohra Sehgal and Olaf Pooley).

Personal life
Since 1963[14] Cameron has been a practitioner of Baháʼí, joining the faith at the time of the first Baháʼí World Congress, held at the Royal Albert Hall in London. The Baháʼí community held a reception in London in 2007 to honour his 90th birthday. He currently lives in Kenilworth, Warwickshire, in England.[20] He is married to Barbara Cameron. His first wife, Audrey Cameron, died in 1994. He has six children.

Cameron died on 3 July 2020, at the age of 102.[22]

Honours

• He was appointed Commander of the Order of the British Empire (CBE) in the 2009 New Year Honours.
• The Earl Cameron Theatre in Hamilton, Bermuda was named in his honour at a ceremony he attended there in December 2012.
• The University of Warwick awarded Cameron an honorary doctorate in January 2013.

Filmography
1951 Pool of London - Johnny Lambert
1951 There Is Another Sun - Ginger Jones
1952 Emergency Call - George Robinson
1955 Simba - Karanja
1955 The Woman for Joe - Lemmie
1955 Safari Jeroge (Njoroge)
1956 Odongo Hassan -
1957 The Heart Within - Victor Conway
1957 The Mark of the Hawk - Prosecutor
1959 Killers of Kilimanjaro
1959 Sapphire - Dr. Robbins

1960 Tarzan the Magnificent - Tate
1961 No Kidding - Black father
1961 Flame in the Streets - Gabriel Gomez
1963 Tarzan's Three Challenges - Mang
1964 Guns at Batasi - Captain Abraham
1965 Thunderball - Pinder
1966 The Sandwich Man - Bus Conductor
1967 Battle Beneath the Earth - Sgt. Seth Hawkins
1968 Two a Penny - Verger
1969 Two Gentlemen Sharing - Jane's father

1972 Six Days of Justice - Maynard
1973 A Warm December -
1976 Mohammad, Messenger of God - Najashi
1979 Cuba - Col. Leyva

2001 Revelation - Cardinal Chisamba
2005 The Interpreter - Edmond Zuwanie
2006 The Queen - Portrait Artist

2010 Inception - Elderly Bald Man

Earl Cameron (I)

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0131565/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0
Actor

1925: Robert Brownjohn is born--Newark, New Jersey.
(He dies 1 August 1970 at age 44--London, England.)

Robert Brownjohn
American, 1925–1970

See the complete article here:

https://www.moma.org/artists/816?locale=en

While best known for his title sequences for the James Bond films From Russia with Love and Goldfinger, Robert Brownjohn had a short but influential career, which integrated design, advertising, film, photography, and music. A major figure in the New York advertising and design scene of the late 1950s, he later moved to London, where he was at the epicenter of the burgeoning music, art, and fashion scene of London’s “swinging ’60s.”

Born in New Jersey to British parents, Brownjohn later moved to Chicago, where during the mid-1940s he studied under former Bauhaus teacher Laszlo Moholy-Nagy at the Chicago Institute of Design. He quickly caught the attention of his teachers, who later brought him on as an instructor at the school. After moving to New York in 1951, he spent five years as a freelance designer for clients including George Nelson and Bob Cato. In 1956, he formed a partnership with Ivan Chermayeff, a designer and son of the modernist architect Serge Chermayeff (with designer Tom Geismar joining a year later). Brownjohn, Chermayeff & Geismar quickly grew into one of the most innovative design and advertising firms in New York. Brownjohn’s many personal problems, caused primarily by the heroin addiction that later claimed his life, ultimately soured his New York relationships, precipitating his move to London in 1960.

In London, Brownjohn rapidly established himself as a designer of note. While working for the firm McCann Erickson, he designed the opening credits for the second James Bond film, From Russia with Love, his first foray into film. The following year he directed the film titles for Goldfinger. For both title sequences, he employed a surprising and attention-grabbing approach in which the credit texts and scenes from the films were projected onto scantily clad women, initiating the long-running Bond film tradition of elaborate title sequences featuring seductive women. Brownjohn’s treatment of type as dynamic, abstract forms in the title sequences illustrated both his mastery of graphic design and the enduring influence of Moholy-Nagy’s use of type and photography. His combination of sexually suggestive images and wry humor was a fitting accompaniment to the James Bond mythos. The broad acclaim he received for the Bond film titles led to more film and commercial work for clients ranging from Pirelli to Midland Bank to the Rolling Stones. Though he continued to produce original and challenging work, in the latter half of the 1960s, his life became increasingly unstable. He was moving from one partnership to another until he died in 1970, at the untimely age of 44.

Introduction by Paul Galloway, Collection Specialist, Department of Architecture and Design, 2016

Robert Brownjohn (1925–1970)
Miscellaneous Crew | Actor | Art Director
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0115226/
Filmography

Miscellaneous Crew (6 credits)

1969 Michael Kohlhaas - Der Rebell (titles)
1967 The Night of the Generals (title sequence designer)
1966 The Tortoise and the Hare (Short) (title designer)
1966 Where the Spies Are (title designer)
1964 Goldfinger (titles designed by)
1963 From Russia with Love (titles designed by)

Actor (1 credit)

1969 Otley - Paul

Art director (1 credit)

1963 A... is for Apple (Short)

[img][/img]

1959: The Moonraker comic strip ends its run in The Daily Express.
(Started 30 March 1959. 226-339 ) John McLusky, artist. Henry Gammidge, writer.

Swedish Semic Comic 1979
https://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/comics/semic_1979.php3?s=comics&id=02181

Moonraker
(Moonraker)

Swedish Semic Comic 1974
https://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/comics/semic_1974.php3?s=comics&id=01800

Moonraker Betyder Döden
(Moonraker)

Danish 1975 https://www.bond-o-rama.dk/en/jb007-dk-no31-1975/

James Bond Agent 007 no. 31: “Moonraker” (1975)

Danish 1966 https://www.bond-o-rama.dk/en/jb007-dk-no-7-1966/

James Bond Agent 007 no. 7: “Moonraker” (1966)
"Moonraker - den dødbringende raket"
[Moonraker - the deadly rocket]

1977: Christopher Porterfield reviews The Spy Who Loved Me in Time magazine.

Cinema: Giggles, Wiggles, Bubbles and Bond

See the complete article here:

http://content.time.com/time/subscriber/article/0,33009,915224,00.html

By Christopher Porterfield - Monday, Aug. 08, 1977

THE SPY WHO LOVED ME
Directed by LEWIS GILBERT Screenplay by CHRISTOPHER WOOD and RICHARD MAIBAUM

Jottings found on the screening-room floor after a critics' viewing of the new James Bond film:

They'll never top first stunt: skier hurtles off precipice. Long breathtaking plunge. Shucks off skis in midair, free-falls for a while, then opens parachute and floats earthward. Wow.

Does anybody know this flick has nothing to do with 1962 novel of same name, since Ian Fleming nixed sale of anything but title to movies? Does anybody care? All that's left of Bond formula here is 007 character, sexy starlets and gee-whiz gadgets. (Question: What else did it ever consist of?)

Plot seems snipped from previous installments. Bond tangles with female Russian spy: From Russia with Love. They team up against seagoing megalomaniac who captures nuclear subs belonging to both East and West and plans to destroy world: shades of Diamonds Are Forever. Lots of underwater stuff: Thunderball. Also skiing: On Her Majesty 's Secret Service. (Think about: Curt Jurgens, as megalomaniac, pronounces O07's name Bund. This hint he's crypto-Nazi? Farfetched, but can anything be too farfetched in a film like this?)

Amphibian Bondmobile. Series getting awfully ingrown. Sexual innuendo coarser. In London HQ, Bond reported to be on assignment in Austria, meaning he's doing you-know-what in front of fireplace in Alpine hideaway. Thunders M: "Tell him to pull out—immediately!" Only moment of real wit: amphibian Bondmobile drives into sea and becomes two-seater submarine; it veers to elude underwater pursuers, but only after flashing turn signal—for the wrong direction.

New Bond girl, Barbara Bach. Very pretty, especially as seen in cushioned escape bubble. But dewy as a debutante ("Oh! James!"). Hard to believe her as dangerous spy. Where are the Honor Blackmans and Diana Riggs of yesteryear? Roger Moore, as Bond, a road-company Sean Connery. At least he's improvement on that instant-trivia question, George Lazenby.

Good gadgets: wristwatch radio with tape printout of messages received. Hollow cigarette that blows knockout gas. Flying tea tray that decapitates human target.

Best gadget of all is human one —seven-foot thug with preternatural strength and steel teeth, which he uses to snap victims' spinal cords. Name: Jaws. Orthodontist's nightmare. Running gag is that each time he is dispatched—trapped in building cave-in, flung from speeding train, tossed into shark tank, even torpedoed—Jaws (Richard Kiel) implacably reappears. In his silly, mechanical, likable way, a perfect symbol for Bond films. They're attacked, dismissed, put out of mind, but keep coming back and back and back.

(Nope. Never did top that first Stunt.)

1984: Variety reports A View to a Kill filming will include the Musee Vivant Du Cheval in Chantilly, France (Zorin’s stud farm). Also in San Francisco: Fisherman’s Wharf, Potrero Hill, the China Basin Landing, the Civic Center, and City Hall.

1997: Tomorrow Never Dies films the showdown between OO7 and Carver.

2007: Ian Fleming Publications honors the passing of John Gardner.

All at Ian Fleming Publications Limited were saddened
and shocked to hear of the death of John Gardner
on Friday 3rd August.

John was a highly respected and admired member of the
Bond family and he will be great missed.

Our thoughts at this time are with his family.

Ian Fleming Publications, 8 August

2014: The Sun proposes Sam Smith is in talks to write and perform the title song for BOND 24, a film scheduled to be released October-November 2015. (Sam Smith denies it 13 August 2014. And again 3 July 2015, 6 July 2015, 28 July 2015, and as late as 3 September 2015.)

Sam Smith: The Many, Many Times He Lied
About Singing The New Bond Theme

https://www.nme.com/blogs/nme-blogs/sam-smith-the-many-many-times-he-lied-about-singing-the-new-bond-theme-764351
Larry Bartleet | Sep 8, 2015 3:18 pm

Did any of us see it coming? Er, not exactly. There have definitely been significant signposts since August 2014 that Sam Smith would be singing the theme for the latest James Bond film, Spectre, but his brilliant and kinda shameless lying skills have consistently made it difficult to trust what we’ve seen. Why? Well, because there were more mischievous misdirection devices in Smith’s year of flat-out denial than you’d expect from your average politician. He is singing the theme for Spectre, and it’s called ‘Writing’s On The Wall’. But for a long time we were all fooled, in the face of information from ultimately trustworthy ‘insider sources’ and the like. This is how…

August 8, 2014: The Sun publishes an article claiming Smith is in negotiations with MGM movie bosses to record the new Bond theme. We are curious; we have no reason to disbelieve. It is the start of a tumultuous, nerve-frazzling, 13-month journey.

August 13, 2014: NME is naturally very happy to be able to exclusively break the news that this is false. We ask Smith if he’s singing the new Bond theme, and he tells us, as if what he’s saying is true or something: “No, I have no idea what that was about and I know as much as you do. You probably know more than me; I didn’t even read the article. I think it’s something everyone would love to do, but yeah, it was all news to me. I won’t say any more on it.”

November 4, 2014: The New York Post reveals a secret weapon: an insider source! An insider source that cattily reveals to everyone that Lana Del Rey “had lobbied hard” for the opportunity, but lost out to Smith, who had met with Bond producer Barbara Broccoli and been labelled a “clear winner”. So, it is on?

December 4, 2014: We begin to think Smith might have been lying to us when the betting odds indicate he’ll be singing the theme. But odds are lowest not just for Smith, but also for Adele and Rihanna (all are 4/1), so we’re still not really sure.

June 9, 2015: Speculation is reignited, fuelled by gossip sites. But who believes gossip sites, man?

July 3, 2015: Smith continues to parrot his ‘not me’ line, here to Capital FM: “People seem to think I’m doing it but I have no idea what’s going on. I’m being deadly serious. I think I would know by now.” But then he says something else, something a little bit worse. “I heard Ellie Goulding was going to do it. It’s definitely not me.” Ellie Goulding, he says, like a tattletale. And we still kind of believe him.

July 3, 2015: Later that day, The Mirror reports that Ellie’s management have said it is a “wind up” and that there’s no truth to the claims. It’s a pretty humourless move, considering they could have had some fun with it.

July 6, 2015: Just three days later, Smith denies it again on Absolute Radio. “It’s the funniest thing just to sit back and watch everyone confirming something I know nothing about,” he says. “I’ve heard loads of rumours. I would have loved to have done it. But definitely not.” So… who is doing it, then? He looks away, shamefaced. “I’ve no idea.” He pauses. “Ellie Goulding?” And then his lip quivers slightly – just slightly – with the merest hint of mirth. You can see the moment below. We should have known. We should have known!

July 28, 2015: Ellie Goulding appears either to be in on the joke or to have been woefully misinterpreted, when she posts this Instagram photo at London’s Abbey Road – where Adele recorded ‘Skyfall’. We’re convinced that Smith was telling the truth – that Goulding is in fact singing the theme – and if this is her going along with the ruse, good on her. Good work. If she’s just recorded something else there, well, we don’t really care so much about that.

September 3, 2015: Five days ago. Just five days before he makes the announcement, and he’s still lying, still on camera, and to Jo Whiley of all people. How do you lie to Jo Whiley? There’s something inhuman about that.

If we’ve learned one thing from all this, it’s that Sam Smith is not to be trusted. If you encounter a Sam Smith in your local area, your best chance of survival is to run or hide, and tell the police. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.

2017: Blanche Lindo Blackwell dies at age 95--London, England. (Born 9 December 1912--San José, Costa Rica.)

Jamaica

Blanche Blackwell obituary

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2017/aug/29/blanche-blackwell-obituary
Heiress who became the ‘Jamaican wife’ of James Bond creator Ian
Fleming and was supposedly the model for Goldfinger’s Pussy
Galore
Ian Thomson | Tue 29 Aug 2017 12.26 EDT

Blanche Blackwell and Ian Fleming.
Photograph: Taken from the biography of Ian Fleming by Andrew Lycett

Blanche Blackwell, who has died aged 104, was a divorcee in her 40s when in 1956 she met Ian Fleming, her neighbour in Jamaica and the creator of James Bond; and soon they became lovers. Cracks had by then begun to show in Fleming’s marriage to Ann Charteris. Ann was ashamed of her husband’s success as a thriller writer (the Bond novels were “pornography”, she told friends), and had begun to stay away from their Jamaican home, Goldeneye.

Blackwell’s friendship with Fleming intensified when Ann began an affair with the politician Hugh Gaitskell. Ann became suspicious of “Ian’s Jamaican wife” after Anthony Eden’s wife, Clarissa, mentioned how helpful Blackwell had been at Goldeneye when the prime minister recuperated there in 1956 after the debacle of Suez. In an attempt to make Goldeneye more welcoming for the Edens, Blackwell had planted the garden with flowers; Ann later tore them out and threw them over the cliff.

Fleming wrote all 13 of his 007 novels in Jamaica, though only three (Dr No, Live and Let Die, The Man with the Golden Gun) were set partly on the island. Noël Coward, another neighbour, dubbed Fleming’s home “Goldeneye, nose and throat” for its lack of creature comforts. It was in this Spartan retreat that Fleming immersed himself in a Bond-like life of tropical oblivion fuelled by vodka and cigarettes (like 007, Fleming smoked 70 a day).

Impishly, he included sketches of his friends (and enemies) in his fiction. Blackwell was supposedly a model for Pussy Galore, the trapeze artist turned leader of a team of lesbian cat burglars who passes herself off as an air stewardess in his novel Goldfinger; for the film, she is a pilot and martial arts expert. In Dr No, the guano-collecting ship was named the Blanche. Blackwell claimed not to have read any of the books, though: “I don’t like violence.”

Daughter of Hilda (nee Lindo) and Percy Lindo, cousins who married, she was born into a wealthy Jamaican family, descended from Sephardic Jews from western Europe who had settled in Kingston in the mid-18th century and came to control much of the island’s commerce. Her father had helped to consolidate the family fortune in Costa Rica – where Blanche was born, in San José – before returning to Jamaica, where he owned property and produced rum.

In 1936, in London, Blanche married Joseph Blackwell, a captain in the Irish Guards and heir to the Crosse & Blackwell foods fortune. Together they ran the family estates in Jamaica and owned a string of racehorses. In 1937 their son Christopher was born. Blanche was not happy in the marriage, however. The actor Errol Flynn (“a gorgeous god,” Blackwell called him) became one of her admirers.

By the time she and Joseph divorced in 1949, she had moved to Jamaica’s north coast, to a house equidistant between Coward’s and Fleming’s. “Noël became a special pal of mine,” Blackwell told me during an interview in 2007, and Coward was said to have based his play Volcano on island life, and one of its central characters, Adela, on Blackwell.

Fleming adored “Birdie” Blackwell and her darting, kingfisher mind. And Blackwell, in her turn, considered Fleming a “charming, handsome, gifted man”, but one plagued by self-doubt and self-hate. “Ian was an angel”, she told me. “Errol was another … Both lovely men – both exceptionally gifted and definitely not for domesticating.”

When Fleming died of a heart attack in 1964, Blanche was invited neither to the funeral nor the memorial service. For years, she kept watch over Goldeneye for Fleming’s son Caspar; and after Caspar’s death in 1975 the house was bought first by Bob Marley, and then by her son, Chris, the founder in 1959 of Island Records, who had “discovered” Marley.

Tough and good-humoured, in later life Blackwell wore her white hair bobbed round an animated, heart-shaped face. Her life, until she decamped in 2003 to a flat in Knightsbridge, London, had been one of island entertainments and literary friendships. Now, looked after by three Jamaican maids, Blackwell became an unlikely devotee of bingo. Each week her chauffeur took her to the Cricklewood Mecca to play. In Kingston, she had liked to bet on the horses, but London bingo was not without its thrills. “Cricklewood might seem a little dull to you,” she said. “It isn’t really. I could sit for hours in the Mecca. The tension as your number comes up. Bing-bing-bingo!”

She is survived by her son.
• Blanche Blackwell, born 9 December 1912; died 8 August 2017

This article was amended on 13 September 2017. The original description of Pussy Galore as a pilot and martial arts expert applies only to the film; in the novel she is a trapeze artist turned leader of a team of lesbian cat burglars who passes herself off as an air stewardess.

See also

Blanche Blackwell, mistress and muse of
James Bond's creator
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/obituaries/blanche-blackwell-mistress-and-muse-of-james-bonds-creator-a7893731.html
Descended from a wealthy Jamaican family, she also enchanted Errol Flynn and inspired Noel Coward
Matt Schudel | Tuesday 15 August 2017 11:27

Vivacious and outdoorsy, Blackwell said she had lived a ‘marvelous life’

2020: Matt Sherman's Playing Games With James Bond is independently published.

https://literary007.com/2020/10/05/playing-games-with-james-bond-and-matt-sherman/

https://bondonthebox.wordpress.com/2020/10/25/playing-games-with-james-bond-by-matt-sherman/

2020: James Bond on Twitter salutes International Cat Day.

https://twitter.com/007/status/1292128442343809025

2021: The Golden Gate Park Band plays Video Game Music plus Music from Stage & Screen at the Golden Gate Park Shell, San Francisco.

Video Game Music plus Music from Stage & Screen

See the complete article here:

https://goldengateparkband.org/calendar/?mc_id=6

Calendar
Video Game Music plus Music from Stage & Screen
August 8, 2021 1:00 pm – 2:45 pm
Golden Gate Park Bandshell
San Francisco, CA

Program will be selected from the following:
El Caballero---Joseph Olivadoti
Beguine for Band--Glenn Osser
Minecraft---Daniel Rosenfeld/arr Ralph Ford
Spirited Away---Joe Hisaishi & Yumi Kimura/arr Kazuhiro Morita
Video Games Live--Part I---Marty O'Donnell/arr Ralph Ford
Waltz no 2 and March from Jazz Suite---Dmitri Shostakovich/arr Johan De Meij
Lincoln--John Williams/arr Jay Bocook
Bond...James Bond---arr Stephen Bulla
Symphonic Dances from Fiddler on the Roof---Jerry Bock/arr Ira Hearshen

Donations to the GGPB fund are tax-deductible.

The GGP Band is a non-profit organization sponsored by the Recreation & Park Department of San Francisco.

2021: The Great Games Treasure Hunts hosts Virus Safe Outdoor James Bond Westminster London Treasure Hunt.

AUG
8

Virus Safe Outdoor James Bond
Westminster London Treasure
Hunt

See the complete article here:

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/virus-safe-outdoor-james-bond-westminster-london-treasure-hunt-tickets-136689667475

The James Bond treasure hunt is a themed treasure hunt around the
Westminster London area. Can you break the code and be a secret agent?

About this event
Please due to covid be patient with the Pubs we work with, they have had a really tough year and might be reluctant with discounts. It will also be difficult for us to guarantee to book you any tables this Spring and Summer because it is going to be very busy. Please be understanding and we will try our best to cater to your needs but book ahead of time to guarantee us reserving you a place at the pub. :) Also all booking are flexible so if we can't book you a place at the pub, we can find a date for you that we can all do. :)

The Great Game Treasure Hunt James Bond London is a unique outdoor treasure hunt. Perfect to do whilst isolating, in order to get outdoors and exercise during these times, especially when you're stuck for something to do! NHS guidelines say it safe to go on walks outside and are encouraging exercise that doesn't involve close face to face contact with strangers. If you can't go to the gym, cinema or theatre, why not try a safe treasure hunt?

If you want to skip the pub at the end you can as your discount won't expire and you can use it in the future when things go back to normal.

This hunt does have a clue in the National Gallary. Please check with the National Gallery about getting entry passes on their website for the day of your hunt, due to covid. This clue can be skipped if you want to still play however during covid.

The James Bond hunt includes two parts:
Rated 5/5 on Google and 4.5/5 on Tripadvisor.

Firstly a secret agent mission to work out who is the spy. With this correct information you can obtain 20% off in the restaurant at the end (must purchase two courses), you will also debrief yourself to find out which rank you have achieved.

You are given an agent mission, compass, wristbands and clues to find your way along the route. If you are successful you will reveal where the treasure is - a great restaurant! At the restaurant you will receive discount off your bill.

Secondly, answer the James Bond trivia to successfully lead you around the area and to some famous spots from the films. Finally, you will reach a great restaurant with a bar at the end.

• Start: Parliament Square.
• Length: 2.2 miles, 3 hours.
• Treasure: Stylish modern restaurant with bar (20% off total food & drink bill - must purchase two courses).
• Route Info: This winding route takes in some of the famous sites from the films.
• Important info: Due to opening times for access to one clue this hunt must be started no later than 4pm.

Date and time
Sun, August 8, 2021
10:00 AM – 11:00 PM BST

by The Great Game Treasure Hunts
490 followers
£14.99 – £24.99

Location
Parliament Square
Great St George Street
London
SW1A 0AA
United Kingdom

[/quote]


The Great Game Treasure Hunts

RichardTheBruce

August 9th [51 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1927: Robert Archibald Shaw is born--Westhoughton, Lancashire, England.
(He dies 28 August 1978 at age 51--Tourmakeady, County Mayo, England.)

Actor Robert Shaw, Known for Menacing
Roles, Dies in Ireland

See the complete article here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/local/1978/08/29/actor-robert-shaw-known-for-menacing-roles-dies-in-ireland/10011e2d-0410-4cb0-a10b-90457d2f89a5/

By Gary Arnold | August 29, 1978

Robert Shaw, 52, one of the most forceful and successful character actors on the contemporary English speaking screen, died Sunday near his home in Ireland.

According to a police spokesman, Mr. Shaw became ill while driving with his third wife, Virginia, and their 20-month-old son, Thomas, near the family's home in Tourmakeady, County Mayo. Mr. Shaw reportedly stopped the car, got out and died on the roadside.

Mr. Shaw first achieved movie prominence in 1964 as the sinister assassin with granite physique and short platinum haircut who stalked Sean Connery's James Bond in "From Russia With Love." Later, he made imposing invaluable contributions to a pair of Academy award-winning films-the 1966 "A Man for All Seaons" in which he won an Oscar nomination for his supporting portrayal of Henry VIII, and the 1973 "The Sting," in which he played a menacing Irish gangster-and to one of the greatest box-office sensations, "Jaws," in which he appeared as the fanatical shark-hunter Quint.

While pursuing a notable acting career in the theater and motion pictures. Mr. Shaw also wrote five novels and three plays. He was working on a sixth novel at the time of his death. In a recent interview he remarked. "I find acting much easier than writing, but writing is more important to me. I think as I get older I'd rather write, but acting is so much more profitable." Mr. Shaw's best-known literary effort was The Man in the Glass Booth, a novel the author himself later dramatized successfully.

Born in the Lancashire town of Westhoughton on Aug. 9, 1927. Mr. Shaw grew up in Cornwall and the Orkney Islands. His father, a doctor, committed suicide with an overdose of opium when Robert Shaw was 12.

As a youth, Mr. Shaw excelled at sports, especially rugby, squash and track where his specialty was the 400-meter dash. He spurned a scholarship to Cambridge and a career in the family profession of medicine to apply at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art in London in 1945. He later recalled RADA with fond horror as a hotbed of competition for aspiring actors in the post-war period, "closer to a concentration camp than a school."

After graduation from RADA, Mr. Shaw spent several years as a member of the Shakespeare Memorial Theatre at Stratford-on-Avon and the Old Vic. He made his professional debut at Stratford-on-Avon as Angus in "Macbeth." His most noteworthy West End credits were "Tiger at the Gates" in 1956 and "The Long and Short and the Tall" in 1959, the same year his first novel, "The Hiding Place," was published.

Mr. Shaw made his film debut in the 1955 British war melodrama "The Dam Busters." Ironically, he will star as the chief dam-buster in "Force 10 from Navarrone" an adventure melodrama about World War II commandoes scheduled for release at Christmas. He also had completed a starring role as a defecting KGB agent in "Avalance Express" at the time of his death. This spy thriller, which costars Lee Marvin, is tentatively scheduled for release in the spring of 1979.

Alert moviegoers might have spotted Mr. Shaw early in 1964 as one of the fascinating misfits in "The Guest" the movie version of Harold Pinter's play "The Caretaker." With in a few months the success of "From Russia With Love" brought mass audience recognition to Mr. Shaw, and fame soon caught up with his costars from "The Caretaker," Donald Pleasence and Alan Bates.

Mr. Shaw's theatrical career has been linked closely with Pleasence and Pinter. He made his Broadway debut in a production of Pinter's "The Physicists" and later costarred in Pinter's "Old Times." Pleasense enjoyed a Broadway triumph in the title role of "The Man in the Glass Booth," which was directed by Pinter.

In an interview with Clarke Taylor that appeared in the Washington Post two years ago, Mr. Shaw stated, "My time is real development, both personally and professionally, came in working with Harold Pinter. He's the most interesting talent working in the theater today. It was a great creative, happy period for me."

A prolific actor and author, Mr. Shaw also extended himself as a paterfamilias. He had four daughters by his first marriage, to Jennifer Bourke, then two sons and two daughters by his second marriage, to actress Mary Ure, who died in 1975 from a fatal combination of alcohol and barbiturate poisoning. Mr. Shaw's third wife, the former Virginia Jansen, had worked as the secretary to the actor and Miss Ure for many tears. Mr. Shaw adopted Jansen's son by a previous marriage, and their own son was born in December 1976.

Mr Shaw frequently cited this brood as a spur to his creative or merly mercenary activity. Discussing his choice of certain film roles with Taylor, Mr. Shaw confided, "Money isn't the sole reason. But I do seem to spend more than I earn. And it takes a lot of money to raise these children of mine.

"I don't spend much on myself, maybe a drink. And I like to travel and stay at really fine hotels. I have an interest in fast cars, and I now have a Mercedes 450SL, but it's not like before, when I woned Rolls Royce convertibles and Astin Martins [sic]. Of course, the tax situation in Britain is impossible.

"I wake up in the middle of the night, frequently, with pain and humiliation and a great deal of shame at some of the work I've done in films. And I would do a good movie any day, regardless of the money. Unfortunately, there aren't many, and . . . if you are not successful now and again, nobody asks you to be in any movies at all. For years the studios would say 'Shaw's pictures make no money, he's not an international star.'"

Despite his vital participation in such hits as "The Sting" and "Jaws," Mr. Shaw never quite established credibility as a bankable star. Usually at his best as a menace, he may have had too much authority for conventional heroic leads. At any rate, he failed to bring a satisfying heroic or romantic presence to such starring vehicles as "Custer of the West," "Swashbuckler" and "Black Sunday." His physically and technique had a rather intimidating potency. He was frequently an impressive performer but rarely an ingratiating one.

Assessing his work, Mr. Shaw remarked. "Most of the time, in movies, I'm about 50 times larger than the part." While justified by the evidence, self-criticism like this was no doubt instrumental in earning the rugged, outspoken actor a reputation for insufferable vanity from some segments of the press.

Moviegoers and film-makers can attest to the authenticity of that larger-than-life quality. Mr Shaw's most gripping sustained scene on film is probably Quint's description of the shark attack on survivors of the U.S.S. Indianapolis that anticipates the thrilling finale of "Jaws."

Director Steven Spielberg has recalled that Mr. Shaw's first reading of Quint's speech, which the actor had helped rewrite, "devastated the set." Ironically, "the effect was so overwhelming that it threatened to capsize everyone prematurely. We had to do it again, with more restraint. In terms of the finished film, the reading was even better because Bob was imposing more controls on his emotions."

The larger-than-life identity seems certain to endure, but Mr. Shaw did submerge himself in the role of a victimized man in "The Caretaker" and a frustrated man in "The Luck of Ginger Coffrey." Irvin Kershner's fine, unjustly neglected movie version of Brian Moore's novel. Mr. Shaw also was prominently, if indecisively, featured in such movies as "Young Winston" (where he played Lord Randolph Churchill). "The Battle of Britain," "The Birthday Party." "Robin and Marian" (as the Sheriff of Nottingham) and "The Taking of Pelham 1-2-3."

He achieved considerable success in England as the lead in a television series called "The Buccaneers." He made a brief, unsuccessful attempt at the Broadway musical stage in 1970 as a singing Elmer Gantry in a failed song-and-dance adaptation of the Sinclair Lewis novel.

Three years ago, Mr. Shaw bought a 150-year-old mansion near a troutfilled lake in Tourmakeady and moved in with his wife and most of the Shaw progeny. According to friends, he described the location as "the nearest point on earth to heaven" and added. "When I go, I hope it will be from here."

Robert Shaw

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Robert_Shaw_(actor)

Work

Stage
The Caretaker (1962)
The Physicists (1964)
The Man in the Glass Booth (1968)
Gantry (1970)
Old Times (1971)
The Dance of Death (1974)

Filmography

The Cherry Orchard (1947)

The Lavender Hill Mob (1951) – Chemist at Police Exhibition (uncredited)
The Dam Busters (1954) – Flight Sgt. J. Pulford
Double Cross (1956) – Ernest
A Hill in Korea (1956) – Lance Corporal Hodge
The Buccaneers (1956–1957, TV Series) – Captain Dan Tempest
Rupert of Hentzau (TV, 1957) – Rupert of Hentzau
Sea Fury (1958) – Gorman
Libel (1959) – First Photographer

The Four Just Men (1960, TV Series) – Stuart
The Dark Man (TV, 1960) – Alan Regan
Danger Man (1961) – TV episode – Bury The Dead – Tony Costello
The Winter's Tale (1961) – Leontes
The Valiant (1962) – Lieutenant Field
The Father (1962) – The Captain
Tomorrow at Ten (1962) – Marlowe
The Caretaker (1963) – Aston
The Cracksman (1963) – Moke
From Russia with Love (1963) – Donald 'Red' Grant
Hamlet (1964) – Claudius, King of Denmark
The Luck of Ginger Coffey (1964) – Ginger Coffey
Carol for Another Christmas (1964) – Ghost of Christmas Future
Battle of the Bulge (1965) – Col. Martin Hessler
A Man for All Seasons (1966) – King Henry VIII
Custer of the West (1967) – Gen. George Armstrong Custer
Luther (TV, 1968) – Martin Luther
The Birthday Party (1968) – Stanley Webber
Battle of Britain (1969) – Squadron Leader "Skipper"
The Royal Hunt of the Sun (1969) – Francisco Pizarro

Figures in a Landscape (1970) – MacConnachie (also adapted for the screen)
A Town Called Bastard (a.k.a. A Town Called Hell) (1971) – The Priest
Young Winston (1972) – Lord Randolph Churchill
A Reflection of Fear (a.k.a. Labyrinth) (1973) – Michael
The Hireling (1973) – Steven Ledbetter
The Golden Voyage of Sinbad (1973) – The Oracle of All Knowledge (uncredited)
The Sting (1973) – Doyle Lonnegan
The Taking of Pelham One Two Three (1974) – Mr. Blue – Bernard Ryder
Jaws (1975) – Quint
The Man in the Glass Booth (1975) – Writer only
End of the Game (a.k.a. Der Richter und sein Henker, Murder on the Bridge, Deception, and Getting Away with Murder) (1975) – Richard Gastmann
Diamonds (a.k.a. Diamond Shaft) (1975) – Charles / Earl Hodgson
Robin and Marian (1976) – Sheriff of Nottingham
Swashbuckler (a.k.a. Scarlet Buccaneer) (1976) – Ned Lynch
Black Sunday (1977) – Major David Kabokov
The Deep (1977) – Romer Treece
Force 10 from Navarone (1978) – Major Keith Mallory
Avalanche Express (1979) – General Marenkov (final film role)

Writing
The Hiding Place (1960)
The Sun Doctor (1961)
The Flag (1965)
Situation Hopeless... But Not Serious (screenplay adaptation of The Hiding Place, 1965)
The Man in the Glass Booth (1967)
The Man in the Glass Booth (play adaptation, 1968)
A Card from Morocco (1969)
Figures in a Landscape (1970) (screenplay adaptation of novel)
Cato Street (play, 1971)

Awards
He became the second actor to be nominated to the 39th Academy Awards for playing Henry VIII of England in the film A Man for All Seasons (1966). He was also nominated to the 24th Golden Globe Awards for the same role.

1977: On Her Majesty's Secret Service re-released in the Philippines.
1979: Moonraker: Misión espacial (Moonraker: Special Mission) released in Argentina.

https://www.comicsroyale.com/

1985: Agent 007 i skudlinien (Agent 007 in the Firing Line) released in Denmark.

https://www.bond-o-rama.dk/en/avtak-dk-poster-1985/

1985: 007 ja kuoleman katse (007 and a Look at Death) released in Finland.

https://ahvenaario.wordpress.com/2017/09/08/roskasarjat-007-ja-kuoleman-katse/

1985: James Bond 007 – Im Angesicht des Todes (James Bond 007 - In the Face of Death) released in West Germany.

1987: The New York Times prints a letter to the editor written by Raymond Benson responding to Janet Maslin's 31 July review of The Living Daylights and her comments on Timothy Dalton.

To the Editor:

As the vice president of the James Bond 007 Fan Club and author of ''The James Bond Bedside Companion,'' which studies the Bond phenomenon, Ian Fleming's life and the James Bond character, I feel I am qualified to comment on Janet Maslin's review, ''Film: 'Living Daylights,' With the New Bond'' [ July 31 ] . She has mildly criticized Timothy Dalton's performance as being almost ''too serious.''

I would like to point out that up to this point, we have never seen a ''purist's'' characterization of the Bond character on the screen, i.e., one who embodies Ian Fleming's original character from the novels. Sean Connery was magnificent in the role; he added a sardonic, cynical amusement to the character that sold 007 to audiences around the world, but this was not necessarily a trait of the literary Bond. George Lazenby merely attempted to emulate Connery's performance and failed. Roger Moore, who publicly admitted ignoring the Fleming books, made the character his own by turning Bond into a superficially charming international playboy who uses one-liners and a raised eyebrow to escape dangerous situations.

Timothy Dalton, on the other hand, has gone back to Fleming and has attempted (and in my opinion, succeeded very well) in creating the author's Bond - a real flesh-and-blood man who has doubts and feelings. James Bond is not a superman; he detests killing and does it because it's his job; he is not ''witty'' and ''dapper'' as the films have so often portrayed him; he is somber and reflective, basically cold-hearted, ruthless, and he takes his job very seriously. When it comes to food and drink, he is a gourmand - he simply appreciates what he likes; because he must usually ''dine alone,'' he insists on his meals and drinks prepared a specific way. Mr. Dalton is presenting to us the most accurate interpretation of the literary character we've ever seen on screen.

As for the new film's treatment of Bond's womanizing (he only sleeps with one woman in this one), this was a conscious decision on the film makers' part as a response to the current AIDS crisis. It just wouldn't do to have Bond hop from bed to bed in this day and age, even if it is a bit out of character.

I feel that ''The Living Daylights'' is the most mature and most ''adult'' Bond film since the 60's.

RAYMOND BENSON New York City

1991: The United Nations Children's Fund (UNICEF) appoints Roger Moore as Goodwill Ambassador
and its special representative for the film arts.

https://unicef.org/

2002: RTE reports that Lee Tamahori told Vanity Fair about filming a steamy love scene with Pierce Brosnan and Halle Berry.

Brosnan shoots steamy Berry scene

See the complete article here:

https://www.rte.ie/entertainment/2002/0809/397333-brosnanp/

Originally Published / Friday, 9 Aug 2002

007 star Pierce Brosnan has just completed filming a steamy love scene with Bond girl Halle Berry for the latest James Bond movie.

Director Lee Tamahori told Vanity Fair magazine he had shot a sizzling scene for 'Die Another Day' but is not sure whether it will survive the censors, or even make the producers' cut.

Navan born Brosnan is playing the secret agent in the 20th Bond film.

The world premiere of 'Die Another Day' will take place at London's Royal Albert Hall on 18 November.

2018: Forbidden History airs "The Real James Bond" featuring footage of Fleming plus Maryam d'Abo.

Forbidden History (2013– )
The Real James Bond

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt8817054/
1h | Documentary, History | Episode aired 9 August 2018
Season 5 | Episode 4

Jamie uncovers the truth behind the world famous fictional spy, revealing those elements of the character that were drawn from creator Ian Fleming's own experiences.

Cast (in credits order)
Jamie Theakston ... Self - Presenter / Narrator
Rest of cast listed alphabetically:
Maryam d'Abo ... Self
Ian Fleming ... Self (archive footage)
Andrew Gough ... Andrew Gough

Available to enhanceTV subscribers.

https://www.enhancetv.com.au/video/forbidden-history-the-real-james-bond/53344

2021: 007 - The Music of James Bond at San Harbor, Lake Tahoe, Nevada.

007: The Music of James
Bond at Sand Harbor

See the complete article here:

https://www.visitrenotahoe.com/events-listing/category/live-music/photo/

Sand Harbor State Park | Aug 9, 2021
Visit Website
https://laketahoeshakespeare.com/?play=monday-night-showcase

When it comes to the music of James Bond films, “Nobody Does it Better” than the Reno Phil! Bond films have produced some of the greatest movie music of all time. Broadway stars Hugh Panaro and Morgan James bring these cinematic classics to life at Lake Tahoe and headline an unforgettable concert conducted by Jason Altieri. Prepare to be “shaken” and “stirred”!

RichardTheBruce

August 10th [50 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1918: Martin Benson is born--London, England.
(He dies 28 February 2010 at age 91--Markyate, Hetfordshire, England.)

Martin Benson obituary

See the complete article here:

https://www.theguardian.com/film/2010/may/06/martin-benson-obituary

Often cast as villains, he appeared in Goldfinger and The King and I
Gavin Gaughan
Thu 6 May 2010 13.49 EDT

Martin Benson in the 1985 TV wartime drama Arch of Triumph Photograph: ITV / Rex Features

The actor Martin Benson, who has died aged 91, occupied a screen category filled in its time by Herbert Lom, with whom he acted on several occasions, and previously Conrad Veidt – that of the worldly, sophisticated, foreign villain. With jet-black hair, dark colouring and pronounced eyebrows on a thin face, he never seemed properly dressed without a tuxedo. As well as remaining furiously busy during six decades as an actor, he pursued several artistic disciplines.

Born into a Jewish family in London, he seemed briefly destined to become a pharmacist. As a gunner in the army during the second world war, he organised entertainment for the troops, and produced a tour of Gaslight in aid of a fund to replace HMS Dorsetshire. By 1944, he had been promoted to captain and was posted to Alexandria, Egypt, where he built a theatre from scratch, assisted by his sergeant-major, another aspiring actor – Arthur Lowe.

Among Benson's earliest screen roles was an unbilled part for Alfred Hitchcock in Under Capricorn (1949). The King and I had its British stage premiere at Drury Lane in October 1953, with Lom as the King, and Benson as his court chancellor, Kralahome. Benson played the part again opposite Yul Brynner in the Hollywood film version in 1956. He also played the King himself in February 1955, when Lom was ill. Benson later asserted that "despite the reputation which Yul Brynner continues to enjoy, the more intelligent as well as intelligible performance came from Herbert Lom, notwithstanding a good deal less swagger".

Back in Britain and in modestly budgeted monochrome thrillers, he was on characteristic form in Soho Incident (1956) as a "big boss" running crooked boxing and horse-racing schemes. Venturing into television, Benson was among a repertory company of actors in the half-hour anthology Douglas Fairbanks Presents (1953-57), aimed at US television, shown in Britain as cinema shorts and as schedule-fillers in ITV's early days. Benson also worked on the scripts, where as many foreign settings were included as possible. Another rep company member was Christopher Lee, who called it a valuable training ground. He and Benson made up a comic double act for one segment, The Death of Michael Turbin (1953), as slow-witted east Europeans.

He was a regular, as the villainous Duke de Medici, in Sword of Freedom (1957-58). In 1958 and 1959, he played a barrister in the unscripted courtroom series The Verdict Is Yours and, in On Trial (1960), which recreated celebrated cases, Micheal MacLiammoir played Oscar Wilde, with Benson as his prosecutor, Edward Carson.

After a role in Cleopatra (1963), he was an American gangster coerced into taking a doomed car ride with the henchman Oddjob, in Goldfinger (1964). He was among a houseful of suspects in Peter Sellers's second outing as Clouseau, A Shot in the Dark (1964).

From 1960 to 1985, Martin Benson Films, based in Radlett in Hertfordshire, made more then 100 educational and training films, which Benson directed, wrote and occasionally narrated. Some were for Save the Children.

For Lew Grade's ITC series, the logical successors to the Fairbanks shows, he variously played corrupt South American ministers, Algerian majors, ruthless Turkish policemen and cigar-smoking gamblers. Submerged under green makeup, Benson played the Vogon Captain, an excruciatingly bad poet, in Douglas Adams's The Hitch Hiker's Guide to the Galaxy (1981).

Benson began painting in his stage dressing room, and in 1993 he staged an exhibition of his Shakespearean paintings at the Shakespeare Globe Centre, the subjects including Laurence Olivier, John Gielgud and Alec Guinness.

His later credits included Alan Parker's adaptation of Angela's Ashes (1999) and a 2005 episode of Casualty.

His wife Joy, son and three daughters, two stepdaughters and one stepson survive him.

• Martin Benson, actor, born 10 August 1918; died 28 February 2010

Martin Benson
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martin_Benson_(actor)

Filmography

Suspected Person (1942) as minor role (uncredited)[citation needed]
The Blind Goddess (1948) as Count Stephan Mikla
But Not in Vain (1948) as Mark Meyer
Trapped by the Terror (1949) as Prison Governor[citation needed]
Under Capricorn (1949) as Man Carrying Shrunken Head (uncredited)[citation needed]
The Adventures of PC 49: Investigating the Case of the Guardian Angel (1949) as Skinny Ellis

I'll Get You for This (1951) as Frankie Sperazza
Assassin for Hire (1951) as Catesby
Night Without Stars (1951) as White Cap
The Dark Light (1951) as Luigi
Hotel Sahara (1951) as Minor Role (uncredited)[citation needed]
Mystery Junction (1951) as Steve Harding
Judgment Deferred (1952) as Pierre Desportes
The Frightened Man (1952) as Alec Stone
Wide Boy (1952) as Rocco
Ivanhoe (1952) as Minor Role (uncredited)[citation needed]
The Gambler and the Lady (1952) as Tony - Pat's Dance Partner
Top of the Form (1953) as Cliquot
Wheel of Fate (1953) as Riscoe
Recoil (1953) as Farnborough
Always a Bride (1953) as Hotel Desk Clerk (uncredited)[citation needed]
Black 13 (1953) as Bruno
Escape by Night (1953) as Guillio
You Know What Sailors Are (1954) as Agrarian Officer (uncredited)[citation needed]
West of Zanzibar (1954) as Dhofar
Knave of Hearts (1954) as Art (uncredited)[citation needed]
Passage Home (1955) as Gutierres
Doctor at Sea (1955) as Head Waiter (uncredited)[citation needed]
Soho Incident (aka Spin a Dark Web) (1956) as Rico Francesi
23 Paces to Baker Street (1956) as Pillings
The King and I (1956) as Kralahome
Istanbul (1957) as Mr. Darius
Doctor at Large (1957) as Maharajah of Rhanda
Interpol (1957) as Captain Varolli
The Flesh Is Weak (1957) as Angelo Giani
Man from Tangier (1957) as Voss
Windom's Way (1957) as Samcar, Rebel Commander (uncredited)[citation needed]
The Strange World of Planet X (1958) as Smith
Sea of Sand (1958) as German Half-track Officer (uncredited)[citation needed]
The Two-Headed Spy (1958) as Gen. Wagner
Make Mine a Million (1959) as Chairman
Killers of Kilimanjaro (1959) as Ali

Once More, with Feeling! (1960) as Luigi Bardini
Oscar Wilde (1960) as George Alexander
Sands of the Desert (1960) as Selim
The Gentle Trap (1960) as Ricky Barnes[citation needed]
The 3 Worlds of Gulliver (1960) as Flimnap
Exodus (1960) as Mordekai
Gorgo (1961) as Dorkin
Five Golden Hours (1961) as Enrico
A Matter of WHO (1961) as Rahman
The Silent Invasion (1962) as Borge
Satan Never Sleeps (1962) as Kuznietsky
Village of Daughters (1962) as 1st Pickpocket
Captain Clegg (1962) as Mr. Rash (innkeeper)
I tre nemic (1962) as Prof. Otto Kreutz[citation needed]
The Fur Collar (1962) as Martin Benson
Cleopatra (1963) as Ramos
Mozambique (1964) as Da Silva
The Secret Door (1964) as Edmundo Vara
A Shot in the Dark (1964) as Maurice
Behold a Pale Horse (1964) as Priest
Goldfinger (1964) as Mr. Solo
The Secret of My Success (1965) as Rex Mansard
A Man Could Get Killed (1966) as Politanu
The Magnificent Two (1967) as President Diaz
Battle Beneath the Earth (1967) as Gen. Chan Lu

Pope Joan (1972) as Lothair
Tiffany Jones (1973) as Petcek
The Omen (1976) as Father Spiletto
Mohammad, Messenger of God (1976) as Abu-Jahal
Al-risâlah (1976) as Kisra[citation needed]
Jesus of Nazareth (1977, TV mini-series) as Pharisee
Meetings with Remarkable Men (1979) as Dr. Ivanov
The Human Factor (1979) as Boris
The Sea Wolves (1980) as Mr. Montero
Sphinx (1981) as Muhammed
Young Toscanini (1988) as Comparsa (uncredited)[citation needed]

The Camomile Lawn (1992) as Pauli Erstweiler
Angela's Ashes (1999) as Christian brother

1928: Jimmy Dean is born--Plainview, Texas.
(He dies 13 June 2010 at age 81--Varina, Virginia.)

Jimmy Dean dies at 81; country music star and sausage king

See the complete article here:

https://www.latimes.com/local/obituaries/la-me-jimmy-dean-20100615-story.html

By Dennis McLellan
| Los Angeles Times | Jun 15, 2010 | 12:00 AM

Jimmy Dean helped bring country music into the mainstream in the 1960s. (CBS TV)

When the Country Music Assn. announced in February that Jimmy Dean would be inducted into the Country Music Hall of Fame later this year, Dean joked, "I thought I was already in there."

"Seriously, it brought a huge grin to my face," he said in a news release. "I am honored."

Dean already had been inducted into the Virginia Country Music Hall of Fame in 1997 and the Texas Music Hall of Fame in 2005.

That's not to mention his 2009 induction into the Meat Industry Hall of Fame.

Indeed, Dean, who died Sunday evening at his home in Henrico County, Va., at age 81, may be better known by some today as "the sausage king" of TV commercial fame than a hit-making country music star and one-time TV show host who helped bring country music into the mainstream in the 1960s.

The Texas-born entertainer and businessman, who began his recording career in the 1950s, scored a No. 1 hit on both the country and pop singles charts in 1961 with his spoken-narrative song about a coal miner — "a giant of a man" — who saves fellow workers from "a would-be grave" after their mine collapses.

"Big Bad John," which Dean said he wrote in an hour and a half on a flight from New York to Tennessee, earned a Grammy Award for best country and western recording.

The 1960s were the down-home entertainer's heyday.

He went on to record hits including "Dear Ivan," "Little Black Book," "P.T. 109" (inspired by the Naval vessel commanded by John F. Kennedy during World War II) and "The First Thing Ev'ry Morning (And the Last Thing Ev'ry Night)."

From 1963 to '66, he hosted "The Jimmy Dean Show," an hourlong TV musical variety show that ran on ABC and featured singers including Roger Miller, George Jones and Buck Owens. The show also regularly featured Dean's humorous banter with a "dog" named Rowlf, the first of Jim Henson's Muppets to attract national attention.

Along with headlining in Las Vegas and performing in venues such as Carnegie Hall and the London Palladium, Dean played fur trapper Josh Clements on Fess Parker's "Daniel Boone" series in the late '60s and had the supporting role of a reclusive billionaire in the 1971 James Bond film "Diamonds Are Forever."

He launched the Jimmy Dean Meat Co. in the late '60s, after previously buying a hog farm in his native Texas.

"Everything was fine and dandy until hog prices dropped out," he told the Richmond Times-Dispatch in 2004. "One morning I was having breakfast at a little old diner in Plainview — sausages and eggs — and reached up and plucked a [large] piece of gristle out of my teeth."

It was then, he said, that he became determined to produce a quality sausage.

"It was not something I just put my name on," he said. "It was my money and my sausage and my work — and those commercials that they think are so funny."

After selling his meat company to what later became known as the Sara Lee Corp. in 1984, he remained as chairman of the board and TV spokesman. After he was dropped as spokesman in 2003, Dean reportedly stopped eating the products that bear his name and changed his license plates that read SSG KING.

Dean was born Aug. 10, 1928, in Olton, Texas, and grew up in Plainview. He and his brother Don were raised on a farm by their mother after their father left when Dean was still a child. They were so poor, he once said, he wore shirts that his mother made out of sugar sacks.

Poverty, Dean told the Times-Dispatch, "was the greatest motivating factor in my life."

He began singing early on, and his mother taught him to play his first chord on the piano when he was 10. He later taught himself to play the harmonica, guitar and accordion.

Dropping out of high school at 16, he joined the Merchant Marines and later served in the Air Force. While stationed at a base in Washington, D.C., Dean and three other airmen formed a country music quartet that played local honkytonks.

After his discharge in 1948, Dean formed the Texas Wildcats. He began developing a following with a show on an Arlington, Va., radio station and had his first country top 10 hit, "Bumming Around," in 1953.

Dean and the Texas Wildcats moved to local television in 1955, and from 1957 to 1959 he hosted the first version of "The Jimmy Dean Show," a half-hour daily variety series on CBS.

Thirty Years of Sausage, Fifty Years of Ham: Jimmy Dean's Own Story, a 2004 autobiography, was co-written with his second wife, Donna Meade Dean, a singer and songwriter he married in 1991.

In addition to his wife, he is survived by his children from his first marriage, Garry Dean, Connie Dean Taylor and Robert Dean; and two granddaughters.

[email protected]

Jimmy Dean (I) (1928–2010)

Soundtrack | Actor
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0212818/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

1959: Diamonds Are Forever comic strip begins its run in The Daily Express.
(Ends 30 January 1960. 340-487) John McLusky, artist. Henry Gammidge, writer.

Swedish Semic 1972
https://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/comics/semic_1972.php3?s=comics&id=01759

Diamantfeber
(Diamond Fever - Diamonds Are Forever)

Swedish Semic 1988
https://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/comics/semic_1988.php3?s=comics&id=02331

Diamantfeber
(Diamonds Are Forever - Part 1) (Diamonds Are Forever - Part 2)

Danish 1967 https://www.bond-o-rama.dk/en/jb007-dk-no9-1967/

James Bond Agent 007 no. 9: “Diamonds are Forever” (1967)
"Død og diamanter" [Death and diamonds]

1962: Life prints Tim Green's article “Bon Vivant and the Scourge of Smersh: The Master of Agent 007.”
1963: Sean Connery finishes all From Russia With Love filming, ending in Rhoda’s truck.

https://twitter.com/007/status/895676125904478210

1966: Stars and Stripes reports on You Only Live Twice filming.

'007' takes Japanese village by storm

See the complete article here:

https://www.stripes.com/news/007-takes-japanese-village-by-storm-1.20205

by Al Ricketts • • August 10, 1966

Sean Connery with actresses Mie Hama, left, and Akiko Wakabayashi at a press conference
during the filming of the James Bond movie, ''You Only Live Twice,'' in July, 1966.
(Hideyuki Mihashi/Stars and Stripes)

The tiny fishing village of Akime, on the southernmost tip of Japan, will never be the same.

James Bond and company have descended upon it via helicopters, buses and air-conditioned cars. They have a mobile snack bar (sandwiches, lime juice, tea and water) and a built-in-a-bus restroom on the set at all times.

And when superstar Sean Connery, sans trench coat, tricky attache case and made up to look like a Japanese fisherman, strides unsmilingly toward the camera, he is besieged by a battalion of Japanese photographers.

The film, loosely based on Ian Fleming's Japan-laid You Only Live Twice, is creating more controversy among the Japanese press than any flick ever filmed in the land of cherry blossoms and automatic bows.

Although Tetsuro Tanba (as detective Tiger Tanaka), Mie Hama (as Kissy Suzuki) and Akiko Wakabayashi (filling a write-in role as a sort of female Bond counterpart) all have received their share of attention, it's the rugged Connery--the biggest boxoffice attraction in the world today--who has caused the most excitement.

The Japanese press--en masse--has submitted formal complaints to publicity people and co-producer Albert "Cubby" Broccoli because they don't feel they are getting enough photographs or personal interviews with the star.

Although the straw hat sales and the amount of beer peddled across the counter in Akime's only hotel have skyrocketed, the villagers are only mildly impressed.

Fishing nets them several million yen a year and on weekends they always attract at least 300 fishermen and swimmers a day.

But there's one thing they all have in common. Just say "007" to any Japanese in the vicinity and he's bound to break into a great big grin of acknowledgment.

1981: Agent 007 – Strengt fortroligt (Agent 007 - Strictly Confidential) released in Denmark.

"Agent 007 - strictly confidential" or "Agent 007: Strict Confidence"

1982: Octopussy first unit filming begins at the Berlin Wall and Checkpoint Charlie. As watched closely by Stasi.

How Communist spies tracked James
Bond in real life: East Germany's
feared Stasi were poised to arrest
Roger Moore on set of Octopussy for
crossing into East Berlin at Checkpoint
Charlie, files reveal

See the complete article here:

https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9730769/How-Communist-spies-tracked-James-Bond-set-Octopussy-crossing-East-Berlin.html

• East Germany's secret police were spying on Roger Moore on set of Octopussy
• A Stasi report states that James Bond film crew 'violated' border of Berlin Wall
• In scene filmed at Checkpoint Charlie, 007s car crossed the line while turning

By Clare Mccarthy For Mailonline | Published: 27 June 2021

East Germany's secret police, the Stasi, were poised to arrest Roger Moore on set of James Bond movie, Octopussy, uncovered files have revealed.

The documents, published yesterday in German newspaper, Bild, revealed that the Stasi were closely tracking the movements of James Bond film crew while filming in Berlin on August 10, 1982.

A Stasi report stated that the crew had 'violated' the border of the Berlin Wall by about '4 to 5 metres' while they shot a scene at Checkpoint Charlie, the most famous of the seven border crossings into East Berlin.

East Germany's secret police, the Stasi, were poised to arrest Roger Moore
(pictured at Checkpoint Charlie) while filming James Bond movie, Octopussy,
in Berlin in 1982

In the classic movie scene, Roger Moore, as 007, was ­chauffeured in a dark Mercedes 200 to Checkpoint Charlie to meet 'M', the head of British intelligence, played by Robert Brown.

The same scene was reshot a number of times at the request of Octopussy director John Glen, with the Mercedes driving up to the East-West German border during each take before turning around.

However, the crew did not realise that while turning, the car was crossing into East Germany.

It is now known that the feared and brutal intelligence and secret police agency who ran the communist state of East Germany were tracking the car's every movement.

The documents, published yesterday, revealed that the Stasi were closely tracking the movements of James Bond film crew while filming in Berlin and noted the incident in detail

The Stasi officers' report said: 'When turning, the vehicle violated the state border four times by about 4 to 5 metres.

'Report on filming of a 'James Bond' movie, in the western apron of the border crossing point Friedrich/Zimmerstrasse on August 10, 1982, between 7:30am and 1:33 pm.

'12 vehicles appeared in the western apron of the border crossing point... most of them parked in the parking lot behind the house Zimmerstrasse 19 a.'

The Stasi was the official secret police agency of the former East Germany which was established in 1950 and had up to 100,000 employees by 1989 but was disbanded when Germany reunified in 1990.

One of the Stasi's main tasks was spying on the population, primarily through a vast network of citizens turned informants, who spied on and denounced colleagues, friends, neighbours, and even family members.

1987: The Living Daylights released in Ljubljana, Yugoslavia.
1989: Lizenz zum Töten released in West Germany.

2003: The Washington Post proposes literary Bond can "Live or Let Die".

Live or Let Die? A Midlife Crisis for the James Bond Novels

See the complete article here:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/2003/08/10/live-or-let-die-a-midlife-crisis-for-the-james-bond-novels/5e266f5e-651e-4fc4-bd1a-2c820dbcb6e0/?utm_term=.a22c9e6b2b3a

By Bob Bryant August 10, 2003

-- For seven years, Raymond Benson was James Bond's boss. Benson planned the secret missions, scoped out the death traps, plumbed the dark hearts of 007's enemies from 1996 through 2002.

Bond went where Benson willed, did as Benson wished, took lives or spared them as Benson saw fit. Such is the power of a James Bond novelist.

Benson, who lives in the Chicago suburbs, was only the fourth man -- and the first American -- to write a series of Bond novels since Britain's Ian Fleming created the character. "It was terrifying and exciting, all at the same time," Benson, 47, says of his six original Bonds and three movie novelizations. "It was a roller coaster."

But as Bond celebrates his 50th year in literature -- half a century since Fleming published "Casino Royale" in the spring of 1953 -- the 007 series is at a small crossroads.

Benson has left the series to write his own novels, and no new Bond novelist has been named. After five decades and 35 original Bond books (not counting movie novelizations) that have sold nearly 100 million copies in all, where do the Bond books go from here?

Whoever writes the Bond novels "is going to be in the hot seat," Benson said in a telephone interview. "Whoever is in this spot is going to be under a microscope."

One reason for that is the passion of Bond fans, many of whom have built sharply opinionated Internet sites about 007. Another is the small number of people in the Bond Novelists Club.

Fleming wrote 14 "Bonds" before he died in 1964 at age 56. There was a one-shot 1968 Bond novel by Kingsley Amis. It was more than a decade after that when Fleming's heirs authorized another British novelist, John Gardner, to write a new Bond series, and Gardner did 14 novels. Then came Benson and six more original Bonds.

Benson said he had no idea who might be in line to be the next Bond novelist or in what direction the books might go. The novelists typically have set the books in the present day, whenever that might be -- the '60s through the '90s -- but Benson's wish is that the novels "stay in the Cold War. I'd like to see Bond frozen in time."

It's unlikely the literary series can again explode as it did in the 1960s, when Fleming paperbacks, fueled by the Bond movies' success, sprouted bold covers on every drugstore rack. And no one should expect that, says Los Angeles writer-producer John Cork, co-author of "James Bond: The Legacy," a coffee-table book published last year.

Fleming -- ex-reporter, ex-British Naval Intelligence officer, world traveler, unabashed womanizer -- started it all with a slim, grim novel called "Casino Royale."

No spectacular action scenes here -- it's about one spy trying to bankrupt another at the gambling tables. Fleming wrote the book in about six weeks at his Jamaican retreat, Goldeneye, then casually offered "this miserable piece of work . . . this dreadful oafish opus" to a novelist friend with publishing connections. It sold.

Fleming kept going back, year after year, to his main character, James Bond, 007, licensed to kill in the name of Her Majesty the Queen.

Bond was Fleming's "dream self," a Fleming biographer said. Bond shared Fleming's tastes, smoked Fleming's cigarettes (70 a day for both agent and author).

The Bond movies always kept Fleming's titles -- those titles were gold. But ever since Fleming's heirs resurrected the Bond novels in 1981, the books and the films have run on separate tracks. None of the 20 "modern" Bond novels by Benson or Gardner has been made into a film; all of Fleming's were.

Partly because of that, none of the new novels has enjoyed a fraction of the fame Fleming's work has.

Gardner's first Bond novel, restarting the series in 1981, updated the politics by abolishing the Double-O branch of the Secret Service -- the spies licensed to kill -- except for Bond, who stayed on as a global "troubleshooter."

Gardner gave up the series in 1996.

"His early novels were on the New York Times bestseller list," said Bryan Krofchok, who runs a Bond site on the Internet (www.bondian.com) and teaches computer science at Sacramento (Calif.) City College. "[But] the general public's interest in new Bond novels seems to have petered out midway through Gardner's series, at least here in the United States."

Gardner, already an established novelist when he took the Bond job, remembers his time as "the most difficult years of my professional life."

In an e-mail interview from his home in Hampshire, England, the author, now 76, said it was a struggle to find the right style while trying to satisfy the Fleming heirs and to quell the "strange hostility and mistrust" of Bond fans. "My consistent nightmare," Gardner said, "is that I shall be remembered only as the author who took James Bond through the '80s and into the '90s. Yet I am proud of my work on the Bonds and believe that the books did the job."

Benson's Bond books, starting in 1997, brought a faster pace and a more fallible 007.

"Sometimes I wonder why I bother," a beat-up Bond muses in "High Time to Kill" (1999). "In the old days, the enemy was clear cut. Communism was a worldwide threat. . . . Today it's different. I feel as if I've become a glorified policeman. There must be a better way to die."

Benson, who got the Bond job after writing a book called "The James Bond Bedside Companion" in the 1980s, said he never pictured his 007 as one of the movie Bonds but instead as "a shadowy, non-specific guy."

Benson said he would look at a map of the world and ask, "What locales would Britain have an interest in?" That might lead to a story. Then he would submit a detailed outline to Glidrose Publications, which holds the Bond copyrights: "I never had one rejected."

Then Benson would travel to the locations on Bond's itinerary -- "Walk in Bond's footsteps." (Fleming did the same, laden with small notebooks.) Benson's travel phase might take one to four weeks. The actual writing might take four to five months, Benson said. Then editing by the publishers and the Fleming interests. Bond essentially was a full-time job, he said.

And the reaction from readers? The hard-core Bond fans, the Internet fans, were the loudest voices Benson heard. "They either loved me or hated me," he said. "It was a challenge dealing with the fans. They're so opinionated."

Bond fans such as Krofchok acknowledge that the series is serving "a niche market" of longtime 007 fans -- and at the same time facing competition from mainstream thrillers. "There are now many other authors writing 'Bondian'-style novels -- but without James Bond," Krofchok said. (Who is Tom Clancy's hero, Jack Ryan, but an American Bond?)

The new Bond books also are competing with the very similar, but very different, new Bond movies, Cork noted. One solution, he said, could be along the lines of Benson's suggestion -- to permanently put the literary Bond in a Cold War setting.

The books' future seems wide open. There's no announced heir to the Fleming throne -- Fleming's family has announced no successor to Benson. Representatives of Ian Fleming Publications couldn't be reached for comment. Cork said his impression was that in this 50th-anniversary year, they preferred to put the focus back on Fleming's novels, which are being reissued as trade paperbacks with 1950s-style pulp-art covers.

Gardner, who has written more Bond books than any other living man, thinks the bell has tolled for the Bond novels. Don't "play games" with Cold War flashbacks, he said -- the new novels "should end now."

And if the literary Bond heads into more happy decades of martinis, girls and guns? In that case, Gardner said, "I pray that they find a Brit who is a professional novelist with a track record."

"The sad thing today," he said, "is that people talking of Bond usually talk of the films and not the books. And the films, alas, seem to have gone down the road to Dumbville."

American Raymond Benson is the latest official James Bond novelist, but after six books with 007, he's giving up the job.Ian Fleming wrote his first Bond novel, "Casino Royale," in 1953. Kingsley Amis, under the pseudonym Robert Markham, took up the Bond series for one novel.

2004: MI6 reports that Dark Horizons proposes longtime stuntman, stunt coordinator and second unit director Vic Armstrong is a candidate to direct BOND 21.

Vic Armstrong
rumoured as James
Bond 21 director

See the complete article here:

https://www.mi6-hq.com/news/index.php?itemid=1592

10-Aug-2004 • Casino Royale

2006: Daniel Craig comments to Entertainment Weekly on expectations for the Bond role.

Daniel Craig says James Bond fans
'don't think I'm right for the role'

See the complete article here:

https://www.9news.com/article/entertainment/daniel-craig-says-james-bond-fans-dont-think-im-right-for-the-role/73-344468547

NEW YORK (AP) - Daniel Craig, the new James Bond, wants critics to give him a chance.
Author: Jeffrey Wolf | Published: 8/10/2006

"If I went onto the Internet and started looking at what some people were saying about me -- which, sadly, I have done -- it would drive me insane," the British actor says in an interview in Entertainment Weekly magazine, on newsstands Friday. "They hate me. They don't think I'm right for the role. It's as simple as that. They're passionate about it, which I understand, but I do wish they'd reserve judgment." A group of James Bond fans have launched a Web site, www.craignotbond.com, to protest Craig replacing Pierce Brosnan in the 007 film franchise, and to boycott "Casino Royale," slated for release Nov. 17. The fair-haired Craig, whose screen credits include roles in "Munich" and "Layer Cake," was tapped last October to play the secret-agent icon. While filming "Casino Royale," the 38-year-old actor was uneasy about uttering those famous words, "The name is Bond, James Bond."

"People kept asking, `Have you done the line yet?"' Craig tells the magazine. "But honestly, I didn't rehearse it at all. I didn't practice it in the mirror every morning or anything like that. I didn't want to even think about saying it because I didn't want it to be this weight around my neck. I just wanted to get on with it and not blow it." Craig decided to take Bond in a new direction. "I watched every single Bond movie three or four times, taking in everything I could about how the character had been portrayed in the past; then threw all that away once I started doing the role," Craig says. "There's no point in making this movie unless it's different. It'd be a waste of time unless we took Bond to a place he'd never been before."

2012: Five new posters advertise Skyfall.

2020: A cable suspending the Arecibo space telescope in Puerto Rico breaks. (Another follows November this year.)

Arecibo space telescope where James Bond film
GoldenEye and Jodie Foster movie Contact filmed
to close down over collapse fears

• The Arecibo telescope in Puerto Rico is one of the largest in the world
• Two cables supporting the 900-tonne structure are broken

See the complete article here:

https://www.scmp.com/news/world/article/3110623/brink-collapse-famed-arecibo-space-telescope-close-down

Published: 10:17am, 20 Nov, 2020

Engineers are concerned other cables could also break at any time,
making any attempt at repair excessively dangerous. Photo: Reuters

The US National Science Foundation on Thursday announced it will close down the massive space telescope at Puerto Rico’s Arecibo Observatory, ending 57 years of astronomical discoveries after suffering two destructive mishaps in recent months.

Operations at the observatory, one of the largest in the world, were halted in August when one of its supportive cables slipped loose from its socket, falling and gashing a 30-metre hole in its 305-metre-wide reflector dish.

Another cable then broke earlier this month, tearing a new hole in the dish and damaging nearby cables as engineers scrambled to devise a plan to preserve the crippled structure.

“NSF has concluded that this recent damage to the 305-metre telescope cannot be addressed without risking the lives and safety of work crews and staff,” Sean Jones, assistant director of the Mathematical and Physical Sciences Directorate at NSF, said on Thursday.

“NSF has decided to begin the process of planning for a controlled decommissioning of the 305-meter telescope,” Jones said.

Engineers have not yet determined the cause of the initial cable’s failure, a NSF spokesperson said.

The telescope was built in the 1960s with money from the Defence Department amid a push to develop anti-ballistic missile defences. Over decades, it endured hurricanes, endless humidity and a recent string of strong earthquakes.

Two cables broke on August 10 and November 6. Photo: AFP

The observatory’s vast reflector dish and a 900-tonne structure hanging 137 metres above it, nestled in the humid forests of Arecibo, Puerto Rico, has featured in the Jodie Foster film Contact and the James Bond movie GoldenEye.

It had been used by scientists and astronomers around the world for decades to analyse distant planets, find potentially hazardous asteroids and hunt for signatures of extraterrestrial life.

The telescope was instrumental in detecting the near-Earth asteroid Bennu in 1999, which laid the groundwork for Nasa to send a robotic probe there to collect and eventually return its first asteroid dirt sample some two decades later.

An engineering firm hired by the University of Central Florida, which manages the observatory for NSF under a five-year US$20 million agreement, concluded in a report to the university last week “that if an additional main cable fails, a catastrophic collapse of the entire structure will soon follow.”

Citing safety concerns, the firm ruled out efforts to repair the observatory and recommended a controlled demolition.

A large gash to the radio telescope's reflector dish. Photo: AP

The announcement saddened many beyond the scientific world as well, with the hashtag #WhatAreciboMeansToMe popping up on Twitter along with pictures of people working, visiting and even getting married or celebrating a birthday at the telescope.

Alex Wolszczan, a Polish-born astronomer and professor at Pennsylvania State University who helped discover the first extrasolar and pulsar planets, said that while the news wasn’t surprising, it was disappointing. He worked at the telescope in the 1980s and early 1990s.

“I was hoping against hope that they would come up with some kind of solution to keep it open,” he said. “For a person who has had a lot of his scientific life associated with that telescope, this is a rather interesting and sadly emotional moment.”

Additional reporting by Associated Press

2020: Halle Berry is photographed in an orange bikini and separately recalls the Heimlich maneuver.

Halle Berry sizzles in beach bikini
photo, gives off James Bond vibes
Berry famously played Bond girl Jinx Johnson in 'Die Another Day'

See the complete article here:

https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/halle-berry-sizzles-beach-bikini-photo-james-bond

By Julius Young | Fox News

Halle Berry never wastes a moment to shine for social media.

The former Bond girl -- who famously played Jinx Johnson, James Bond’s American muse in the 2002 film installment “Die Another Day" -- channeled her innermost spy when she donned a similar swimsuit to the one she wore in the iconic film.

“Never been a shady beach. 😂,” the 53-year old actress captioned an Instagram photo on Sunday in which she matches Jinx’s orange bikini – the only articles missing are the knife and the white accent belt it hangs from. She also tagged the clothing brand, boohoo.

The memorable scene from the film showed Jinx, also a spy, as she emerges from the waters in Cuba where she discovers Bond, played by Pierce Brosnan, sipping a mojito.

The mother of two's svelte physique in her latest beach flex is hardly distinguished from the fit stature showcased in 2002. Berry even added a little extra sizzle in her Instagram picture while letting her luscious locks flow underneath a beige straw sunhat from Hat Attack pulled lower over her eyes for dramatic effect.

Halle Berry in 'Die Another Day.' (Eon Productions, MGM, 20th Century Fox)

The Oscar-winner also places her hand on her hat, likely to keep it from flying off her head.

In April, the “Monster’s Ball” standout revealed that Brosnan, 67, had actually saved her life while the two were filming “Die Another Day” when Berry began choking.

Pierce Brosnan and Halle Berry. (Photo by Jon Kopaloff/FilmMagic)

“I was supposed to be all sexy, trying to seduce him with a fig,” Berry quipped to late-night host Jimmy Fallon of her Bond girl character. “I end up choking on it and he had to get up and do the Heimlich.”

"That was so not sexy,” added Berry. “James Bond knows how to Heimlich! He was there for me, he will always be one of my favorite people in the whole world.”

RichardTheBruce

August 11th [49 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1948: Harold Sakata wins the silver medal in the light-heavyweight division of the weightlifting competition at the Summer Olympic Games, London, England.

1948 Summer Olympic awards for light-heavyweight weightlifting competition:
Harold Sakata of the USA (silver), Stanley Stanczyk of the USA (gold) and Gosta Magnusson of Sweden (bronze).

1959: Ian Fleming's letter to Ivar Bryce on seeking a screenwriter also declares...
"Richard Burton would be by far the best James Bond!"

The Battle for Bond, Robert Sellers, 2007.
Chapter 6 - Looking for a Writer

So McClory took it upon himself to hire a screenwriter, satisfied that
Fleming, while an established and experienced novelist, would be quite unable
to produce a satisfactory film script. The man he chose was Paul Dehn whose
first screenplay, Seven Days to Noon, back in 1950, had earned him an Oscar.
At first Dehn was interested and met with Fleming, but that enthusiasm
ultimately dissipated and he turned the assignment down, much to Fleming's
disappointment as he expressed in a letter to Bryce dated 11 August: "Alas,
Dehn can't take the job on for two excellent reasons. Firstly, he wrote a film
script called something like "Seven Hours to Midnight' (Fleming almost got it
right), in which London was held up by an atomic bomb. And, secondly, he
says that he is really only interested in the development of character in
murderers, etc, and this bang, bang, kiss, kiss stuff is not for him. On the other
hand, he greatly like the treatment and thinks it will be a terrific success." Just
five years later Dehn, with Richard Maibaum, would write arguably the greatest
Bond script of all - Goldfinger.

Chapter 11 - The Search for James Bond

Earlier, during Fleming's meetings with Paul Dehn, the subject of who to
cast as Bond had arisen. In his letter of 11 August to Bryce, Fleming
announce, "Both Dehn and I think that Richard Burton would be by far the
best James Bond!" It's a fascinating suggestion, and possibly the first
recorded statement by Fleming about who should play his hero. Years later
Fleming would champion David Niven as Bond, a very traditional English
actor and a million miles away from the wild Celtic image and brooding
manner of Burton. But what a Bond pre-Celopatra/pre-Elizabeth Taylor
Burton would have been!

Interestingly at this time the makers of the proposed American TV
version of From Russia With Love had already cast James Mason as Bond.
"So if the worst comes to the worst, we might have to settle for him,"
Fleming wrote Bruce, sounding not entirely won over by the idea. But he
must have later warned to it as Christopher Lee, who was Fleming's cousin,
informed this author that Fleming told him that Mason was his preferred
choice as Bond.

1964: After dining with friends at a hotel in Canterbury, Ian Fleming suffers a heart attack.

A gentleman’s game: Like his Bond
character, writer Ian Fleming had a love
affair with golf

See the complete article here:

https://golf.com/news/features/james-bond-writer-ian-fleming-love-affair-golf/

By: Chris Nashawaty | June 3, 2020

Ian Fleming at his home office.

The author of the Bond novels had a love for the links as well, and golf played a major role in some of his books.

The James Bond franchise’s newest addition, No Time To Die, was scheduled for release in April but was pushed to November due to the coronavirus pandemic.

Fleming never came out and said that he was the model for James Bond, but he never exactly denied it either. The British author, who first introduced the dangerously debonair secret agent in his 1953 novel Casino Royale, had worked in naval intelligence during World War II. And while he’d mostly been stationed behind a desk, in his off-hours he played cards, drank and swapped stories with the real-life cloak-and-dagger spies who would provide the globe-trotting exploits of his best-selling 007 novels.

Like his fictional, licensed-to-kill creation, Fleming had a hedonist’s sweet tooth for fast cars and even faster women. But they also shared another passion — golf. Both Fleming and his alter ego had dog-eared copies of Tommy Armour’s How to Play Your Best Golf All the Time and Ben Hogan’s The Modern Fundamentals of Golf on his bookshelf. The two characters also shared a flat swing, a weak grip and a nine handicap — traits that are laid out in Fleming’s 1959 novel Goldfinger, which five years later would be turned into the third and best of all the Bond films thanks to its climactic golf match with the bullion-hoarding gold magnate (and flagrant golf cheat), Auric Goldfinger.

In 1964’s Goldfinger, Bond memorably one-upped the baddie.
Entertainment Pictures/Zuma Press

When it came to the sport, Fleming certainly knew what he was writing about. His first brush with the game came while attending prep school in Dorset. And shortly after his father — a well-to-do member of Parliament — died on the Western Front in World War I, he would spend his weekend afternoons with his grandmother at Huntercombe Golf Club, not far from Henley-on-Thames, where they would drive in her Rolls-Royce to play 18. She was a low handicapper with the decidedly eccentric habit of tipping her caddies with toothbrushes instead of cash.

In the years following World War II, Fleming would regularly play the courses at Gleneagles and Cooden in Sussex. But in 1948, while still in his pre-Bond bachelor years, when he was working as a journalist at the London Times, Fleming became a member at Royal St. George’s, in Sandwich, Kent. After dictating the last of his newspaper columns for the week, he’d hop in his black Ford Thunderbird convertible with a set of American clubs in the backseat and drive to his weekend house in Sandwich, which was once owned by his close friend, playwright Noel Coward. But Fleming’s interest in golf was hardly for relaxation.

Although his swing off the tee wasn’t easy on the eyes, what Fleming lacked in grace and form he made up for in enthusiasm. Like one of his most famous fans, John F. Kennedy — another golfer playboy who often had a 007 novel on his White House nightstand and who would name From Russia With Love one of his 10 favorite novels — Fleming enjoyed the clubby male companionship of the game, often wagering 50 pounds per match. Said Albert Whiting, then the head pro at St. George’s, “He was a great one to gamble on his games. He used to squeeze the last stroke out of his handicap. He made matches tough — the game would be deadly serious after the handicaps and bets had been fixed. He hated to lose. Everybody had to play like hell.”

On August 11, 1964, [Fleming] had his last lunch at his beloved Royal St. George’s,
where he’d by then become the club’s captain-elect.

Established in 1887, the 7,204-yard sweep of wild duneland at Royal St. George’s was once named “the greatest seaside golf course in the world” by the Financial Times. The private club has hosted the Open Championship 14 times — most recently in 2011. And it’s there that Fleming set one of the greatest fictional golf matches of all time.

In the 1964 film, Sean Connery’s Bond (driving a gadget-festooned Aston Martin DB5 instead of a black Thunderbird) squares off with Gert Frobe’s nefarious Goldfinger at a golf club called “St. Mark’s.” Although filmed at Stoke Park, just a stone’s throw from the 007 set at Pinewood Studios, the course in the movie is, for all intents and purposes, a thinly veiled version of Royal St. George’s. The club pro in the film is named Albert Blacking (instead of Albert Whiting, the St. George’s pro). And Bond’s caddie, his wily coconspirator against Goldfinger’s cheating, is named Hawker after the club’s most sought-after bag carrier at the time, Alf Hawkes.

Fleming was a strict believer in golf’s gentleman’s code and the rules of the game. Which is what makes Goldfinger’s under-handed tendency to improve an awful lie or substitute a lost ball with the assistance of his hulking, bowler-hatted man servant Oddjob all the more galling to Bond. It was an outward symbol of his immoral villainy. The wager may be a bar of Nazi gold valued at 5,000 pounds, but for 007 there is more at stake in his match with Goldfinger than just money. It’s about honor — a battle between right and wrong, the values of the West triumphing over the corruption of SMERSH and the wickedness that lay on the other side of the Iron Curtain. Outwitting Goldfinger by switching his Slazenger 1 with a Slazenger 7 (Bond plays a Penfold Hearts) is the ultimate Cold War comeuppance.

In the film version of Goldfinger, the entire golf sequence is over and done with in a brisk nine minutes of screen time. But in Fleming’s novel, the match stretches out for 37 white- knuckle-tense pages, which also happens to be some of the best hole-by-hole golf writing ever to come pouring out of a typewriter — the “brassie lies,” the “spoon,” the “blaster” and “old hickory Calamity Jane” in Bond’s bag.

And also some of the most colorful…

On the set of Goldfinger, Fleming and producer Harry Saltzman had a swinging time with Connery.

Goldfinger had made an attempt to look smart at golf and that is the only way of dressing that is incongruous on a links. Everything matched in a blaze of rust-coloured tweed from the buttoned “golfer’s cap” centred on the huge, flaming red hair to the brilliantly polished, almost orange shoes. The plus-four suit was too well cut and the plus-fours themselves had been pressed down the sides. The stockings were of a matching heather mixture and had green garter tabs. It was as if Goldfinger had gone to his tailor and said, “Dress me for golf — you know, like they wear in Scotland.”

To readers who actually knew and had played Royal St. George’s, the book’s level of detail would have been strikingly familiar. The layout of each hole syncs up seamlessly with the layout of Fleming’s home course, something that would later become apparent to Connery when he finally played St. George’s years after the film was released.

Although Connery certainly looked the part of a respectable golfer in the film — the jaunty, straw porkpie hat, the natty V-neck sweater and the smooth, fluid backswing — he was anything but at the time that Goldfinger was shot. Although he’d grown up in Scotland, the son of a factory worker was not a golfer. That would come later. Connery had been given lessons before the cameras rolled. “I never had a hankering to play golf,” he later said. “It wasn’t until I was taught enough golf to look as though I could outwit the accomplished Gert Frobe in Goldfinger that I got the bug.”

Fleming’s love affair with the game would continue until his premature death. Like the 007 of the novels, he smoked up to 80 custom-made Morland cigarettes a day. And a golf course is where he first felt the icy threat of an adversary more lethal than any of the iconic villains that 007 ever faced. During a golf getaway with his old Eton schoolmates at Rye, Fleming was taken ill with heart palpitations. Soon after, on August 11, 1964, he had his last lunch at his beloved Royal St. George’s, where he’d by then become the club’s captain-elect. In the early hours of the morning after, Fleming said goodbye — to Bond and to the game both of them adored.

http://jamesbondmemes.blogspot.com/2017/09/improve-your-golf-with-ian-fleming.html

1976: The Hollywood Reporter reports the withdrawal of McClory's injunction against The Spy Who Loved Me.
1978: Principal photography kicks off for Moonraker at Château Vaux-Le-Vicomte in France.

https://twitter.com/007/status/1028310070918959105

1986: People magazine showcases Pierce Brosnan as "The Spy Who's Loved Too Much".

The Spy Who's Loved Too Much

See the complete article here:

https://people.com/archive/cover-story-the-spy-whos-loved-too-much-vol-26-no-6/

Laura Sanderson Healy and Mary Ann Norbom - August 11, 1986 12:00 PM

“It was,” says Pierce Brosnan, “too much like a job.” Admittedly a good job, with more than good pay. In a series that made an obscure Irish actor into an American TV star. With a role that painted him debonair and slightly devilish. And an image that made him the perfect, obvious, only choice to become the next Bond, James Bond. Although Brosnan had prospered as the roguish title character on NBC’s detective series Remington Steele, “I had just had enough,” he says. In fact, “I’d had enough after two years, but I’d signed a seven-year contract.” Brosnan was relieved—”really relieved”—when Remington Steele was cancelled last May.

But wait. Put the emphasis on the past tense: was cancelled, was relieved. For just when it seemed that Brosnan, 35, had snagged one of the most sought-after and profitable roles in movie history, he now finds himself once again tied to Remington Steele, and he is not pleased.

For most of the last two months, Brosnan thought he had fulfilled an ambition of long standing, to replace Roger Moore as 007. He had settled in London. Thinking he had closed a chapter of his career, he had taken to occasionally trashing Remington Steele and the high life in L.A. He had all but signed for The Living Daylights, the $40 million Bond film originally scheduled to begin shooting this month. Then, ironically, the prospect of Brosnan as Bond revived NBC’s interest in its show. The network saw a promotional windfall in beaming the man who would be Bond into America’s living rooms—particularly so after more than 1000 furious fans phoned and wrote NBC protesting the cancellation. This summer, Remington has greatly improved its ratings during reruns. In the halls of NBC, programming chief Brandon Tartikoff joked about his booboo, “Anybody can cancel a show in 59th place. It takes real guts to cancel one in ninth place.” Consequently, just last month, three days before options on the Remington cast expired, NBC made it official: The show was renewed for six episodes as a midseason replacement.

Since then, the legendary producer and protector of the James Bond film properties, Cubby Broccoli, has been making like Dr. No. Although he had been negotiating a three-picture deal with Brosnan, Broccoli didn’t want his 007 tainted by television. “He’s not going to have another company riding on our publicity,” says a Broccoli aide. To accommodate the movie’s schedule, MTM, the production company responsible for Steele, even suggested shooting the season’s first episode in Europe. “Obviously it would be to our benefit to have Pierce playing Bond, and we’re not giving up on the idea,” says Steele executive producer Michael Gleason. “Anything we can do, we are more than willing to do.” But Broccoli has remained decidedly cool to stopgap measures. The net result for Brosnan is a career catch-22: Because Remington was cancelled, Brosnan could do Bond. But because he might be Bond, Remington was uncancelled. And because Remington was uncancelled, Brosnan may not be able to be 007. The choice for Brosnan seems clear: Bond or bondage.

The network’s decision has started a worldwide scramble for another Bond, while shooting on The Living Daylights has been postponed to late September. The producers talked to 60 aspirants in one recent week alone. Earlier Mel Gibson and Bryan Brown were considered but not screen-tested. Australian model Finlay Light was tested and so was Sam (Kane & Abel) Neill, who was a front runner at last check. But the players change constantly. After Broccoli saw The Taming of the Shrew in London, new rumors surfaced last week that actor Timothy Dalton was the first choice. If you are a handsome, breathing male with a British accent, you are a candidate.

Brosnan has not talked publicly about his dilemma since Remington’s revival created it. But he was positively voluble when last interviewed in London, basking in the afterglow of what he considered a pro forma screen test for Bond—and in the midst of filming a kind of warm-up for the part, Frederick Forsyth’s thriller The Fourth Protocol, in which Brosnan plays a KGB bad guy. Had Steele been renewed, he said, “I would have risen to the occasion, but I would have gone back to work reluctantly, just gritting my teeth…. Under the circumstances [of the Bond offer], if it had gone a fifth [season], I would have been pissed off…. No risks were being taken. I wanted the show to get a little more hard-edged, but they wanted to keep it like it was.” He was particularly distressed by Moonlighting, which bears more than a passing resemblance to Remington. In fact that show was created by Glenn Gordon Caron, a former Remington writer. “Moonlighting [is] a direct steal which has just done it in a different, much fresher way,” Brosnan said. “At least they take risks.” Co-star Stephanie Zimbalist apparently agrees. “Now those people are doing at Moonlighting exactly what we’re supposed to be doing at Remington Steele.”

Brosnan’s trouble on Remington apparently involved more than creative differences: Almost from the start, stories of discord between Brosnan and Zimbalist were common. Although the series was conceived primarily as a vehicle for her, he got more mail and publicity. To create the character, Brosnan said, “I’d look at old Cary Grant movies, steal a little bit from him and mix in my own personality. In some respects, it was a cross between John Cleese, Cary Grant and James Bond.” Zimbalist was clearly dissatisfied with the show’s shifting focus. “I have to do something,” she told one interviewer in 1983, “or when this show goes off the air, all anybody is going to remember is that Pierce Brosnan starred in it.” If her relations with Brosnan were occasionally frosty, they were positively frigid with his wife, actress Cassandra Harris, who reportedly saw Steele as a stepping-stone to superstardom for her husband.

In a show that relies on character chemistry, there was little combustion. As Brosnan put it, they “were never progressing in the relationship…. There was all this kind of cat and mouse, old movie rubbish…. The people who were behind it were never courageous enough to say, ‘Well, let’s just throw it up in the air, what we can do next, how we can keep it alive.’ ” On that he and Zimbalist were agreed, and the producers’ notable idea for invigorating the show—having them get married—infuriated both of them. During production earlier this year, Zimbalist said: “If they decide to marry Remington and Laura, they can find themselves someone else to play Laura. That is not the character I signed to play.” And, of course, in the season’s last episode, Laura and Steele were married. Brosnan recalls, “There was a lot of tension about that.” Exec producer Gleason observes: “Pierce and Stephanie are both quite vocal when it comes to their characters.” Although weddings are usually Nielsen bonanzas, the union did nothing for Remington ratings.

For Brosnan, television was no longer the most becoming medium. “You learn bad habits as an actor [on TV]. As the season goes on, you take short cuts, fatigue sets in. Then your confidence goes.” With it goes some measure of esteem. “The word ‘star’ doesn’t mean an awful lot to me. ‘Good actor’ and having the respect of one’s peers means more. You don’t really get much of that doing a show like Remington Steele.”

By the end of last season, Brosnan wanted to leave Los Angeles as well as the show. Despite the comforts of a home in the hills, “I was becoming so Hollywood. All it became was money—get as much as you possibly can. I just find that you can become a very boring person living in L.A. I tell you, living there on a day-to-day basis is vacuous, terribly fake.” So he particularly liked the prospect of shooting back-to-back features in London: “It’s extremely civilized working here.”

Brosnan has long considered playing Bond a career goal, but only recently has he pursued that prospect with passion. In fact, when he was first mentioned as a candidate he was reticent. “I said, ‘Why do I want to do it? It’s become an institution.’ ” But the idea kept coming back. Roger Moore told a newspaper that Pierce was his hand-picked successor. The mushrooming attention made Brosnan reconsider. So, no doubt, did the lack of attention given Brosnan’s feature Nomads, a quick fizzle released last March. Finally, he said, “I thought, if I don’t do Bond and some other guy gets it and I’ve been such a strong contender, I’m going to be really pissed off.”

Brosnan had begun to feel almost as if fate had assigned him the role. Bond, he said, was “part of my upbringing.” Among the first films he saw when he moved from Ireland to England in the early ’60s were Bond flicks. “For an Irish boy, age of 11, really green, very naive, sheltered Catholic upbringing, it was just mindblowing.” Some 20 years later, he would meet the maker of those movies face-to-face. It was 1981, and Brosnan’s miniseries, The Manions of America, was set to premiere in America. He and wife Cassie had had to borrow $3,500 to pay for their trip to L.A., but soon he was cast as Remington Steele (after Anthony Andrews turned down the role). Cassie, it so happened, was playing one of Bond’s girls in the 1981 flick For Your Eyes Only—and they were invited to dinner at Broccoli’s estate. “I remember turning to Cassie that night in this old Rent-a-Wreck car, and I was joking the whole way home saying, ‘My name’s Bond, James Bond.’ I said, ‘This is it, darling, there’s no looking back now’—little knowing that five years on, one would be stepping into the role. There are a lot of funny things that happen in one’s life.”

So there are. A few weeks ago, Brosnan returned to L.A., and there, barring strikes or other acts of a merciful God, he will begin shooting Remington Steele next October.

1989: Licença Para Matar released in Portugal.

1999: A federal appeals court for MGM Inc. v. 007 Safety Products Inc. finds the manufacturer of a pepper spray violated use of the “007” trademark.

2021: Made in China.

2010: 24/7 reviews a book proposing writer Roald Dahl was a real-life James Bond.

Roald Dahl was real-life James Bond: Book

See the complete article here:

https://www.emirates247.com/roald-dahl-was-real-life-james-bond-book-2010-08-11-1.277710

Children's author Dahl was a dashing, bed-hopping spy, according to a new book (FILE)
By Staff - Published Wednesday, August 11, 2010

He may be best-known as the author of chaste children's books, but Roald Dahl was a secret service agent with a "whole stable" of women and a license to kill, in the manner of fictional spy James Bond, according to an explosive new book.

The British author slept with countless high society women while gathering intelligence in the US in the 1940s, says Donald Sturcock in his new book "Storyteller: The Life of Roald Dahl".

Dahl's life as a young, handsome and dashing RAF officer in the early 1940s is recreated in the book through interviews with many associates and lovers, reported the UK's The Telegraph newspaper.

Antoinette Haskell, a wealthy friend of Dahl's who looked up to him as a brother even thought he was "drop dead gorgeous", said the Charlie And The Chocolate Factory author was a relentless womaniser. "He was very arrogant with his women, but he got away with it. The uniform didn't hurt one bit and he was an ace pilot. I think he slept with everybody on the east and west coasts that had more than USD 50,000 a year," Haskell is quoted as saying in the book.

Dahl had fought as a fighter pilot earlier in the war, until injuries grounded him. He then worked for a secret service network based in the United States called British Security Coordination (BSC).

It was during this time that he worked with such other well known agents as Ian Fleming, the creator of James Bond and David Ogilvy.

It is not known exactly how Dahl was recruited as a British agent, but it is thought he was working loosely for BSC by the first four months of 1944 when, officially, he had a public relations role at the British Embassy in Washington DC.

Yet Dahl's secretive role too ended soon as it went against the grain because he was a terrible gossip who frequently betrayed confidence, according to his family and friends.

Dahl, who died in 1990 aged 74, remains one of the world's bestselling fiction authors, with sales estimated at 100 million and counting.

2020: Funko Pop! releases figures of Bond, Safin, Nomi, and Paloma.

Arrow Right

2020: The GoldenEye 25 project redirects to non-007 content.

After years of development, the
GoldenEye 25 fan remake just
got lawyered
No time to die.

See the complete article here:

https://www.eurogamer.net/articles/2020-08-11-after-years-of-development-the-goldeneye-25-fan-remake-just-got-lawyered

News by Tom Phillips, News Editor | 11 August 2020

Back in 2018, we reported on one fan's ambitious project to remake the entire N64 GoldenEye 007 campaign in Unreal Engine 4. The aim was to release a polished version of the ancient single-player mode in time for the game's 25th anniversary in 2022.

It seemed like a lot of work but, a year later, GoldenEye 25 creator Ben Colcough seemed to be making good progress. Now, two years in, the project should have been halfway to the finish line.

Step up 2020. Last night, the game's Twitter account posted to say it had been "kindly asked by the IP holder (MGM/Danjaq) to cease development of GoldenEye 25.

"This was always in the back of our heads as a possibility but we've tried our best to keep going. Of course we will comply and want to thank you for your ongoing support.

"We cannot do a Bond game but we can still do a great game with all the beloved aspects of our favourite 90's action shooter. If you are still interested in following us, please come over to @projectianus where we will share development of our new game.

"This account will be deleted by Friday at the latest."

So, GoldenEye 25 is dead, but the project lives on. Writing on the new Project Ianus account, Colcough confirmed development will continue on this "original game" without using the names or likenesses of James Bond characters.

On the upside, stripping the game of its Bond references means the project can now release on Steam, as well as potentially on consoles.

We'll keep a golden eye on any future updates - and while it lasts, here's a look at the project in action from a year ago:

https://twitter.com/spies_game/status/1293024792866689025

Tom Phillips | News Editor | tomphillipsEG
Tom is Eurogamer's news editor. He writes lots of news, some of the puns and makes sure we put the accent on Pokémon.

2021: Reno Phil presents 007 - The Music of James Bond at Greater Nevada Field, Nevada.

007: The Music of
James Bond at
Greater Nevada
Field

See the complete article here:

https://www.renophil.com/event/007atgreaternevadafield/

August 11 @ 6:30 pm - 9:30 pm
Greater Nevada Field
250 Evans Ave
Reno, NV 89501
Contact
Phone: (775) 323-6393

THE NAME'S BOND... JAMES BOND
When it comes to the music of James Bond, ‘Nobody Does it Better’ than the Reno Phil”! Broadway stars Hugh Panaro — best known as the Phantom in The Phantom of The Opera — and Morgan James, featured in Postmodern Jukebox, headline the show. The 25 Bond films that span five decades have produced some of the greatest movie music in history. From “Goldfinger” and “From Russia with Love” to “Diamonds are Forever” and Oscar-winning “Skyfall” by Adele, be prepared to be shaken AND stirred by the blockbuster Bond hits!

The Reno Phil will be led by Maestro Jason Altieri.

Tickets for this concert are sold through Greater Nevada Field.

Gates open at 6:30 PM | Concert begins at 7:30 PM and will end with a thrilling firework display!

THINGS TO KNOW:

• Greater Nevada Field has a clear bag policy–all bags, backpacks and containers brought into the stadium cannot be larger than 12″ x 6″ x 12″ and must be clear. All bags are subject to search before entry.
• Concession stands will be cashless. Credit and debit cards will be the only forms of payment accepted.
• All patrons at Greater Nevada Field must wear a mask when indoors, regardless of vaccination status. Face coverings are exempt outdoors for vaccinated individuals.
• Guests are allowed to bring sunflower seeds, peanuts, one (1) factory-sealed bottle of water into Greater Nevada Field. All other food and beverages must be pre-approved based on specific medical conditions. Formula for babies is allowed entry.

For additional information about regulations at Greater Nevada Field, please see their A to Z Guide.

MORGAN JAMES

Morgan James is a classically trained vocalist, Broadway veteran and recording artist. Ms. James recently premiered a song cycle for voice and orchestra entitled “Song Of The River”, written for her by frequent collaborator and conductor Teddy Abrams, with the Louisville Orchestra. In concert, Ms. James has appeared with the Rhode Island Philharmonic Orchestra, the Malaysian Philharmonic, Breckinridge Music Festival, Rhode Island Philharmonic, Utah Symphony, Louisville Orchestra, Colorado Symphony and Wichita Symphony performing her solo Bernstein show, conducted by Teddy Abrams. Morgan was featured with the Philadelphia Orchestra in “West Side Story” in concert, conducted by Yannick Nézet-Séguin. For more information and tour dates, please visit her website: www.morganjamesonline.com. Instagram: @morganajames

HUGH PANARO

Hugh Panaro is perhaps best known for having played the coveted role of the Phantom in Broadway’s The Phantom of the Opera over 2,000 times, including the 25th Anniversary production. In fact, Hugh is one of the few actors to be cast by Harold Prince as both The Phantom and Raoul in the show’s Broadway production and recently starred as the title role in the New York production of Sweeney Todd.

Hugh made his Broadway debut in the original production of Les Misérables as Marius, the role he originated in the First National Company. He also created the roles of Buddy in the original Side Show (Sony cast recording); Julian Craster in Jule Styne’s last musical, The Red Shoes; and the title role in the American premiere of Cameron Mackintosh’s Martin Guerre. Hugh was nominated for an Outer Critics Circle Award for his performance in the title role of Elton John’s Lestat, based on Anne Rice’s Vampire Chronicles.

JASON ALTIERI

Jason Altieri is the current Associate Conductor for the Reno Philharmonic and Music Director of the Atlanta Pops Orchestra in Atlanta, Georgia. Known for making audiences laugh while on the podium, you’ll often see Jason conducting the Reno Phil Pops Concerts.

2021: The King George Ballroom presents Shaken Not Stirred - The Music of James Bond at Liuna Station, King George Ballroom, Hamilton, Ontario, Canada

Shaken not Stirred--The Music of James
Bond at Liuna Station - King George
Ballroom

See the complete article here:

https://www.toronto.com/events/7265821--shaken-not-stirred-the-music-of-james-bond/

Event Details

Celebrating one of the longest continually running film series in history, each Bond with a distinct theme of their own. From the smooth and impenetrable tunes of the Connery era to the radio-ready offerings from the Daniel Craig years. Aston Martins, Bollinger and vodka martinis are the backdrop for this fun and musical trip through the Bond films. Jeans n Classics & The National Academy Orchestra

Audience: All Ages
Price: $41 Reg, $38 Sr, $25 Brott35, $15 Stu
Time
(Friday) 7:30 PM - 11:59 PM
Liuna Station - King George Ballroom
360 James St. N., Hamilton ON, L8L 1H5
Latitude: 43.265831
Longitude:-79.864769

Contact
Name: Rachel Vorobej
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 905-525-7664
Website: http://brottmusic.com/

2021: James Bond Trivia Night at Connecticut Valley Brewing Company, New Windsor, Connecticut.

James Bond Trivia Night (08-11-21)

See the complete article here:

https://www.ctvalleybrewing.com/tc-events/james-bond-trivia-night-08-11-21/

August 11, 2021 6:30 pm - 8:30 pm

Come spend Wednesday night with us for James Bond Trivia Night! Free to play, teams are welcome! Top 3 teams win a Gift card!

RichardTheBruce

August 12th [48 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1959: Fleming expresses doubts for McClory in a letter to Bryce.

The Battle for Bond, Robert Sellers, 2007.
Chapter 6 - Looking for a Writer

It seemed like the question of McClory's shortcomings stayed with Fleming
as the following day he had lunch with Laurence Evans and asked his opinion on
the matter. Evans didn't mince his words. Of course he thought McClory had
talent and potential, but his first stab at movies with The Boy and the Bridge had
not really come off, if the first batch of negative reviews were to be believed.
Fleming wrote to Bryce on 12 August about Evans' misgivings: "What he is
alarmed about is that, while we may all want big stars to feature in the Bond film,
he thinks it very possible that people of the calibre we have been discussing may
not wish to be produced and directed by a young man with only one film to his
name and a film that has not found favour with the critics. He advises more or
less on the lines of what I suggested my last letter - that Kevin should be
number 2 to a bigger man; say Asquith or Hitchcock for instance."

McClory later believed this letter showed, "the first seeds of distrust being
planted in Bryce's mind by Fleming suggesting that I might not necessarily
have teh experience and should take second place to someone else." This was
in direct contradiction to a Fleming letter of just four months previous when
he'd told McClory, "There is no one who I would prefer to produce James
Bond for the screen."

1964: Ian Lancaster Fleming dies at age 56--Canterbury, Kent, England.
(Born 28 May 1908--Mayfair, London, England.)

Ian Fleming Dead; Created James Bond

See the complete article here:

https://www.nytimes.com/1964/08/13/archives/ian-fleming-dead-created-james-bond.html[/center]

AUG. 13, 1964

LONDON, Aug. 12 — Ian Fleming, the creator of James Bond, Agent 007 of the British Secret Service, died early today in a hospital at Canterbury after suffering a heart attack. He was 56 years old.

Mr. Fleming was stricken last night at his hotel in Sandwich, where he was spending a golfing vacation with his wife, Anne Geraldine Fleming, and their son, Caspar, who became 12 years old today.

The novelist suffered a coronary thrombosis three years ago. It forced him to curtail his activities and reduce his daily quota of gold‐tipped cigarettes, which Bond also smoked incessantly, from 60 to 20.

In little more than a decade James Bond became the world's best known secret agent.

Countless readers avidly followed his undercover war against .Soviet master spies and terrorists and later against a mysterious international crime syndicate.

Mr. Fleming equipped his hero with an impeccable social background, good looks, bravery, toughness and a disillusional sort of patriotism.

More important, the double‐O identification number, carried by only three men in the British Secret Service, authorized him to kill in the line of duty. It was a privilege Bond exercised frequently and sometimes reluctantly, most often with a .25‐caliber Beretta automatic that he carried in a chamois shoulder holster.

President Kennedy and Allen Dulles, while he was the head of the Central Intelligence Agency, said that they enjoyed Mr. Fleming's books. In fact, it was probably the President's praise in 1961 that was largely responsible for their enormous popularity here. In Britain, Prince Philip led the cheering section.

Mr. Fleming wrote 12 books, all but two about Bond, and was working on the 13th when he died. All told, they sold more than 18 million copies, mostly in paperback editions, and were translated into 10 languages.

Two highly profitable films. “Doctor No” and “From Russia With Love,” were made from his novels, a third, “Goldfinger,” was recently completed and is awaiting release and others are planned.

Mr. Fleming had made $2.8 million from his books, according to his agent, Peter Janson Smith. In March, in a complex transaction for tax purposes, he sold a 51 per cent interest in his future income to a British holding company for $280,000.

Critics differed on the merits of his works. Some said he was an aristocratic Mickey Spillane, pandering to the public's taste for sadism and sex. A critic in London's New Statesman called “Doctor No,” which tells of how Bond destroys a missile‐sabotage center in the Caribbean, “the nastiest book” he had ever read.

“There are three basic ingredients in ‘Doctor No,‘” he said, “all unhealthy, all thoroughly English: the sadism of a schoolboy bully, the mechanical, two‐dimensional sex‐longings of a frustrated adolescent, and the crude snob‐cravings of a suburban adult.

“Mr. Fleming has no literary skill. But the three ingredients are manufactured and blended with deliberate, professional precision.”

On the other hand, the contemporary novelist Kingsley Amis, in a 40,000‐word study, described Bond as tender rather than sadistic, classless rather than snobbish and a moderate Tory rather than a Fascist.

On the whole, American critics did not take Mr. Fleming quite so seriously, regarding his books as thrillers that had tended to become less thrilling in recent years.

Mr. Fleming said he thought of them as entertainment of no special significance. He attributed their popularity to a hunger for larger‐than‐life heroes that was left unsatisfied by most contemporary fiction.

At the same time Bond's adventures slaked a public thirst for information about espionage that had been whetted by such events as the trial of Dr. Klaus Fuchs, the Burgess‐McLean case, the U‐2 incident and the growing awareness of the work of the C.I.A.

The first of the novels, “Casino Royale,” published in London without fanfare in 1953, described Bond's destruction of Le Chiffre, the head of the French branch of Smersh, the Soviet espionage and terror ring, Bond's nearly fatal torture and his discovery that the woman he had fallen in love with was a Soviet agent.

Mr. Fleming later said he wrote the book because he needed to keep his mind off his impending marriage, marking the end of his bachelor days.

“Writing about 2,000 words in three hours every morning, he said, “‘Casino Royale’ dutifully produced itself. I wrote nothing and made no corrections until the book was finished. If I had looked back at what I had written the day before I might have despaired.”

Other novels followed rapidly. In “Goldfinger” Bond foils a plot to rob Fort Knox; in “Moonraker” he prevents the firing of a missile into the heart of London; in “Live and Let Die” he destroys Smersh's chief agent in the United States, a Negro dabbler in voodoo and racketeering known as Mr. Big.

In “From Russia With Love,” Bond escapes from Smersh's plot to destroy him but appears to be dying of poison as the book ends. Concern over his fate mounted among the public. His publishers finally stated, “After a period of anxiety the condition of No. 007 shows definite improvement.”

Mr. Fleming liked to point out that Smersh, although often thought to be a fictional organization, existed as a Soviet counterespionage organization during and after World War II Its name is the combined form of the Russian words “smyert spionam,” meaning death to spies.

When Smersh was disbanded, Mr. Fleming set up SPECTRE, as Bond's opponent. It was unquestionably fictional, the word being formed from the initials of Special Executive for Counter‐intelligence Terror, Revenge and Extortion.

Under the leadership of Ernest Stavro Blofeld, whose career began as a double or triple agent in prewar Warsaw, SPECTRE has enlisted the services of former Gestapo agents, disenchanted Smersh operatives, members of the Mafia, the Red Lightning Tong and other Master criminals.

In “Thunderball” Bond balks the organization's plot to extort millions of dollars from the United States with a stolen nuclear bomb. He continues his pursuit of Blofeld in “On His Majesty's Secret Service” [sic] and appears to have destroyed him in his most recent adventure, “You Only Live Twice,” both of which were serialized in the magazine Playboy.

Mr. Fleming was often accused of making Bond a thinly disguised projection of himself. In their love of fast cars, golf, gambling and gourmet cooking, in their skill with firearms and cards, the two men were indeed similar, but Mr. Fleming once said, “Apart from the fact that he wears the same clothes that I wear, he and I really have little in common. I do rather envy him his blondes and his efficiency, but I can't say I much like the chap.”

Mr. Fleming said he had conceived Bond as “a hero without any characteristics who was simply the blunt instrument in the hands of his government.”

However, as with most authors, Fleming's experiences largely shaped those of his creation.

Mr. Fleming was born on May 28, 1908. His father, Major Valentine Fleming, at one time a Conservative member of Parliament, was killed while fighting on the Somme in 1916. His obituary in The Times of London was written by Winston Churchill.

The boy was educated at Eton, Britain's most exclusive school, and Sandhurst, the military academy. While there he was a member of the rifle team and competed in a match against the United States Military Academy.

He earned a commission, but resigned before beginning active service in the largely inactive British Army of the 1820's. He also said later that he regarded tanks and trucks as a step downward from horses and sabers.

Planning to enter the diplomatic service, he learned excellent French and German at the Universities of Munich and Geneva. He stood seventh on the service's entrance examinations, but since there were only five vacancies he decided to try journalism.

He joined Reuters, the international news agency, and in 1929 was appointed its Moscow correspondent.

“Reuters was great fun in those days,” he said. “The training there gives you a good straightforward style. Above all, I have to thank Reuters for getting my facts right.”

There was a difference of opinion about this among Bond fans. They delighted in finding errors in the novels, such as the sending of a woman gang leader to Sing Sing, a men's prison.

After four years he was offered the post of assistant general manager of Reuters in the Far East, but feeling the need for money, he decided to join a private bank in London. In 1935 he became a stockbroker and remained one until the outbreak of war in 1939.

Mr. Fleming was commissioned in the Royal Navy and became in time personal assistant to Rear Admiral T. H. Godfrey, director of naval intelligence. The admiral was the prototype of “M,” the retired seadog who heads Bond's secret service.

More important, it was Mr. Fleming's wartime service, from which he emerged as a commander, that provided the insights into the technique and practice of intelligence work that his readers found enthralling.

After the war, he became foreign manager of The Sunday Times of London. His contract provided for two months of vacation a year, which he spent at Goldeneye, his home near Oracabessa in Jamaica. Mr. Fleming did most of his writing there and the island provided the background for many of his novels.

Like Bond, Mr. Fleming was , tall (6‐foot‐1) and slender (168 pounds). His curly hair was graying, his complexion was ruddy and his nose had been broken.

The novelist was a collector of first editions and rare books and published The Book Collector, the bibliophilic magazine.

Besides his widow, whose marriage to Viscount Bothermere ended in divorce in 1952, and his son, Mr. Fleming is survived by two brothers, Peter, the explorer and writer, and Richard, a banker.

1964: Pierce Brosnan leaves Ireland to join his mother May and new husband William Carmichael in Longniddry, East Lothian, Scotland.

1974: Agente 007 contra el Dr. No re-released in Spain.

1977: Spionen der elskede mig released in Denmark.

1983: Octopussy – mustekala (Octopussy - Soft-bodied Cephalopods Squid/Octopus/Cuttlefish) released in Finland.

https://www.007travelers.com/items/007-item-james-bond-007-octopussy/

2013: Halle Berry talks to Total Film about filming Die Another Day.

Halle Berry had to be sexier as Bond girl

See the complete article here:

https://www.rte.ie/entertainment/2013/0812/467674-halle-berry-had-to-be-sexier-as-bond-girl/

Monday, 12 Aug 2013

Halle Berry was told by James Bond bosses that she had to be sexier

Halle Berry has admitted that she was told by James Bond bosses to ''be sexier'' while filming her classic scene in 2002's Die Another Day.

Speaking to Total Film, the 46-year-old actress, who was pictured emerging from the water in an orange bikini for a classic scene in 2002' s Die Another Day, was urged to up her sex appeal for the shots.

Speaking to Total Film, Berry said: ''The sea was freezing! I had to do it quite a few times too. I went in the water and I went out the water. Then I had to walk up the beach in a 'certain way'.

''They kept saying, 'Can you be sexier?', and I was like shouting back at them, 'this is all the sexy I got! I'm gonna get hip dysplasia if I try and make it any sexier!' ''

When asked whether she thought she would be a Bond girl when she was growing up, she explained: ''My mother thought the Bond films were too adult for me to watch when I was growing up, so I never really had a chance to think about it.

''It was only as I got older I became aware of Bond.''

2018: Tweets from Idris Elba spark more Bond rumours.

Idris Elba offers cheeky tweets amid latest James Bond rumors

See the complete article here:

https://pressfrom.info/us/news/entertainment/-175973-idris-elba-offers-cheeky-tweets-amid-latest-james-bond-rumors.html

12 august 2018 | Source: ew.com

Idris Elba appears to have caught wind of the latest round of rumors that he might one day play James Bond, and he’s having some fun with the buzz on social media.

Early Sunday morning, the Luther star tweeted a heavily filtered selfie and wrote, “my name’s Elba, Idris Elba” — an obvious nod to 007’s signature “Bond, James Bond” line.

But while some fans might have taken that as a hint that Elba, 45, would someday don Bond’s tuxedo, he followed up hours later with a photo of Public Enemy and another tweet name-checking one of the group’s most well-known songs. “Don’t believe the HYPE…” he wrote.

2034: Where the Copyright Extension Act of 1998 is applied, the Fleming books could enter the public domain in the EU and US.

RichardTheBruce

August 13th
[47 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1961: The East German government starts construction of the Berlin Wall.

j_w_pepper wrote: »

Re August 13th

...today the East German government, with probably a slight prodding from their big brothers in Moscow, started building the Berlin Wall, in effect the centerpiece of the Iron Curtain, separating East and West for the next 28 years and about three months, not to mention being sort of prominently displayed in OCTOPUSSY. Famous quote from then Chairman of the East German Communists, Walter Ulbricht, in June 1961: "No one has the intention of erecting a wall." Two months later, it was there.

1971: Diamonds Are Forever films Sean Connery's last scene with OO7 in a crematorium.

https://twitter.com/007/status/1029049380064641025

1979: People magazine features Moonraker.

1979: Moonraker released in Denmark.

1987: Su nombre es peligro (His Name Is Danger) released in Argentina.

1987: James Bond 007 – Der Hauch des Todes (The Breeze Of The Death) released in West Germany.

1999: Eon select Michael Apted to direct The World Is Not Enough.

Michael Apted: The Director That Set
the Future of James Bond

See the complete article here:

https://ultimateactionmovies.com/michael-apted-james-bond/

By Nicolás Suszczyk - January 10, 2021
RIP to an ultimate 007 legend…

After the release of Tomorrow Never Dies in December 1997, Pierce Brosnan frequently observed that the film was overloaded with action sequences and he hoped for something more subdued for his third adventure as James Bond. This sentiment was also shared by producers Michael G Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, who decided to take their first step in what would be their imprint in their Bond saga after the death of legendary producer Albert R Broccoli in 1996: an emotionally complex and romantic Bond film where nothing was so obvious that we immediately knew who the good and the baddies were and what they were up to.

On August 13, 1998, the director for the upcoming Bond film was chosen: Michael Apted, known mostly for dramas or psychological thrillers like Blink (1993), Gorillas in The Mist (1988) and Agatha (1979), all a world apart of the style of the first eighteen James Bond movies. It wasn’t the first time a drama director joined the Bond team: Lewis Gilbert, known for Alfie (1966), was hired to direct You Only Live Twice (1967) and would return for The Spy Who Loved Me (1977) and Moonraker (1979), but all of these adventures were famous for being big action extravaganzas where the emotional side of Bond and Gilbert’s drama experience were pretty much cast aside. The same wouldn’t happen with Apted: his drama background was purposely chosen for this upcoming Bond movie, with a story (the first by regulars Neal Purvis & Robert Wade) that would show us a more fallible action hero that the one we knew before. By November of the same year, Pierce Brosnan revealed on an interview that the film’s title was The World Is Not Enough, which was none other than the Bond family motto as featured in Ian Fleming’s 1963 novel On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, the novel and the film adaptation from 1969.

The World Is Not Enough took much more from On Her Majesty’s Secret Service than its title: both stories place James Bond in a situation where he has to directly or indirectly protect the defiant and adventurous daughter of a wealthy and powerful man to reach the antagonist, and in both occasions, the secret agent has soft feelings for the woman in question: one becomes the short-lived Mrs Bond, the other turns out to be the mastermind behind it all and it’s Bond himself who kills her in cold blood right after she gives her accomplice the order to dive the submarine which will be used to provoke a nuclear meltdown below the Bosphorus in Istanbul.

While Martin Campbell and Roger Spottiswoode donned GoldenEye and Tomorrow Never Dies with an accelerated, somewhat urgent and bombastic pace, Michael Apted opted for a much slower pace. The nineteenth Bond isn’t devoid of explosions, chases, stunts and shootouts –some very imaginative as the moment where the secret agent is stalked by helicopters attached with big buzz-saws that cut the walkways of a caviar factory over the Caspian Sea like butter– but the viewer will feel that the moments preceding every action piece will develop in a sweet, romantic manner: the romance between Bond and Elektra adorned with a calm and mellow post-sex scene where he inquires about her kidnapping, the conversation between M and Bond where she admits that convinced Elektra’s father Sir Robert King not to pay the ransom so that she can get to Renard, the terrorist that kidnapped her; and a brief moment where 007 investigates video archives of the woman’s ordeal, freeze-framing the recording just as she sheds a tear after escaping and being rescued by the police. There is also a tender moment with the “good girl” Christmas Jones (Denise Richards) minutes before the end credits roll as both celebrate Christmas day in Istanbul, clinking glasses as fireworks can be seen in the background – quite fitting for the last James Bond film of the millennium in a season where the world was excited for the arrival of the year 2000.

Apted’s choice wasn’t an exception made by Barbara Broccoli: not counting Martin Campbell’s return in Casino Royale (2006), every other Pierce Brosnan and Daniel Craig movie was characterized by the choice of drama directors like Lee Tamahori, Marc Forster, Sam Mendes and Cary Joji Fukunaga, which has helmed the yet-unreleased No Time To Die. Without doubt, a director like Michael Apted and a film like The World Is Not Enough is much closer to Barbara Broccoli’s idea of a Bond film than GoldenEye and Tomorrow Never Dies, which were much more in line with Cubby Broccoli’s action-oriented style of Bond flick.

Introducing the First Female Bond Villain
The World Is Not Enough features the first female villain in the series, something the audience discovers on par with James Bond as the story progresses: Apted observed on the DVD audio commentary that people would get impatient with the hero if they’d see him flail around in his ignorance long before he discovered who the real enemy was. The director took Elektra’s development seriously, taking advantage of his experience of directing female-lead productions and with the unaccredited collaboration of his then-wife screenwriter Dana Stevens, who added more dimensions to this important character. Sophie Marceau’s character appears before our eyes as a victim whose father dies on an attack inside the MI6 headquarters and both Bond and particularly M (Judi Dench) see her as a victim in need of protection. In reality, Elektra turned her once kidnapper, Renard, into her psychological slave by using her sexuality appealing to the man’s biggest weakness. He uses the terrorist to provoke an attack that would increase King Industries’ oil supply by eradicating the competence and the patriarchal figure of her deceased father, whom she took a disliking for when the man refused to pay the ransom money for her.

Simultaneously, the man we are meant to believe is the main villain, this terrorist Renard, is also shown as a victim of sorts: he’s slowly dying as a consequence of a bullet fired on his head by agent 009 following M’s orders, and he is now willing to kill or die for the only woman that has apparently loved him. The character development is so important in this movie that we not only have a romantic post-coital moment between Bond and Elektra but a de-romanticized post-sex moment between Elektra and Renard, where the woman doesn’t feel sexually pleased by her accomplice as he asks her if Bond was a good lover. Her answer: “What do you think? I wouldn’t feel anything?”

The World Is Not Enough presents us with a smart woman who plays with the emotions of people around her, a villain who is terminal and his biggest cause is the love he feels for that woman, and M making the story move along. Whatever Bond does here is more of a favour to M than an officially-sanctioned mission, from recovering Sir Robert’s money from a murky Swiss banker’s office in Bilbao to protecting Elektra King to reach Renard. During the third act, rescuing M becomes the mission when Elektra and Renard kidnap her before launching their attack to Istanbul, too. The relevance of Elektra and M in the story was so huge at one point that GoldenEye and Tomorrow Never Dies screenwriter Bruce Feirstein had to be brought again to give James Bond more relevance in a story where he seemed to be overshadowed by these female personalities.

Not surprisingly, most of the aforementioned dynamics were resurfaced in 2012’s Skyfall, Daniel Craig’s third James Bond film directed by Sam Mendes and the most lucrative EON production to date: it is M’s past the one that sets the main conflict and she becomes the important woman influencing 007 throughout the story, as MI6 is also under attack and he has to protect her from a villain whom she considered death or missing, someone who has also endured big suffering on his own.

An Ultimate Bond Legacy Remembered
Michael Apted’s recent death strongly affects those who grew up with the Pierce Brosnan movies, since he is the first director of this era to depart and in such a sudden manner. Many critics expressed concern on dwelling on the emotional side of James Bond back in 1999, however in this time and age, many seemed to celebrate every attempt to approach Bond’s human side under the scope of men like Sam Mendes or Marc Forster. While most people seem to regard these recent Bond movies as the real beginning of what we could call “Barbara Broccoli’s stamp on Bond”, the truth is that this drama-oriented change showed its roots two decades ago in The World Is Not Enough, the cradle of most of the topics we saw onwards in the series. And the late Michael Apted was indeed the man chosen to lead the way.

Nicolás Suszczyk
https://ns-writings.blogspot.com/
Nicolás Suszczyk has been a James Bond enthusiast since 1998, when he watched GoldenEye on TV and Tomorrow Never Dies on the big screen in his native Buenos Aires. He manages The GoldenEye Dossier, a site dedicated to the 17th James Bond film, and has collaborated for web sites and magazines related to 007 and other films of his liking. In 2019 he wrote the books The World of GoldenEye and The Bond of The Millennium.

2012: A Coca-Cola ad campaign related to Skyfall is revealed in the press. Slogan: "Unlock the 007 in You".

Coca-Cola Zero releases Skyfall
campaign continuing its
partnership with the James
Bond franchise

See the complete article here:

https://www.thedrum.com/news/2012/08/13/coca-cola-zero-releases-skyfall-campaign-continuing-its-partnership-james-bond

By Staff Writer-13 August 2012 11:57am

Coca-Cola Zero products will undergo a Bond themed makeover

The Coca-Cola Company has announced its Coca-Cola Zero brand is to team up with the 23rd installment of the James Bond series, Skyfall, as part of promotions for the films worldwide release this autumn.

The announcement continues Coca-Cola and James Bond’s successful partnership, which began in 2008 through the brand’s association with Quantum of Solace. This time the campaign will be asking fans to “Unlock the 007 In You.”

The association will see all Coke Zero products undergoing a special Bond themed makeover. The limited edition designs will feature across multiple pack formats, including cans, PET bottles and an aluminum bottle, all of which will showcase the famous Bond ‘gun barrel’ design.

Marketing Director for Coca-Cola Great Britain, Zoe Howorth, commented: “Skyfall is without a doubt one of this year’s most anticipated film releases, and we are very excited to be a part of it and to continue our relationship with the world’s favourite movie franchise.

“James Bond is a global cultural icon who consistently takes action to create what’s possible, making this the perfect partnership for Coca-Cola Zero.”

The campaign is set to roll out across TV, cinema, PR and outdoor advertising. Digital and social media campaigns, as well as on-pack promotions are also planned.

2015: The Telegraph reports that The Guardian reports that David Oyelowo will be Bond.

Telegraph Culture Books What to Read

David Oyelowo to be James Bond (sort of)

See the complete article here:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/books/what-to-read/david-oyelowo-james-bond/

David Oyelowo to play James Bond in 'Trigger Mortis'
Credit: Rex/Richard Saker - Catherine Gee
13 August 2015 • 10:04am

British actor David Oyelowo is to play James Bond – though in voice only. The Guardian reports that the 39-year-old is set to read the audio edition of Trigger Mortis, a new novel commissioned by the Ian Fleming estate and written by Anthony Horowitz.

It’s set during the space race in 1957, two weeks after the events in Goldfinger. It will also contain previously unpublished material written by Fleming for Murder on Wheels, a television series that was never made. Oyelowo’s invitation to play Bond came directly from the Fleming estate.

“I am officially the only person on planet Earth who can legitimately say: ‘I am the new James Bond’ — even saying that name is the cinematic equivalent of doing the ‘to be or not to be’ speech,” he said. “I was asked specifically by the Fleming estate, which is really special.”

Oyelowo was born in Oxford and began his career on the stage with the Royal Shakespeare Company and became the first black actor to portray the title role in Henry VI in 2001. Last year he was a regular screen presence with roles in the HBO TV film Nightingale, Interstellar and A Most Violent Year.

The Bafta, Emmy and Golden Globe-nominated actor was also widely acclaimed for his role as Martin Luther King in Selma.

In a statement, Horowitz said: “What an honour to have an actor as talented as David to read my take on Bond. He has a brilliant voice and talent for bringing out the nuances of dialogue and characters.”

Oyelowo is not the first black actor to play the role of Bond in audio form. In 2012, Hugh Quarshie read the audiobook of Dr No as part of a box set.

The casting of cinema's next 007 is still yet to be announced, although rumours continue to circulate that Idris Elba will become the first black Bond – despite Elba ruling himself out. Daniel Craig is contractually obliged to play Bond in one more film after Spectre, which is released in November, but reports suggest he may be released from his contract early.

Trigger Mortis will be released on 8 September.

2020: Steidl publishes The Goldfinger Files: The Making of the Iconic Alpine Sequence in the James Bond Movie “Goldfinger” by Steffen Appel and Peter Waelty.

https://speedreaders.info/22883-the-goldfinger-files/

2021: Q the Music performs The James Bond Concert Spectacular at Hull City Hall, Queen Victoria Square, Yorkshire, England.

THE JAMES BOND CONCERT SPECTACULAR

See the complete article here:

https://www.visithull.org/whatson/the-james-bond-concert-spectacular/

HULL CITY HALL, Queen Victoria Square, Hull, HU1 3RQ
13 Jun 2021 | 19.30 | £23.50

*RESCHEDULED DATE FROM 20 JUNE 2020.
ORIGINAL TICKETS REMAIN VALID*

The popular Q The Music Show is coming to Hull City Hall and they will be bringing the fabulous and iconic music of James Bond to you in a stunning concert. This show has been a huge success all around the world with its energetic and exciting performance by some of the UK’s leading musicians. The show will be compered by the lovely Caroline Munro who played Naomi in The Spy Who Loved Me.

Featuring all the songs from the 007 movies, you can hear the greats like Goldfinger, Diamonds Are Forever, Skyfall, Thunderball, Live And Let Die, Goldeneye and Licence To Kill amongst all the others. With top musicians and an informative compere – who appeared in the films herself – this show has everything you could want for a fabulous night out – and one that you will be talking about for years to come.

Don’t miss this superb evening as…Nobody Does It Better

HULL CITY HALL,
Queen Victoria Square,
Hull,
HU1 3RQ

01482 300 300
[email protected]
http://www.hcandl.co.uk/hullcityhall

RichardTheBruce

August 14th
[46 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1962: The Thames Ditton factory delivers a 1962 AC Aceca Coupe to Ian Fleming.

Ian Fleming sports car under hammer at Goodwood Revival

See the complete article here:

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-11340815

17 September 2010

The car was delivered in the same year that
the writer finished The Spy Who Loved Me

A sports car once owned by James
Bond creator Ian Fleming is being
auctioned at the Goodwood Revival
in West Sussex.

The 1962 AC Aceca Coupe is said to be one of six surviving Ford-powered Acecas in the world.

Bonhams which is running the auction said the car had a pre-sale estimate of £100,000 to 130,000.

The two-seater, which is dark blue with a red leather interior, is recorded as having left the factory in Surrey in 1962 for delivery to Ian Fleming.

The car was delivered from the Thames Ditton factory to the writer on 14 August. It was the same year that he completed The Spy Who Loved Me.

According to Bonhams, Fleming kept the car for a year before selling it in 1963. Since then, it has changed hands several times.

Another car in the auction, with a sale estimate of £20,000 to £24,000, is a 1988 Jaguar XJ-S V12 soft-top convertible that once belonged to the Duchess of York.

And a 1953 Jaguar C-Type, the same make and model that won the Le Mans 24-Hours race twice in 1951 and 1953, will also be auctioned with a guide price of between £800,000 and £1m.

The auction is being held at the racing festival near Chichester on Friday evening.

1964: Agent 007 jages (Agent 007 Hunted) re-released in Denmark.

1964: Salainen agentti 007 Istanbulissa (Secret Agent 007 in Istanbul; also Swedish Den hemliga agenten 007 i Istanbul/The Secret Agent 007 in Istanbul) released in Finland.

1966: Halle Berry is born--Cleveland, Ohio.

1978: Moonraker filming begins in Paris, France.

1987: Spioner der ved daggry (Spies Die at Dawn) released in Denmark.

1987: The Living Daylights released in Zagreb, Yugoslavia.

1993: Domark publishes video game James Bond 007: The Duel--developed by The Kremlin, for use with Sega's Mega Drive/Genesis, Master System and Game Gear consoles. Timothy Dalton's last appearance in the role.

James Bond 007: The Duel (1993)

James Bond: The Duel (original title)
Action, Adventure, Thriller | Video game released 14 August 1993
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0483987/

In James Bond 007: The Duel, you must infiltrate a Caribbean island base where a mad professor is holding people hostage.
Writer: Ian Fleming (characters and universe)

https://www.imdb.com/video/vi1346813209?playlistId=tt0483987

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0483987/videoplayer/vi1346813209

2002: Peter Roger Hunt dies at age 77--Santa Monica, California. (Born 11 March 1925--London, England.)

Peter Hunt
The man who cut down 007

See the complete article here:

https://www.theguardian.com/news/2002/aug/16/guardianobituaries.filmnews[/center]

Ronald Bergan - Thu 15 Aug 2002 20.16 EDT

The film editor and director Peter Hunt, who has died aged 77, was associated with the huge success of the James Bond movies, the longest-running series in the history of the cinema. He edited the first five Bond films - generally considered the best - creating a style of sharp cutting that has been emulated by many editors and directors of action movies.

He also directed one, On Her Majesty's Secret Service (1969), mistakenly thought of as the worst of the Bond films because of George Lazenby's forgettable 007. The inexperienced Australian model carried the can for the film's comparative box-office failure, but Hunt was praised for his pacy, and seemingly effortless, direction.

Already with a decade of editing behind him, Hunt only reluctantly agreed to edit the first Bond film, Dr No (1962). "I was really not interested in doing it at all," he recalled. "But, then I thought, well, if the director is Terence Young, and I know him well enough, and I find him rather nice, maybe it will be alright." Previously, Hunt had suggested to Harry Saltzman that, in his search for an actor to portray James Bond, the producer look at the film he had just edited, the feeble army comedy On The Fiddle (1961), in which Sean Connery played a Gypsy pedlar.

The editing style of the Bond movies was established because, "if we kept the thing moving fast enough, people won't see the plot holes," what editors call "chets", or cheated editing tricks. "On Dr No, for example, there was a great deal missing from the film when we got back from shooting in Jamaica, and I had to cut it and revoice it in such a way as to make sense."

It was from then that Hunt decided to use jump cuts and quick cutting, and very few fade-ins, fade-outs and dissolves, which "destroy the tension of the film". The fight between Connery and Robert Shaw on board the Orient Express, in From Russia With Love (1963), took a total of 59 cuts in 115 seconds of film.

Born in London, Hunt learned his craft from an uncle who made government training and educational films. His first claim to fame was, in fact, appearing on a recruiting poster for the Boy Scouts Association when he was 16, and he read the lesson at Lord Baden-Powell's funeral. At 17, he joined the army, and was almost immediately shipped off to Italy, where he took part in the battle of Cassino.

After the war, he returned to work with his uncle, before becoming assistant cutter for Alexander Korda, and a fully fledged editor with Hill In Korea (1956). He worked with both Terence Young and Lewis Gilbert on a number of films prior to editing their Bond efforts.

Besides editing, Hunt directed some second-unit work on the Bond films, as well as the title sequence for Chitty Chitty Bang Bang (1968). "I had a terrible time in the cutting room on You Only Live Twice (1967), with Donald Pleasance as Blofeld. Lewis [Gilbert] had made him into a camp, mini sort of villain. If you look at the film very carefully, Pleasance doesn't walk anywhere, because he had this mincing stride. He was so short that he looked like a little elf beside Connery. I used every bit of editing imagination I could so that he could be taken seriously as a villain."

Many purist Bond fans regret that Hunt never directed another 007 movie. His determination to be more faithful to the Ian Fleming original, even down to the death of the heroine (Diana Rigg) and the scaling down of gadgetry, puts On Her Majesty's Secret Service above many subsequent films in the series. It also happened to be the best picture he directed.

There followed two overlong adventure yarns set in Africa with Roger Moore, Gold (1974) and Shout At The Devil (1976); a couple of macho movies with Charles Bronson, Death Hunt (1981) and Assassination (1986); and the dispensable Wild Geese II (1985). But the work began to dry up, a situation that depressed the normally ebullient and energetic Hunt. In 1975, he settled in southern California with his partner Nicos Kourtis, who survives him.

Peter Roger Hunt, film editor and director, born March 11 1925; died August 14 2002

Peter R. Hunt (I) (1925–2002)

Editor | Director | Editorial Department
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0402597/?ref_=fn_al_nm_1

2008: Heineken renews its product placement in the Bond film franchise.

Heineken beer in James Bond movie Quantum of Solace

http://www.007museum.com/HeinekenQOS.htm"]007museum.com/HeinekenQOS.htm
Amsterdam, 14 August 2008 - Heineken International today announced that it will launch a worldwide promotional campaign for the 22nd James Bond film, “Quantum of Solace,” a Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer Pictures’/Columbia Pictures’ release of EON Productions. The film, which will be released in movie theatres worldwide in November 2008, is Heineken’s 5th consecutive global partnership with one of the most successful and longest running movie franchises in history.

Stefan Orlowski, Group Commerce Director, Heineken N.V., said of the partnership: “Our long association with James Bond has helped enhance the profile of the Heineken brand across the world. The partnership supports our commitment to extend the brand’s leadership position within the international premium beer segment. Our global campaign offers a great opportunity to drive sales growth and to help build the value of Heineken's brand equity."

The new marketing campaign provides the opportunity for consumers to experience the premium, stylish and international world of James Bond. The campaign features leading lady Olga Kurylenko and was shot using actual film sets and scenes from the film. It includes TV and print advertising and on- and off-premise promotions, interactive and digital activities, radio promotions, consumer competitions and tie-ins with local premiere events. The campaign will be launched globally across an estimated 40 countries in October in conjunction with the worldwide release of the film.

Olga Kurylenko, who plays the role of Camille in the upcoming film, commented: “I am delighted to support Heineken’s global “Quantum of Solace” marketing campaign. Heineken has done a great job in making James Bond, Camille and the world of Bond connect with their iconic international brand.”

Melinda Eskell, Manager Heineken Brand Communication said: “We worked in close partnership with Eon and Columbia Pictures to ensure the global campaign remained authentic to the film and the James Bond franchise. The involvement of Olga Kurylenko combined with the use of other authentic Bond assets provides Heineken the unique opportunity to allow our consumers worldwide to experience the world of Bond.”

In “Quantum of Solace,” Daniel Craig reprises his role as Ian Fleming’s James Bond 007.The film is directed by Marc Forster, the screenplay is by Neal Purvis & Robert Wade and Paul Haggis and Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli producer.

2013: Mark Sutton dies at age 42--Mont Blanc, France.
(Born 13 April 1971--UK.)

Mark Sutton Dies in Wingsuit Accident in Switzerland

See the complete article here:

https://www.chamonix.net/english/news/mark-sutton-dies-in-wingsuit-accident

ChamonixNews's picture Submitted by ChamonixNews on Fri, 16 Aug 2013 - 09:57

Mark Sutton, 42, was staying in Chamonix with his girlfriend, Victoria Homewood, 39. On Wed 14 Aug 2013 he travelled to Switzerland and took a helicopter flight with Tony Uragallo. They were participating in an event organised by Epic Tv, the French extreme sports online channel, which featured the astonishing Alexander Polli Batman Cave Flight.

At an altitude of 3,300m Mark and Tony Uragallo both exited the helicopter at about 11am. This was a rehearsal to check out their equipment and the flight path. Each pilot was wearing three cameras so that they could film each other and their own trajectory. The anticipated duration of the rehearsal flight was about 60 seconds.

Shortly after exiting the helicopter, Mark appeared to lose control as he deviated from the planned route. He impacted on the mountain side at an estimated 150mph (240km/h) beside the Trient Glacier close to the border with France.

Wednesday's accident was the first involving a wingsuit pilot in the Swiss canton of Valais. On 25 Jul 2013 a 24 year old German male died after jumping from the Brevent (2525m).

Mark Sutton became particularly well known for the parachute jump he and Gary Connery made from a helicopter during the opening ceremony of 2012 London Olympics. Mark played the role of James Bond, while Gary played the role of the HRH Queen Elizabeth II.

2019: Dynamite Entertainment releases James Bond Origins #12.
Ibrahim Moustafa, artist. Jeff Parker, writer.

JAMES BOND ORIGIN #12 (OF 12)

https://www.dynamite.com/htmlfiles/viewProduct.html?PRO=C72513027244712011
Cover A: Dan Panosian
Cover B: Dean Kotz
Cover C: Vasco Georgiev
Cover D: Ibrahim Moustafa
Cover E: Bob Q
Writer: Jeff Parker, Ibrahim Moustafa
Art: Ibrahim Moustafa
Genre: Action/Adventure
Publication Date: August 2019
Format: Comic Book
Page Count: 32 Pages
ON SALE DATE: 8/14/2019

"The Debt: Finale"

In 1941, Lieutenant Bond finally learns the truth of his deceased mentor, Commander Weldon. But truth comes at a cost. The conclusion of Bond's adventures in 1941, by JEFF PARKER (Aquaman, Fantastic Four) and IBRAHIM MOUSTAFA (James Bond: Solstice, Mother Panic).

2019: Media reports on Gerard Butler recalling a meeting with Eon twenty years prior.

Gerard Butler met with James Bond bosses
20 years ago but is now too old to play 007

See the complete article here:

https://metro.co.uk/2019/08/14/gerard-butler-met-james-bond-bosses-20-years-ago-now-old-play-007-10570630/

Mel Evans | Wednesday 14 Aug 2019

https://metro.co.uk/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/GettyImages-1127323698.jpg?quality=90&strip=all&zoom=1&resize=644,452
We won’t be seeing Gerard as Bond (Picture: Getty Images)

Gerard Butler has poured cold water on any hopes he would be donning the famous James Bond tuxedo and getting his martini all shaken, not stirred.

Seems he’s been asked before to play the suave spy and turned it down. Now? Well, he believes he’s just too old.

The Angel Has Fallen star was in London chatting about his new movie when he was quizzed on radio about taking on the famous spy.

His name has been thrown about for a long time and with Daniel Craig about to hang up his 007 badge following the next instalment, Bond 25, next year it begs the question of who will take over.

Everyone from Gerard to Idris Elba, Tom Hiddleston and James Norton has been mentioned.

But Gerard thinks time is no longer on his side.

Daniel Craig in Quantum Of Solace
It’s thought Bond 25 will be Daniel’s last film as the spy (Picture: Rex Features)

‘No. I had a meeting for it like 20 years ago,’ he said on Capital FM’s Breakfast show with Roman Kemp on Wednesday.

‘Now I think I’m at a nice ripe old age where they won’t be coming back my way which is fine.’

Gerard is pretty happy working on his own franchise with Fallen (first it was Olympus, then London, now Angel).

‘Listen, here’s the thing, you know what I love is – and I love Bond, I grew up on Bond – but the cool thing with this is that we created our own franchise,’ he continued.

‘We created our own Bond and that’s more fun than to have to play Bond and be compared to the others.’

That’s not to say he hasn’t had his own brush with Bond in the past, as Gerard recounted a rather thrilling moment on set with former 007 star Pierce Brosnan.

Speaking about the injuries he’s sustained living the life of an action man, he said: ‘Yeah, in Chasing Mavericks I ended up in hospital.

‘I’ve been in car crashes, in fact, Pierce Brosnan – James Bond himself – drove me right into a wall. That was 10 years ago.’

Fun times!

Tomorrow Never Dies

2021: Bond for a Day: Immersive Tour & Dining Experience at The Taj Hotel St James, London. Also 20 and 21 August.

Bond for a Day: Immersive Tour & Dining Experience

See the complete article here:

https://feverup.com/m/93085

Sat 14 Aug
Tickets
🎫 Ticket for 1 to the Bond for a Day immersive tour with a visit to Mayfair, the Floris Museum and a shooting range, including lunch, a Vesper Martini and a Vodka Martini at a 5-star hotel

Included in the Experience
🔍 Immersive experience with an espionage expert tour guide
👝 PPE kit for each guest with your own drawstring souvenir bag
🍽️ Lunch at the 5-star Taj Hotel St James' Court
🍸 A Vodka Martini (shaken, not stirred)
🤫 A lesson on counter-surveillance techniques
🔫 A visit to "Q" / shooting range activity using 300 rounds with the preferred weapons of Bond
🚗 A transported, guided tour of Mayfair visiting locations relating to the life of Ian Flemming & espionage 'secret corners'
🏢 Guided tour of the Floris Museum and its signature collection. Most notable customers include HRH Prince Charles, George IV, Winston Churchill, Marilyn Monroe, Ian Flemming (and James Bond!)
💐 A selected sample of the Bond scent No:89 in the Floris shop, with a 10% discount to splash on yourself if you wish to!
🍹 End with your own version of Bond's favourite cocktail: the Vesper (alcoholic or mocktail) at The Taj St James' Court

General Info
📅 Date: various dates (select during purchase)
🕒 Time: 12pm
⏳ Duration: 6 to 7 hours
📍 Meeting point: The Taj Hotel St James - Garden Court, at the back of the hotel (ask the Concierge for directions)
👤 Age requirement: 18+ with valid ID
🍽️ Dietary requirements: allergies and other dietary requirements are catered for
❓ Please note: this experience requires significant immersion/participation. This is a half-day experience with approx. 70% walking and standing and 30% being transported

Description
Live a day in the life of the most famous spy in the world! Start this immersive experience with a light lunch at the Taj Hotel St James equipped with a Martini (shaken, not stirred) in true Bond style. Then, after an action-packed afternoon mastering your shooting skills and walking in the footsteps of Bond's creator, take in the views as a true 007 with a second Martini. You earned it! Get ready to go behind the scenes of one of the world's most successful movie franchises and play the leading role—who knows, you may even get your own '00' Licence!

The Taj Hotel St James: St. James Court - 54 Buckingham Gate, London SW1E 6AF, SW1E 6AF

2021: Free James Bond Walking Tour, London.

]Free James Bond Walking Tour

See the complete article here:

https://www.eventbrite.com/checkout-external?eid=164370505607]

Free James Bond Walking Tour
Sat, 14 Aug 2021 11:00 - 13:00 BST

2021: Casino Royale plays at the Prince Charles Cinema, London.

CASINO ROYALE

See the complete article here:

https://princecharlescinema.com/PrinceCharlesCinema.dll/Seasons?e=341

CASINO ROYALE
144 mins | rated (15)
Directed by Martin Campbell
Starring Daniel Craig, Eva Green, Judi Dench
UK (2006)
15th Anniversary

Saturday 14 Aug 2021
Book | 5:15pm

2021: American Society of Music Arrangers and Composers present John Barry and the Music of James Bond with Charles Fernandez, part 2 available on Zoom. (Los Angeles 12 PM; New York 3 PM; United Kingdom 8 PM.)

Aug
14
John Barry and the Music of James Bond with Charles Fernandez, part 2

See the complete article here:

https://www.eventbrite.com/e/john-barry-and-the-music-of-james-bond-with-charles-fernandez-part-2-tickets-165215878139

About this event
Saturday, August 14, 2021
LA 12 PM | NY 3 PM | UK 8 PM

John Barry and the Music of James Bond with Charles Fernandez, part 2
Where did John Barry come from? How did he get his start? How did he wind up scoring 11 bond films over a 25 year period? Come to an afternoon dedicated to John Barry and his Music for the James Bond Films. You will hear many, many clips from the films. Learn the major traits he used again and again.

(Part 1 video link sent with order confirmation)

BIOS:

Charles Fernandez is an award-winning, Emmy and Annie-nominated composer, orchestrator, bassoonist, educator and conductor. Hailing from New Orleans, he’s lived in Los Angeles since 1983.

Companies he’s written music for include Disney, Universal, Dreamworks, Amblin, MGM, JUMBO and for shows such as Bonkers, Aladdin, Little Mermaid, Casper, 101 Dalmatians, Toonsylvania, Robot Chicken, Doug and Mixed Nutz. He’s worked on countless trailers, including several James Bond trailers including Casino Royale and Spectre.

As an educator, he teaches at UCLA Extension, The Los Angeles High School of the Arts and through Thinkspace (Based in England).

His concert works and arrangements can be found on YouTube and range from Symphonic to Concert Band to Concerto and Chamber.

John Barry Prendergast, was an English composer and conductor of film music and films.He composed the scores for eleven of the James Bond films between 1963 and 1987, and also arranged and performed the "James Bond Theme" to the first film in the series, 1962's Dr. No. He wrote the GRAMMY- and Academy Award-winning scores to the films Dances with Wolves and Out of Africa, as well as The Scarlet Letter, The Cotton Club, The Tamarind Seed, Mary, Queen of Scots, Game of Death, and the theme for the British television cult series The Persuaders!, in a career spanning over 50 years. In 1999, he was appointed with an OBE for services to music.

Born in York, Barry spent his early years working in cinemas owned by his father. During his national service with the British Army in Cyprus, Barry began performing as a musician after learning to play the trumpet. Upon completing his national service, he formed his own band in 1957, the John Barry Seven. He later developed an interest in composing and arranging music, making his début for television in 1958. He came to the notice of the makers of the first James Bond film Dr. No, who were dissatisfied with a theme for James Bond given to them by Monty Norman. Noel Rogers the head of music at United Artists approached Barry. This started a successful association between Barry and Bond series that lasted for 25 years.He received many awards for his work, including five Academy Awards; two for Born Free, and one each for The Lion in Winter (for which he also won the first BAFTA Award for Best Film Music), Dances with Wolves and Out of Africa (both of which also won him GRAMMY Awards). He also received ten Golden Globe Award nominations, winning once for Best Original Score for Out of Africa in 1986. Barry completed his last film score, Enigma, in 2001 and recorded the successful album Eternal Echoes the same year. He then concentrated chiefly on live performances and co-wrote the music to the musical Brighton Rock in 2004 alongside Don Black.In 2001, Barry became a Fellow of the British Academy of Songwriters, Composers and Authors, and, in 2005, he was made a Fellow of the British Academy of Film and Television Arts. Barry was married four times and had four children. He moved to the United States in 1975 and lived there until his death in 2011.
************************************************************************

Our online events are all held on Zoom. A log-on link and password will be sent via email upon completion of your ticket order.

All of ASMAC’s events are recorded, and your participation serves as your consent to be part of this recording. ASMAC reserves the right to rebroadcast this recording, as well as to offer it for sale in various media.

The American Society of Music Arrangers and Composers (ASMAC) is a registered non-profit 501(c)(3). Our mission is to promote the arts of music arranging, composition and orchestration within the music and entertainment industry and to the general public. ASMAC presents master classes, online events, scholarships and other programs for professionals, students, the entertainment community, as well as to schools and to the general public. Visit www.asmac.org for more info.
Tags

Online Events Online Networking Online Music Networking #history #hollywood #asmac #vertigo #arranging #psycho #filmmusic #filmcomposing

ASMAC is an organization whose mission is to promote the arts of Music Arranging, Composition and Orchestration within the entertainment industry community and the general public. ASMAC presents monthly master classes, workshops, luncheons and other programs for the established composers, arrangers and orchestrators as well as students entering the field. Visit www.asmac.org for more info.

RichardTheBruce

August 15th
[45 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1944: Barbara Bouchet is born--Liberec, Czechia.

1947: Jenny Hanley is born--Gerrards Cross, Buckinghamshire, England.

Jenny Hanley about her work on On Her
Majesty’s Secret Service

See the complete article here:

http://iluminar.tv/jenny-hanley-about-her-work-on-on-her-majestys-secret-service/

March 16, 2019

This interview originally appeared on From Sweden with Love
https://jamesbond007.se/eng/intervjuer/jenny_hanley_on_her_majestys_secret_service_interview

By Mark Cerulli

FSWL contributor and LA correspondent Mark Cerulli talks to English actress
Jenny Hanley,
the Irish girl in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (1969) starring
George Lazenby
as Ian Fleming’s 007 that celebrates its 50th Anniversary this year.

A Girl On The Mountain
One of my first questions for the wonderful British actress Jenny Hanley was “When did you get bit by the acting bug?” Her answer was a total surprise – no “acting bug” bit, instead, she was born into show business…

“Both my parents were actors and my grandparents were professional photographers,” Jenny states. (One of their clients was none other than future-Bond, Sir Roger Moore) She studied child psychology and had her sights on a quiet career as a nanny. It was her brother who wanted to be an actor, and yet she got all the breaks – being sent to modeling school, being spotted and suddenly finding herself in front of the camera in commercials and on magazine covers. Not the easiest transition for the painfully shy young woman.

“I wasn’t a wall flower, I was lichen!” the actress remembers with a laugh.

On Her Majesty’s Secret Service was Jenny’s second film. (Her first was a one scene walk on in 1968’s hedonistic British drama Joanna) None other than Harry Saltzman spotted her in a commercial and wanted to include her in the stable of young women he was building for use in films. (During Hollywood’s “Golden” era, studios groomed young talent, giving them acting and voice lessons along with other training. The UK’s Rank Organization had a similar “charm school”.) Saltzman, as always thinking ahead, envisioned building a similar talent pool for Bond films and other projects.

Harry offered her a movie straight away, “But the part had a nude scene which I wouldn’t do…” Jenny recalled. Instead Saltzman suggested she “… go off to Switzerland [Schilthorn Piz Gloria] and have fun for a few weeks.” And just like that Jenny had a role in the next Bond film! The producer also told her that she had to wear a red wig as they already had several blondes in the cast.

Jenny felt right at home on the set as she had worked with many members of OHMSS’s female cast – including Joanna Lumley, Anouska Hempel (now one of the most successful interior designers in Europe) and her London neighbor, Catherine Schnell.

When asked about her memories of Harry Saltzman, Jenny mentioned going into his office, off London’s ritzy Park Lane: “It was a very masculine office, with dark furniture and a leather sofa that was so deep if you sat on it and leaned back, your feet were up off the floor like a child.” And if that weren’t intimidating enough, “Harry was behind an enormous desk up on a plinth, so he was definitely the King!” Of course he was – as half of the most successful producing team in movie history. The Bond films literally coined money and Saltzman and Albert “Cubby” Broccoli wielded immense power, yet both men treated her royally – “Harry was very sweet,” Jenny recalls, adding, “And Cubby was just as his name suggests, ‘Cuddly Cubby’.”

She also called director Peter Hunt “a gentle soul” although, “Peter didn’t have much to do with us because we didn’t have much to do.”

While she said Hunt wasn’t a “strong” director, “He made a really good film and he knew what he wanted. By gosh, the fight scenes, the skiing and car chases were brilliantly done!” Jenny also recalled an incident that shows how the Bond production team would let nothing stand in the way of getting a great shot: “There was a scene up on the mountain, and there wasn’t enough snow, so Peter sent a helicopter to another mountain and they filled up a huge upside-down parachute with snow and made several trips so we had enough snow! In a Bond movie, it was all possible to do…”

In terms of “character development”, there wasn’t a lot for Jenny’s Irish Girl – “I sat around and practiced my Irish accent and wound up not saying anything at all,” Jenny remembers with a chuckle. “I always say that a standard lamp could have done what I did in the film.” (A very beautiful standard lamp!)

For the Bond girls on location – every day began the same: “We were picked up in a horse drawn carriage, bundled in furs just to take us to the cable car to go up the mountain…. it was slightly surreal,” she marvels. Light workload or not, her memories of the set were nothing but positive… “Cubby wanted everything to be a family, which was sweet. And while we were out in Switzerland, his son was going to have his first haircut, which was to be a celebration and everyone was invited. It was great!”

Jenny also had a connection to the new Bond – George Lazenby – having met him when she was modeling. While he was friendly and fun to be around, Jenny recalled a bit of his strong personality coming out when he visited a local restaurant without a reservation. When told it was booked, he came back with, “Don’t you know who I am?” One hopes he got that table!

Of course, the pressure George was under was enormous, with the future of one of Cinema’s most valuable franchises riding on his relatively inexperienced shoulders. Fortunately, Lazenby had enough self-confidence for five men, so he was able to shrug the stress off and do the work.

“He carried the film and he did it beautifully… he had a good sense of humor and we got on well,” Jenny remembers.

The actress is also full of admiration for George’s famous independent streak.

“I remember his coming back for the premiere with long sideburns and facial fur (!) and being told, ‘That’s not Bond, got to a barber and get yourself shaved so you look like Bond’ and George said ‘No, I won’t.’ That was George!”

Looking back on On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Jenny has nothing but good feelings about the film. “It was good fun to do, ” she said, “And being a part of such an extraordinary franchise, Cubby made it like family and we are a family because we still meet up [at conventions] and EON [Productions] is very keen on keeping that family together.”

As On Her Majesty’s Secret Service turns 50 this year the film will be celebrated with two unique events in Portugal and Switzerland, the latter co-hosted by Schilthornbahn AG and Martijn Mulder’s On The Tracks of 007, in May and June.

1964: England buries Ian Lancaster Fleming at Sevenhampton, near Swindon, England.

Omnia perfunctus vitae praemia, marces, meaning
"Having enjoyed all life's prizes, you now decay."
On the Nature of Things (De rerum natura)

1983: Octopussy released in Denmark.

https://www.bond-o-rama.dk/en/op-dk-poster-1983/

https://www.bond-o-rama.dk/en/octopussy-dk-ad-sheet-1983/

1987: “If There Was a Man” by Chrissie Hynde and The Pretenders charts in the U.K., eventually reaching #49.

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1997: Tomorrow Never Dies films OO7 firing rockets at the bad guys.

2007: Horsetalk new Zealand reports on protests for Quantum of Solace filming the Palio horse race in Italy.

Protest at James Bond's Palio horse race plan

See the complete article here:

https://www.horsetalk.co.nz/archives/2007/08/111.shtml

August 15 2007

James Bond may finally have met his match in the form of angry animal-rights activists.

The fictional British Secret Service agent intends involving horses in the climax of his latest adventure. The end of his latest movie centres on the Palio, an ancient bareback horse race around the tight streets of the Tuscan hill town of Siena.

Animal rights activists have long protested against the cruelty of the race, which is estimated to have claimed the lives of 50 horses in the last 35 years, as well as scores more injured.

They argue that Agent 007's involvement will glamourise the race.

The six-monthly race is run in August, and it is understood camera crews will be filming it for the as-yet unnamed 22nd movie in the James Bond series.

It is unclear whether Bond, played by Daniel Craig, will ride in the movie. Insiders have suggested Bond will be chasing a villain around the town as the race unfolds around them.

Opponents of the race include PETA and the the Italian AntiVivisection League. The Italian Federation of Equestrian Sport has also voiced concern, pointing to horses being exposed to "unacceptable risks".

The race is renowned for not having many rules. Riders are allowed to knock other riders off their horses, but are not allowed to grab their reins.

2008: Ford Motor Company puts out a press release on its latest Ka and Bond connections.

BOND MOVIE ROLE FOR NEW FORD KA

See the complete article here:

http://ophelia.sdsu.edu:8080/ford/01-24-2009/about-ford/news-announcements/press-releases/press-releases-detail/pr-bond-movie-role-for-new-ford-ka-28874.html

Brentwood, Essex, August 15, 2008 – The highly-anticipated new James Bond adventure, ‘Quantum of Solace’, will feature a cameo appearance from Ford’s fresh-faced new model, the all-new Ford Ka.

Ford’s cheeky new small car will make its screen debut alongside the film's beautiful but feisty leading lady, Olga Kurylenko. Kurylenko plays Camille, a woman with her own personal mission and who quickly becomes an unlikely ally for Bond.

The 'Quantum of Solace' Ka is unique with metallic gold paint and an exclusive exterior graphics and interior trim combination.

“The new Ka is the perfect match for the character of Camille – adventurous, individual and thoroughly modern,” says Ford of Europe’s Chief Operating Officer, Stephen Odell. “We are delighted that the launch of the film coincides with the launch of such a significant new model for Ford of Europe.”

The special ‘Quantum of Solace’ Ka was created by Ford of Europe’s Design team, in collaboration with the movie’s Oscar ® award-winning production designer, Dennis Gassner. The Ka’s cameo continues Ford of Europe's relationship with the James Bond films, following the debut appearance of the latest Ford Mondeo, in the 2006 blockbuster, ‘Casino Royale’.

Twelve years after the original Ford Ka wowed customers with its modern spirit and what has proved to be a remarkably age-less design, its successor looks set to repeat its impact.

The new model retains all the qualities which made the Ka so popular – compact size, great looks, lively dynamics and fun personality – but presents them in a fresh new package. Further technical details of the new Ford Ka will be revealed closer to launch later in 2008.

‘Quantum of Solace’ is produced for EON Productions by Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli and distributed by Sony Pictures Entertainment.

Directed by Marc Forster, the film stars Daniel Craig as the legendary secret agent, James Bond and opens in the UK and France on October 31st, then across the rest of Europe during November 2008.

The all-new Ka enjoys the spotlight of its own at the 2008 Paris Motor Show, on October 2.
# # #

ABOUT EON PRODUCTIONS
EON Productions/Danjaq, LLC, is owned by the Broccoli family and has produced twenty two James Bond films since 1962, including QUANTUM OF SOLACE. The James Bond films, produced by Michael G. Wilson and Barbara Broccoli, make up the longest running franchise in film history and include the recent blockbuster films GOLDENEYE, TOMORROW NEVER DIES, THE WORLD IS NOT ENOUGH, DIE ANOTHER DAY and CASINO ROYALE. EON Productions and Danjaq LLC, are affiliate companies and control all worldwide merchandising of the James Bond franchise.

ABOUT COLUMBIA PICTURES
Columbia Pictures, part of the Columbia TriStar Motion Picture Group, is a Sony Pictures Entertainment company. Sony Pictures Entertainment (SPE) is a subsidiary of Sony Corporation of America (SCA), a subsidiary of Tokyo-based Sony Corporation. SPE’s global operations encompass motion picture production and distribution; television production and distribution; digital content creation and distribution; worldwide channel investments; home entertainment acquisition and distribution; operation of studio facilities; development of new entertainment products, services and technologies; and distribution of filmed entertainment in 67 countries. Sony Pictures Entertainment can be found on the World Wide Web at http://www.sonypictures.com.

2012: An official James Bond scent becomes available at Harrod's.

For your nose only: James Bond gets his first fragrance

By Oliver Franklin-Wallis
Friday 27 July 2012

See the complete article here:

https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/article/james-bond-007-official-fragrance

Whether in Ian Fleming's novels or the film outings, 007 has never been subtle about his preference for particular brands of car, drink or tailor - but Bond was never particularly forthcoming about his choice of cologne. (The closest we get is Fleming's own preference for Floris No.89.) That's all set to change with the unveiling of the first official James Bond fragrance, arriving in September from P&G to mark the franchise's 50th anniversary. Thankfully, the scent eschews hints of Aston Martin leather and martini top notes for a modern take on classic Sixties fragrances, with hints of fresh apple, cardamom, sandalwood and vetiver. Because given what we've seen of Daniel Craig's motorcycle-riding, Bérénice-seducing, Heineken-swigging hero in Skyfall, he's going to need to freshen up...

£25 for 50ml. Available exclusively at Harrods from 15 August 15. Available nationwide from 19 September. 007.com

2017: Daniel Craig confirms his return for BOND 25. Also confirmed on Instagram.

Daniel Craig will return as 007 in Bond 25. The actor confirmed he would play James Bond for the fifth time to host Stephen Colbert on The Late Show. Bond 25 will be released in US cinemas on November 8, 2019 with a traditional early release in the UK and the rest of the world.

2019: Sotheby's auctions an Aston Martin DB5.

Calling All Secret Agents: James Bond’s 1965 Aston
Martin DB5 Is Up for Auction
By Sotheby's

See the complete article here:

https://www.sothebys.com/en/articles/james-bonds-1965-aston-martin-db5-goldfinger-rm-monterey-auction

Automobiles | RM Sotheby's | Jun 12, 2019

RM Sotheby’s, the official auction house of Aston Martin, is offering perhaps the most iconic Aston Martin of all time to lead ‘An Evening with Aston Martin,’ a special single-marque sale session at the 2019 Monterey auction on 15 August. Featuring thirteen functioning Bond modifications, the James Bond 007 Aston Martin DB5 is one of just three surviving examples commissioned in period by Eon Productions and fitted with MI6 Q Branch specifications as pictured in Goldfinger.

No one could have predicted the fabulously successful multi-decade synergy that would develop when production designer Ken Adam and special effects man John Stears visited Aston Martin’s Newport-Pagnell plant in late 1963. The two men were on a mission to source a pair of the latest Aston Martin models for use in Eon Productions’ third adaptation of an Ian Fleming novel, again about the MI6 superspy with a license to kill, James Bond. The film was called Goldfinger.

https://www.sothebys.com/en/articles/james-bonds-1965-aston-martin-db5-goldfinger-rm-monterey-auction
Monterey 2019: The Most Famous Car in the World

Two near-identical cars were built and loaned to Eon Productions for filming, with each fulfilling various roles; one for stunt driving and chase sequences and therefore needing to be lightweight and fast, and the other for interior shots and close-ups, to be equipped with functional modifications created by Stears. As Desmond Llewelyn’s legendary weapons-master Q would go on to explain to Sean Connery’s 007, the Snow Shadow Gray-painted DB5 was equipped with front and rear hydraulic over-rider rams on the bumpers, a Browning .30 caliber machine gun in each fender, wheel-hub mounted tire-slashers, a raising rear bullet-proof screen, an in-dash radar tracking scope, oil, caltrop and smoke screen dispensers, revolving license plates, and a passenger-seat ejection system. Although never used during the film, the car was also equipped with a telephone in the driver’s door to communicate with MI6 headquarters and a hidden compartment under the driver’s seat containing several weapons.

https://rmsothebys.com/en/auctions/mo19/monterey/lots/r0050-1965-aston-martin-db5-bond-car/778818
The 1965 Aston Martin DB5 Bond Car to be offered at RM Sotheby’s Monterey sale.
Estimate $4,000,000–6,000,000. (Simon Clay © 2019 Courtesy of RM Sotheby’s)

The smash success of Goldfinger was also a success for Aston Martin, which saw DB5 sales surge to fuel an unprecedented level of production. The producers at Eon also took notice of the enormous appeal and potential marketing opportunities. In preparation for Thunderball’s release, the company ordered two more DB5 saloons, receiving chassis nos. DB5/2008/R, the example on offer at RM Sotheby’s Monterey sale, and DB5/2017/R. The two cars were fitted with all of Stears’ Goldfinger modifications and were shipped to the United States for promotional duties for Thunderball.

https://sothebys-com.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/2169d51/2147483647/strip/true/crop/3734x2667+133+0/resize/1158x827!/quality/90/?url=http://sothebys-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com/dotcom/d1/a9/0171062a4cdc911fc3e15c7d25d3/1965-aston-martin-db5-bond-car-simon-clay-c-2019-courtesy-of-rm-sothebys-5.jpg
https://sothebys-com.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/9eae80e/2147483647/strip/true/crop/6273x4480+447+0/resize/1158x827!/quality/90/?url=http://sothebys-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com/dotcom/bf/8a/376eed504a62bcd24e5c623cb566/1965-aston-martin-db5-bond-car-simon-clay-c-2019-courtesy-of-rm-sothebys-10.jpg
A look at the interior gadgets in the Bond DB5
(Simon Clay © 2019 Courtesy of RM Sotheby’s)

Following the tour, the two cars were no longer required as the next two Bond films debuted with different, more current automobiles in the hero roles and, accordingly, they were quietly offered for sale in 1969. The cars were soon purchased as a pair by well-known collector Anthony (now Lord) Bamford, whose British registration for chassis no. 2008/R remains on file. The Aston Martin build record lists Eon Productions as the original purchaser, with the important designation of being a “(Bond Car)” noted. Bamford then sold DB5/2008/R to B.H. Atchley, the owner of the Smokey Mountain Car Museum in Pigeon Forge, Tennessee. The Aston Martin was featured as the museum’s centerpiece, remaining in a pristine state of display for 35 years, receiving regular start-ups for exercise. In 2006, RM Sotheby’s (previously RM Auctions) was privileged to offer this very Bond DB5 for public sale, in a largely unrestored state.

https://sothebys-com.brightspotcdn.com/dims4/default/ad110d1/2147483647/strip/true/crop/5184x3456+0+0/resize/1154x769!/quality/90/?url=http://sothebys-brightspot.s3.amazonaws.com/dotcom/aa/3e/feafe1034c408cf92f0b47e5ca75/1965-aston-martin-db5-bond-car-simon-clay-c-2019-courtesy-of-rm-sothebys-4.jpg
The smoke screen dispenser on the DB5 is engaged
(Simon Clay © 2019 Courtesy of RM Sotheby’s)

Since that time, a well-documented, no-expense spared restoration by Switzerland’s esteemed Roos Engineering was completed. Roos Engineering is one of 13 specialist facilities whom Aston Martin have appointed as official Heritage Specialists. Not only were the chassis and body completely refinished to proper standards, but all thirteen of the John Stears-designed Bond modifications were properly refurbished to function as originally built.

The Bond DB5 will be on view at Sotheby's New York from 28 June through 31 July.

2019: Esquire reports on an auction of James Bond's Rolex.

James Bond's rarest Rolex is going up for auction

It was worn by Sean Connery in James Bond's first proper film outing 'Dr. No'

See the complete article here:

https://www.esquireme.com/content/37926-james-bonds-rarest-rolex-is-going-up-for-auction

15 August 2019 | Esquire Editors

Rolex, James Bond, Sotheby's, Auction

Along with extrajudicial killings and flagrant affairs, James Bond liked his watches.

Very much so. From Ian Fleming's original imagining to the Roger Moore of Octopussy, 007 has enjoyed multiple watches including (but not limited to) Omega, Hamilton and Rolex. And a key Bond memento from the latter is now up for grabs at Sotheby's.

As per the oral history of Dr. No, the Big Crown Submariner ref. 6538 was loaned to Sean Connery by producer Albert "Cubby" Broccoli: the closest relative to the Rolex Oyster Perpetual of Fleming's novels which, in fact, did not actually exist. The 6538 - a piece that ceased production in 1959 - has been considered something of a rarity ever since its starring role, and although Connery's specific wristwear isn't on auction, the model is still a highly desirable piece due to the big Bond connection.

The vintage Rolex bit helps, too.

The piece in question boasts several features that'd send an ardent horologist into self-destruct mode. First, there's the tropical dial, which has evolved into a chocolate brown shade over time. Once thought of as a ball drop on Rolex's part, it's since become a prized attribute by collectors. Moreover, text to the dial that proves the watch's COSC accreditation (that's the Contrôle Officiel Suisse des Chronomètres to non-watch folk - a sign of rigorous testing and accuracy) separates this particular piece from the first Big Crown Submariners. Hallmarks of collectability are in the detail, of which the the ref. 6538 has many.

Fancy your chances? Well, you're not alone. With the piece expected to fetch between £149,000 to £232,000 at auction, there'll be serious competition to own a cousin of Bond's celluloid history. And if that wasn't enough, final prices regularly exceed estimates in lots of great rarity. Hurrah!

2020: James Bond@007 recommends Relaxation Day.

https://twitter.com/007/status/1294559453841424385

2021: Walking tour Spies, Lies and Double Agents in Cambridge.

Aug
15

Spies, Lies and Double Agents (e)

https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/spies-lies-and-double-agents-e-tickets-160529366657
£15

A walking tour which unmasks the long tradition of Cambridge spying, from the earliest days of the university to recent times

About this event
A walking tour which unmasks the long tradition of Cambridge spying, from the earliest days of the university to recent times; from Christopher Marlowe to James Blunt, via James Bond. The tour will be led by Green Badge Guides.

Enjoy a spy-filled walk around some of Cambridge's loveliest streets. Discover how the Tudor monarchs made the university their secret-service HQ, and how they exploited codes, ciphers and undercover agents in their determination to reveal plots. Learn how a famous Elizabethan dramatist was exposed as a spy by his college bar bill. And why did Churchill call the Cambridge code-breakers at Bletchley Park, "the geese that laid the golden eggs."? Then there's James Bond, Miss Moneypenny the Big Five, and much more...

Email [email protected] if you would like a tour in Spanish, Russian, French, German Cantonese, Mandarin or Putonghua.

Location
Outside Great St Mary's (GSM)
The University Church
Senate House Hill
Cambridge
CB2 3PQ
United Kingdom

RichardTheBruce

August 16th
[44 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1944: Maud Russell writes about Ian Fleming in her diary.

Spies, affairs and James Bond... The
secret diary of Ian Fleming's wartime
mistress

See the complete article here:

https://www.telegraph.co.uk/women/life/spies-affairs-james-bond-secret-diary-ian-flemings-wartime-mistress/p/center]

Wednesday 16 August, 1944

Ian dined on Monday and did he breathe a word of the invasion of
the Riviera which happened the next day? No, not a word, the beast.

1952: Lieutenant-Commander Ian Fleming's service in the RNVR (Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve) Special Branch ends with his removal from the active list.
1952: Ian Fleming types out a letter to wife Ann.

"My love, This is only a tiny letter to try out my new typewriter
and to see if it will write golden words since it is made of gold."

1958: Madonna Louise Ciccone is born--Bay City, Michigan.

1965: Daily Variety reports the filmmakers now consider filming one of eight Fleming novels, including On Her Majesty's Secret Service with an existing screenplay by Richard Maibaum.
1966: The Times of London prints “Bulldog Drummond Was a Gentleman: Moral Decline Illustrated by James Bond.”

1973: 鐵金剛勇破 黑魔黨 (Tiě jīngāng yǒng pò hēi mó dǎng; Iron King Mafia, or Iron King Kong Breaks the Black Devil) released in Hong Kong.

1977: Spionen som elsket meg released in Norway.

1982: Octopussy filming begins with Moneypenny at MI6.

https://twitter.com/007/status/765580428061339648

1984: Roger Moore and the cast of A View to a Kill are photographed at Chantilly, France.

1985: Med doden i sikte (With Death in Sight) released in Norway.

1989: Permis de tuer released in France.

1995: Roger Moore comments on Pierce Brosnan in GoldenEye.

"Both Sean Connery and I will be forgotten after everybody sees Pierce."

2007: Fourteen cameras film the Palio di Siena horse race, Siena, Italy.

2017: The press continue to overwhelmingly report Daniel Craig committing to BOND 25.
2017: Dynamite Entertainment publishes James Bond Kill Chain #2.
Luca Casalanguida, artist. Andy Diggle, writer.

JAMES BOND: KILL CHAIN #2 (OF 6)

https://www.dynamite.com/htmlfiles/viewProduct.html?PRO=C72513026017802011
Cover A: Greg Smallwood
Writer: Andy Diggle
Art: Luca Casalanguida
Genre: Action/Adventure, Media Tie-In
Publication Date: August 2017
Page Count: 32 Pages
ON SALE DATE: 8/16

As tensions rise between MI6 and CIA, James Bond investigates the death of a fellow agent. Someone is smuggling military-grade weapons to European neo-Nazis, an arms pipeline stretching from the gutters of Munich to the upper echelons of Swiss high society. The trail will lead 007 to an old friend, a deadly betrayal, and an enigmatic art connoisseur named Chantal Chevalier.

RichardTheBruce

August 17th
[43 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1923: Julius Harris is born--Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.
(He dies 17 October 2004 at age 81--Woodland Hills, Los Angeles, California.)

Julius Harris, 81; Broke Stereotypes of Movie Roles for Black Actors

See the complete article here:

https://www.latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2004-oct-22-me-harris22-story.html

By Dennis McLellan, Times Staff Writer
Oct. 22, 2004

Julius Harris, the deep-voiced stage and screen actor who played the villainous Tee Hee in the James Bond film Live and Let Die and Ugandan President Idi Amin in the TV movie “Victory at Entebbe,” has died. He was 81.

Harris, a former member of the Negro Ensemble Company in New York City, died of heart failure Sunday at the Motion Picture and Television Hospital in Woodland Hills.

In an acting career that spanned four decades, Harris appeared in more than 70 film and television productions.

He played such diverse roles as a preacher who headed a slave group in the 1982 Civil War miniseries “The Blue and the Gray” and a gangster in the 1972 blaxploitation film classic “Superfly.”

“Even today, if I am walking in a black neighborhood, people call me by my ‘Superfly’ name -- Scatter,” Harris told The Times last October before being honored with a tribute by the Next Generation Council of the Motion Picture & Television Fund’s Legacy Film Series at the Directors Guild of America Theatre.

“His work helped African Americans break out of stereotypical movie roles and be seen as dynamic heroes and fully realized human beings,” actress Halle Berry said in a taped introduction to Harris’ film work.

A Philadelphia native whose mother was a Cotton Club dancer and whose father was a musician, Harris served as an Army medic during World War II. After leaving the service in 1950, he found work as an orderly and eventually became a nurse before moving to New York City.

As a regular at a Greenwich Village bar, he became friends with James Earl Jones, Yaphet Kotto, Al Freeman, Louis Gossett Jr. and other actors, whom he teased for being out of work.

“I would say to them, ‘You bums. You are always broke. What kind of actors are you? ... I can do your job with my arms tied behind my back,’ ” he recalled in The Times interview.

To back up his claim, he landed the small role of Ivan Dixon’s drunk, defeated father in “Nothing but a Man,” a critically acclaimed 1964 film about black life in the South starring Dixon and Abbey Lincoln.

“Not knowing the business, feeling I had to be in character, I got me a pint of bourbon, some of the worst rotgut stuff I could get,” Harris said.

When he arrived on the set, the producer and director took one look at him and said, “We can’t do anything with you today, Julius, but if you are the man we think you are, you’ll come back tomorrow.”

Harris said: “I was so embarrassed. So I went back home, sobered up and came back the next day and did the master [shot] in [one] take and close-ups in two [takes] and went home.”

In his review of the film, The Times’s Kevin Thomas deemed Harris’ performance superb.

He is survived by his children, Kimberly and Gideon.

A private memorial service will be held.

Julius Harris (1923–2004)

https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0364918/?ref_=nv_sr_1?ref_=nv_sr_1

Filmography

Actor (92 credits)

1997 ER (TV Series) - Gramps
- Random Acts (1997) ... Gramps
1996 The Burning Zone (TV Series) - Tribal Shaman
- The Silent Tower (1996) ... Tribal Shaman
1994 Shrunken Heads - Mr. Sumatra
1993 The Gifted
1993 Maniac Cop 3: Badge of Silence - Houngan
1992 The Boys (TV Movie) - Doc
1992 Eerie, Indiana (TV Series) - Prop Man
- Reality Takes a Holiday (1992) ... Prop Man
1992 Jake and the Fatman (TV Series) - James Allan Chester
- Pennies from Heaven (1992) ... James Allan Chester
1992 Grave Secrets: The Legacy of Hilltop Drive (TV Movie) - Elderly Farmer
1991 Last Breeze of Summer (Short) - The Reverend
1991 Civil Wars (TV Series) - Judge Adams
- Pilot (1991) ... Judge Adams
1991 Murder, She Wrote (TV Series) - Jack Lee Johnson
- Judge Not (1991) ... Jack Lee Johnson
1991 Harley Davidson and the Marlboro Man - Old Man
1991 The Golden Girls (TV Series) - Mr. Lewis
- Older and Wiser (1991) ... Mr. Lewis
1990 Prayer of the Rollerboys - Speedbagger
1990 Dragnet (TV Series) - Mr. Leyland
- Living Victim (1990) ... Mr. Leyland
1990 Darkman - Gravedigger
1990 To Sleep with Anger - Herman

1989 1st & Ten (TV Series) - Willie Buck Newton
- The Irreducible Bottom Line (1989) ... Willie Buck Newton
1989 Friday the 13th: The Series (TV Series) - Simpson
- The Butcher (1989) ... Simpson
1988 Split Decisions - Tony Leone
1987 Frank's Place (TV Series) - Mr. Kicks
- Cool and the Gang: Part 2 (1987) ... Mr. Kicks
- Cool and the Gang: Part 1 (1987) ... Mr. Kicks
1987 A Gathering of Old Men (TV Movie) - Coot
1987 Outlaws (TV Series) - Butch
- Primer (1987) ... Butch
1986 The Love Boat (TV Series) - Minister
- The Shipshape Cruise (1986) ... Minister
1986 Capitol (TV Series) - Papa Nebo
- Episode dated 6 October 1986 (1986) ... Papa Nebo
1986 Hollywood Vice Squad - Jesse
1983-1986 Cagney & Lacey (TV Series) - Sgt. Major Brennan / Bardo
- Post Partum (1986) ... Sgt. Major Brennan
- The Grandest Jewel Thief of Them All (1983) ... Bardo
1986 My Chauffeur - Johnson
1985 Amazing Stories (TV Series) - Joe
- Mr. Magic (1985) ... Joe
1985 Crimewave - Hardened Convict
1985 Hollywood Wives (TV Mini-Series) - Reverend Daniel
- Episode #1.1 (1985) ... Reverend Daniel
1984 The Jeffersons (TV Series) - Rev. Taylor
- They Don't Make Preachers Like Him Anymore (1984) ... Rev. Taylor
1984 Benson (TV Series) - Uncle Buster
- The Reunion (1984) ... Uncle Buster
1984 Booker (TV Movie) - Lee
1984 Gone Are the Dayes (TV Movie) - Man #1
1984 The Enchanted - Booker T
1984 Hart to Hart (TV Series) - Krohn
- Slam Dunk (1984) ... Krohn
1983 Going Berserk - Judge
1983 Missing Pieces (TV Movie) - Spencer Harris
1983 St. Elsewhere (TV Series) - Earl
- Graveyard (1983) ... Earl
1981-1982 Simon & Simon (TV Series) - Jules / Montgomery
- Thin Air (1982) ... Jules
- The Least Dangerous Game (1981) ... Montgomery (as Julius W. Harris)
1982 Voyagers! (TV Series) - Auctioneer
- The Travels of Marco... and Friends (1982) ... Auctioneer
1982 The Blue and the Gray (TV Mini-Series) - Preacher / Swamp Preacher
- Part 3 (1982) ... Preacher (credit only)
- Part 2 (1982) ... Preacher
- Part 1 (1982) ... Swamp Preacher (credit only)
1981 Full Moon High - Hijacker (uncredited)
1981 Circle of Power - B.B.
1981 Thornwell (TV Movie) - Frisco
1980 First Family - Ambassador Longo
1980 Gorp - Fred the Chef

1979 Uptown Saturday Night (TV Movie) - Geechie Dan
1979 Delta Fox
Tiny (as Julius W. Harris)
1979 The Incredible Hulk (TV Series) - Doc Alden
- The Slam (1979) ... Doc Alden
1978-1979 Insight (TV Series) - Baggott / Avry
- Plus Time Served (1979) ... Baggott
- The Flawed Magi (1978) ... Avry
1979 Vega$ (TV Series) - Yancy
- Kill Dan Tanna! (1979) ... Yancy
1978 B.J. and the Bear (TV Series) - Colonel Whitmore
- The Foundlings (1978) ... Colonel Whitmore
1978 To Kill a Cop (TV Movie) - Detective Baker
1978 The Hardy Boys/Nancy Drew Mysteries (TV Series) - Mr. Dove
- Voodoo Doll, Part II (1978) ... Mr. Dove
- Voodoo Doll: Part 1 (1978) ... Mr. Dove
1978 Ring of Passion (TV Movie) - Chappie Jackson
1977 The Fat Albert Christmas Special (TV Short) - Mr. Tyrone (voice)
1977 Kojak (TV Series) - Joe Addison
- Once More from Birdland (1977) ... Joe Addison
1977 Looking for Mr. Goodbar - Black Cat
1977 Alambrista! - 2nd Drunk
1977 Visions (TV Series) - Second Drunk
- Alambrista! (1977) ... Second Drunk
1977 Islands in the Stream - Joseph
1977 Sanford and Son (TV Series) - Doctor
- The Will (1977) ... Doctor
1976 Good Times (TV Series) - Ben Foster
- Florida's Night Out (1976) ... Ben Foster
1976 Victory at Entebbe (TV Movie) - President Idi Amin (as Julius W. Harris)
1976 King Kong - Boan
1976 Rich Man, Poor Man (TV Mini-Series) - Augie
- Part II: Chapters 3 and 4 (1976) ... Augie
1975 Friday Foster - Monk Riley
1975 Ellery Queen (TV Series) - Doyle the Butler
- The Adventure of the Mad Tea Party (1975) ... Doyle the Butler
1975 Let's Do It Again - Bubbletop Woodson
1975 Doctors' Hospital (TV Series) - Tolan
- Knives of Chance (1975) ... Tolan
1975 Cannon (TV Series) - Millner
- Search and Destroy (1975) ... Millner
1975 A Cry for Help (TV Movie) - George Rigney (as Julius W. Harris)
1975 Harry O (TV Series) - Arthur 'Art Sully' Daniels
- Sound of Trumpets (1975) ... Arthur 'Art Sully' Daniels
1974-1975 Salty (TV Series) - Clancy
- The Vigil (1975) ... Clancy
- To Taylor from Salty with Love (1975) ... Clancy
- Sentimental Value (1975) ... Clancy
- A Sense of Worth (1975) ... Clancy
- Scape Goat (1974) ... Clancy
... 20 episodes
1974 The Taking of Pelham One Two Three - Inspector Daniels
1973 Blade - Card Player
1973 Hell Up in Harlem - Papa Gibbs (as Julius W. Harris)
1973 Shock-a-bye, Baby (TV Movie)
1973 The Bob Newhart Show (TV Series) - Mr. Billings
- Blues for Mr. Borden (1973) ... Mr. Billings
1973 Salty - Clancy Ames (as Julius W. Harris)
1973 Live and Let Die - Tee Hee (as Julius W. Harris)
1973 Black Caesar - Mr. Gibbs (as Julius W. Harris)
1972 Trouble Man - Big
1972 Super Fly - Scatter (as Julius W. Harris)
1972 Shaft's Big Score! - Capt. Bollin (as Julius W. Harris)
1971 Incident in San Francisco (TV Movie) - Henry Carter

1969 Slaves - Shadrach
1968-1969 N.Y.P.D. (TV Series) - Hector / Banks
- Candy Man: Part 2 (1969) ... Hector
- Candy Man: Part 1 (1969) ... Hector
- Which Side Are You On? (1968) ... Banks
1964 Nothing But a Man - Will Anderson

1964: CBC-TV Explorations airs Ian Fleming: The Brain Behind Bond, the author's last recorded interview.

Ian Fleming: the brain behind Bond

See the complete article here:

https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1856624190

56 years ago Archives 27:16

Explorations airs an intimate chat with James Bond creator Ian Fleming.

See it here:

https://www.cbc.ca/player/play/1856624190/

Ian Fleming: The Brain
Behind Bond

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt1327351/trivia?ref_=tt_ql_2
27min | Documentary | Episode aired 17 August 1964

Trivia

This interview was first broadcast by CBC-TV's Explorations five days after Ian Fleming passed away.

1968: Helen Elizabeth McCrory is born--Paddington, London, England.
(She dies at 16 April 2021 at age 52--London, England.)

Helen McCrory, British ‘Skyfall’ and
‘Harry Potter’ Actress, Dies at Age 52

‘GO NOW, LITTLE ONE’

See the complete article here:

https://www.thedailybeast.com/helen-mccrory-british-skyfall-and-harry-potter-actress-dies-at-age-52

Cheyenne Roundtree | Entertainment Reporter
Published Apr. 16, 2021 12:18PM ET

Photo: Stuart C. Wilson

British actress Helen McCrory has died of cancer at age 52 surrounded by family, her husband, actor Damian Lewis, announced Friday. “I’m heartbroken to announce that after a heroic battle with cancer, the beautiful and mighty woman that is Helen McCrory has died peacefully at home, surrounded by a wave of love from friends and family,” he wrote on Twitter. “She died as she lived. Fearlessly. God we love her and know how lucky we are to have had her in our lives. She blazed so brightly. Go now, Little One, into the air, and thank you.” Lewis and McCrory had been married for 14 years, with 14-year-old daughter Manon and 13-year-old son Gulliver.

With more than 72 acting credits to her name, McCrory was best known for her roles in Peaky Blinders, the Harry Potter franchise, and the James Bond movie Skyfall.

Helen McCrory (1968–2021)

Actress
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0567031/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

1973: Live and Let Die released in Ireland.
1979: Kuuraketti (Swedish: Månraketen, Moon Rocket) released in Finland.

Not to be confused with:

1979: Måneraketten released in Norway.

1984 paperback of the Fleming novel.

1984: Albert R. Broccoli is photographed with Bond Girls, Bond.

1999: The World Is Not Enough films OO7 leaping from a Swiss banker's office to ground level.

https://twitter.com/007/status/898212835951390720

1999: Desmond Llewelyn launches the James Bond 007: A License To Thrill motion simulator, Trocadero, London.

License to Thrill (1999)

4min | Short, Action | 1999 (USA)
https://www.imdb.com/title/tt0853249/

Motion Simulator Ride Film. POV James Bond as he rides a motorcycle, shoots it out with bad guys, leaps onto the trailing ladder of a helicopter from a moving train, dodges bullets and explosions, finally landing on a jet ski and saving the kidnapped girl. The most complex live action ride film ever made.
—Keith Melton (original work)

Full Cast & Crew
Directed by Keith Melton
Writing Credits (in alphabetical order)
Gary Goddard ... (writer)
Ty Granoroli ... (writer)
Cast
Judi Dench ... M (Barbara Mawdsley)
Desmond Llewelyn ... Q
Sonny Surowiec ... Lead
Brian Rogers ... producer
Cinematography by Suki Medencevic
Film Editing by Harry B. Miller III
Art Direction by Andrew Max Cahn
Sound Department
James Fielden ... re-recording mixer / supervising sound editor
Stunts
Laura Albert ... stunts
Sonny Surowiec ... stunt performer
Camera and Electrical Department
Pat O'Mara ... grip
Max Penner ... camera operator
Music Department
James Fielden ... music editor
Gary Guttman ... composer: additional music
Script and Continuity Department
Katalin Rogers ... script supervisor (as Katalin Kovacs Rogers)
Other crew
Curtis DeMartini ... production assistant

James Bond 007: A License To Thrill
(partially found motion simulator ride;
1998-2002)

https://lostmediawiki.com/James_Bond_007:_A_License_To_Thrill_(partially_found_motion_simulator_ride;_1998-2002)

2005: The Denver Post reports on Pierce Brosnan talking to Entertainment Weekly about leaving the Bond role.

“Bond” days over for Brosnan

See the complete article here:

https://www.denverpost.com/2005/08/17/bond-days-over-for-brosnan/

Pierce Brosnan takes aim as James Bond in Die Another Day.
By The Associated Press

PUBLISHED: August 17, 2005

New York – A single, surprising phone call and it was over.

That’s how Pierce Brosnan says he learned that his services as James Bond would no longer be required.

“One phone call, that’s all it took!” the 52-year-old actor tells Entertainment Weekly magazine in its Aug. 19 issue.

Brosnan starred in four Bond films. He says that before they stopped negotiations, the producers had invited him back for a fifth time.

“You know, the movie career for me really started with Bond,” says Brosnan, acknowledging that by the time GoldenEye premiered in 1995, he was already 42.

He then starred as 007 in Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), The World Is Not Enough (1999) and Die Another Day (2002).

His departure from the role was a “titanic jolt to the system,” says Brosnan, followed by “a great sense of calm.” “I thought. … I can do anything I want to do now. I’m not beholden to them or anyone. I’m not shackled by some contracted image. So there was a sense of liberation.” Brosnan says he’s grateful to have had the role, but adds: “It never felt real to me. I never felt I had complete ownership over Bond. Because you’d have these stupid one-liners – which I loathed – and I always felt phony doing them.” He plays a foulmouthed, skirt-chasing hit man in the upcoming film The Matador. “(For this) to come on the heels of my departure from the world of Bond is sweet grace, to play this one as a farewell to that chapter in time – it certainly wasn’t planned.”

2010: Pegasus Books releases James Bond: Choice of Weapons: Three 007 Novels collecting Raymond Benson's Zero Minus Ten, The Facts of Death and The Man With The Red Tattoo. Plus short stories "Live at Five" and "Midsummer Night's Doom."

2015: Premiere of the OMEGA Seamaster 300 Spectre Limited Edition wristwatch.

2016: Dynamite Entertainment releases James Bond #9 Eidolon Part Three.
Jason Masters, artist. Warren Ellis, writer.

JAMES BOND #9

https://www.dynamite.com/htmlfiles/viewProduct.html?PRO=C72513024181809011
Cover A: Dom Reardon
Writer: Warren Ellis
Art: Jason Masters
Genre: Action/Adventure, Media Tie-In
Publication Date: August 2016
Format: Comic Book
Page Count: 32 pages
ON SALE DATE: 8/17

EIDOLON, Part Three: Bond is sent to breach a secret base in the depths of England, alone, without back-up, and fully deniable: a place from Cold War history, with only one way in and one way out, while the forces of security services all over the world are seemingly ranged against MI6, and all Bond has is his gun and a few pieces of a bloody, dark puzzle...

2020: James Bond @007 promotes two new Aston Martins.

https://twitter.com/007/status/1295344634303057921

https://www.autoexpress.co.uk/352984/new-aston-martin-vantage-and-dbs-superleggera-007-edition-celebrates-no-time-die-james-bond

2021: James Bond Europe Tour begins nine day schedule.

James Bond Europe
Tour: Prague -
Carlsbad - Solden -
Lake Garda

See the complete article here:

https://www.tourradar.com/t/191853

9 days
Rating • 5.0 (34)
Start and end in Prague

Itinerary
Start and end in Prague! With the Health, Spa & Wellness tour James Bond Europe Tour: Prague - Carlsbad - Solden - Lake Garda, you have a 9 days tour package taking you through Prague, Czech Republic and 2 other destinations in Europe. James Bond Europe Tour: Prague - Carlsbad - Solden - Lake Garda includes accommodation in a hotel as well as an expert guide, transport and more.

Introduction
Day 1: Prague
Day 2: Prague
Day 3: Carlsbad and Solden
Day 4: Solden
Day 5: Lake Garda
Day 6: Lake Garda
Day 7: Lake Garda
Day 8: Prague
Day 9: Prague

2021: James Bond Movies Trivia at The Local, Babylon, New York.

JAMES BOND MOVIES TRIVIA

See the complete article here:

https://www.localbabylon.com/events/2021/8/17/james-bond-movies-trivia

Tuesday, August 17, 2021
7:00 PM 9:00 PM

The Local 7 Depot Place Babylon, NY, 11702 United States

RichardTheBruce

August 18th
[42 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1934: Rafer Lewis Johnson is born--Hillsboro, Texas.
(He dies 2 December 2020 at age 86--Sherman Oaks, Los Angeles, California.)

Rafer Johnson

See the complete article here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rafer_Johnson

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Rafer Johnson

Johnson at the 1960 Olympics

Personal | information
Full name | Rafer Lewis Johnson
Born | August 18, 1934 | Hillsboro, Texas, U.S.
Died | December 2, 2020 (aged 86) | Sherman Oaks, California, U.S.
Height 1.90 m (6 ft 3 in)
Weight 91 kg (201 lb)
Spouse(s) Elizabeth Thorsen (m. 1971)​

Sport
Sport | Athletics
Event(s) | Decathlon
Club | Southern California Striders, Anaheim

Achievements and titles - Personal Bests
100 m – 10.3 (1957)
220 yd – 21.0 (1956)
400 m – 47.9 (1956)
110 mH – 13.8 (1956)
HJ – 1.89 m (1955)
PV – 4.09 m (1960)
LJ – 7.76 m (1956)
SP – 16.75 m (1958)
DT – 52.50 m (1960)
JT – 76.73 m (1960)
Decathlon – 8392 (1960)

Medal record | Representing United States
Olympic Games
Gold medal – first place 1960 Rome Decathlon
Silver medal – second place 1956 Melbourne Decathlon
Pan American Games
Gold medal – first place 1955 Mexico City Decathlon

Rafer Lewis Johnson (August 18, 1934 – December 2, 2020) was an American decathlete and film actor. He was the 1960 Olympic gold medalist in the decathlon, having won silver in 1956. He had previously won a gold in the 1955 Pan American Games. He was the USA team's flag bearer at the 1960 Olympics and lit the Olympic cauldron at the Los Angeles Games in 1984.

In 1968, Johnson, football player Rosey Grier, and journalist George Plimpton tackled Sirhan Sirhan moments after he had fatally shot Robert F. Kennedy.

After he retired from athletics, Johnson turned to acting, sportscasting, and public service and was instrumental in creating the California Special Olympics. His acting career included appearances in The Sins of Rachel Cade (1961), the Elvis Presley film Wild in the Country (1961), Pirates of Tortuga (1961), None but the Brave (1965), two Tarzan films with Mike Henry, The Last Grenade (1970), Soul Soldier (1970), Roots: The Next Generations (1979), the James Bond film Licence to Kill (1989), and Think Big (1990).

Biography
Johnson was born in Hillsboro, Texas on August 18, 1934. His family moved to Kingsburg, California, when he was aged nine. For a while, they were the only black family in the town. A versatile athlete, he played on Kingsburg High School's football, baseball and basketball teams. He was also elected class president in both junior high and high school. The summer between his sophomore and junior years in high school (age 16), his coach Murl Dodson drove Johnson 24 miles (40 km) to Tulare and watched Bob Mathias compete in the 1952 U.S. Olympic decathlon trials. Johnson told his coach, "I could have beaten most of those guys." Dodson and Johnson drove back a month later to watch Mathias's victory parade. Weeks later, Johnson competed in a high school invitational decathlon and won the event. He also won the 1953 and 1954 California state high school decathlon meets.

In 1954 as a freshman at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), his progress in the event was impressive; he broke the world record in his fourth competition. He pledged Pi Lambda Phi fraternity, America's first non-sectarian fraternity, and was class president[6] at UCLA. In 1955, in Mexico City, he won the title at the Pan American Games.

Johnson qualified for both the decathlon and the long jump events for the 1956 Summer Olympics in Melbourne. However, he was hampered by an injury and forfeited his place in the long jump. Despite this handicap, he managed to take second place in the decathlon behind compatriot Milt Campbell. It would turn out to be his last defeat in the event.

Due to injury, Johnson missed the 1957 and 1959 seasons (the latter due to a car accident), but he broke the world record in 1958 and again in 1960. The crown to his career came at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome. His most serious rival was Yang Chuan-Kwang (C. K. Yang) of Taiwan. Yang also studied at UCLA; the two trained together under UCLA track coach Elvin C. "Ducky" Drake and had become friends. In the decathlon, the lead swung back and forth between them. Finally, after nine events, Johnson led Yang by a small margin, but Yang was known to be better in the final event, the 1500 m. According to The Telegraph (UK), "legend has it" that Drake gave coaching to both men, with him advising Johnson to stay close to Yang and be ready for "a hellish sprint" at the end, and advising Yang to put as much distance between himself and Johnson before the final sprint as possible.

Johnson ran his personal best at 4:49.7 and finished just 1.2 sec slower than Yang, winning the gold by 58 points with an Olympic record total of 8,392 points. Both athletes were exhausted and drained and came to a stop a few paces past the finish line leaning against each other for support. With this victory, Johnson ended his athletic career.

At UCLA, Johnson also played basketball under legendary coach John Wooden and was a starter for the Bruins on their 1958–59 team. Wooden considered Johnson a great defensive player, but sometimes regretted holding back his teams early in his coaching career, remarking, "imagine Rafer Johnson on the [fast] break."

Johnson was selected by the Los Angeles Rams in the 28th round (333rd overall) of the 1959 NFL Draft as a running back.

While training for the 1960 Olympics, his friend Kirk Douglas told him about a part in Spartacus that Douglas thought might make him a star: the Ethiopian gladiator Draba, who refuses to kill Spartacus (played by Douglas) after defeating him in a duel. Johnson read for and got the role, but was forced to turn it down because the Amateur Athletic Union told him it would make him a professional and therefore ineligible for the Olympics. The role eventually went to another UCLA great, Woody Strode. In 1960, Johnson began acting in motion pictures and working as a sportscaster. He made several film appearances, mostly in the 1960s. Johnson worked full-time as a sportscaster in the early 1970s. He was a weekend sports anchor on the local NBC affiliate in Los Angeles, KNBC, but seemed uncomfortable in that position and eventually moved on to other things.

Johnson worked on the presidential election campaign of United States Senator Robert F. Kennedy, and on June 5, 1968 with the help of Rosey Grier, he apprehended Sirhan Sirhan immediately after Sirhan had assassinated Kennedy at the Ambassador Hotel in Los Angeles, California. Kennedy died the following day at Good Samaritan Hospital. Johnson discussed the experience in his autobiography, The Best That I Can Be (published in 1999 by Galilee Trade Publishing and co-authored with Philip Goldberg).

Johnson at the 1972 Special Olympics

Johnson served on the organizing committee for the first Special Olympics competition in Chicago in 1968, hosted by Special Olympics founder, Eunice Kennedy Shriver and the next year he led the founding of the California Special Olympics. Johnson, along with a small group of volunteers, founded California Special Olympics in 1969 by conducting a competition at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum for 900 individuals with intellectual disabilities. Following the first California Games in 1969, Johnson became one of the original members of the Board of Directors. The board worked together to raise funds and offer a modest program of swimming and track and field. In 1983, Rafer ran for President of the Board to increase Board participation, reorganize the staff to most effectively use each person's talents, and expand fundraising efforts. He was elected president and served in the capacity until 1992, when he was named Chairman of the Board of Governors.

Family
Johnson married Elizabeth Thorsen in 1971. They had two children and four grandchildren.

Johnson's brother Jimmy is a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame and his daughter Jennifer competed in beach volleyball at the 2000 Olympic Games in Sydney following her collegiate career at UCLA. His son Joshua Johnson followed his father into track and field and had a podium finish in the javelin throw at the USA Outdoor Track and Field Championships.

Johnson participated in the Art of the Olympians program.

Rafer Johnson died after suffering a stroke on December 2, 2020 at Sherman Oaks, California. He was 86.

Johnson at the 1960 Summer Olympics in Rome


Johnson in 2016.

Achievements
Johnson was named Sports Illustrated's Sportsman of the Year in 1958 and won the James E. Sullivan Award as the top amateur athlete in the United States in 1960, breaking that award's color barrier. In 1962, he received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement. He was chosen to ignite the Olympic Flame during the opening ceremonies of the 1984 Summer Olympics in Los Angeles. In 1994, he was elected into the first class of the World Sports Humanitarian Hall of Fame.

In 1998, Johnson was named one of ESPN's 100 Greatest North American Athletes of the 20th Century. In 2006, the NCAA named him one of the 100 Most Influential Student Athletes of the past 100 years. On August 25, 2009, Governor Schwarzenegger and Maria Shriver announced that Johnson would be one of 13 California Hall of Fame inductees in The California Museum's yearlong exhibit. The induction ceremony was on December 1, 2009, in Sacramento, California. Johnson was a member of The Pigskin Club of Washington, D.C. National Intercollegiate All-American Football Players Honor Roll.

Rafer Johnson Junior High School in Kingsburg, California is named after Johnson, as are Rafer Johnson Community Day School and Rafer Johnson Children's Center, both in Bakersfield, California. The latter school, which has classes for special education students from the ages of birth-5, also puts on an annual Rafer Johnson Day. Every year Johnson himself spoke at the event and cheered on hundreds of students with special needs as they participated in a variety of track and field events.

In 2010, Johnson received the Fernando Award for Civic Accomplishment from the Fernando Foundation and in 2011, he was inducted into the Bakersfield City School District Hall of Fame. Additionally, Rafer acted as the athletic advisor to Dan Guerrero, Director of Athletics at UCLA. He was Inducted into the Texas Track and Field Coaches Hall of Fame, Class of 2016.

In November 2014, Johnson received the Athletes in Excellence Award from The Foundation for Global Sports Development, in recognition of his community service efforts and work with youth.

In 2005, Johnson was awarded an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters (L.H.D.) degree from Whittier College.

Encounter with Vitray Tamás
Tamás Vitray [hu], a known personality of the Hungarian television profession, conducted the first interview of his career with Rafer Johnson on August 5, 1958 at an athletics competition. Due to Tamás' smaller height, the cameraman was unable to include him in the frame. They solved this problem by having Vitray stand on a stool during the interview, negating the height difference. In 1960, Johnson won a gold medal in ten trials at the Rome Olympics. His victory was mediated by Tamás Vitray in Hungary.

Filmography

Actor
The Sins of Rachel Cade (1960) – Kosongo
Wild in the Country (1961) – Davis
Pirates of Tortuga (1961) – John Gammel
None but the Brave (1965) – Pvt. Johnson
Tarzan and the Great River (1967) – Barcuma, Afro-Brazilian leader of the Jaguar Cult
Tarzan and the Jungle Boy (1968) – Nagambi, villain who hinders Tarzan's search for the Jungle Boy
The Last Grenade (1970) – Joe Jackson
Soul Soldier (1970) – Pvt. Armstrong
The Games (1970) – Commentator
Roots: The Next Generations (1979)
Licence to Kill (1989) – Mullens
Think Big (1990) – Johnson

Production roles
Billie (1965, technical advisor)
The Black Six (1973, associate producer)

1958 Sports Illustrated's Sportsman of the Year


1960 Summer Olympics, Rome




1984 Summer Olympics, Los Angeles






1989 Licence to Kill

1957: Carole Bouquet is born--Neuilly-sur-Seine, Seine, France.

1960: Ian Fleming's letter to Richard Chopping instructs the design of the Thunderball book cover.

"Two cards will definitely be better than one,
and the second card should be an ace —
perhaps the Ace of Spades — if you can bear
the additional labour.

"Secondly, I think the Queen of Diamonds
would be better than the Queen of Hearts
as money is a keynote of the book."

1971: Robert Peter Fleming dies 18 August 1971 at age 64--Black Mount, Scotland.
(Born 31 May 1907--Mayfair, London, England.)

Peter Fleming

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Fleming_(writer)
Lieutenant Colonel Robert Peter Fleming OBE DL (31 May 1907 – 18 August 1971) was a British adventurer, soldier and travel writer. He was the elder brother of Ian Fleming, creator of James Bond.

Peter Fleming OBE DL

Born Robert Peter Fleming, 31 May 1907, Mayfair, London, England
Died 18 August 1971 (aged 64), Black Mount, Argyllshire, Scotland
Resting place St. Bartholomew's Churchyard, Nettlebed
Education Eton College
Alma mater Christ Church, Oxford
Occupation Writer, adventurer
Spouse(s) Celia Johnson (m. 1935)
Children 3
Relatives Ian Fleming (brother)

Early life
Peter Fleming was one of four sons of the barrister and MP Valentine Fleming, who was killed in action in 1917, having served as MP for Henley from 1910. Fleming was educated at Eton, where he edited the Eton College Chronicle. The Peter Fleming Owl (the English meaning of "Strix", the name under which he later wrote for The Spectator) is still awarded every year to the best contributor to the Chronicle. He went on from Eton to Christ Church, Oxford, and graduated with a first-class degree in English.

Fleming was a member of the Bullingdon Club during his time at Oxford. On 10 December 1935 he married the actress Celia Johnson (1908–1982), best known for her roles in the films Brief Encounter and The Prime of Miss Jean Brodie.

Travels
In Brazil
In April 1932 Fleming replied to an advertisement in the personal columns of The Times: "Exploring and sporting expedition, under experienced guidance, leaving England June to explore rivers central Brazil, if possible ascertain fate Colonel Percy Fawcett; abundant game, big and small; exceptional fishing; room two more guns; highest references expected and given." He then joined the expedition, organised by Robert Churchward, to São Paulo, then overland to the rivers Araguaia and Tapirapé, heading towards the last-known position of the Fawcett expedition.

During the inward journey the expedition was riven by increasing disagreements as to its objectives and plans, centred particularly on its local leader, whom Fleming disguised as "Major Pingle" when he wrote about the expedition. Fleming and Roger Pettiward (a school and university friend recruited onto the expedition as a result of a chance encounter with Fleming) led a breakaway group.

This group continued for several days up the Tapirapé to São Domingo, from where Fleming, Pettiward, Neville Priestley and one of the Brazilians hired by the expedition set out to find evidence of Fawcett's fate on their own. After acquiring two Tapirapé guides the party began a march to the area where Fawcett was reported to have last been seen. They made slow progress for several days, losing the Indian guides and Neville to foot infection, before admitting defeat.

The expedition's return journey was made down the River Araguaia to Belém. It became a closely fought race between Fleming's party and "Major Pingle", the prize being to be the first to report home, and thus to gain the upper hand in the battles over blame and finances that were to come. Fleming's party narrowly won. The expedition returned to England in November 1932.

Fleming's book about the expedition, Brazilian Adventure, has sold well ever since it was first published in 1933, and is still in print.

In Asia
Fleming travelled from Moscow to Peking via the Caucasus, the Caspian, Samarkand, Tashkent, the Turksib Railway and the Trans-Siberian Railway to Peking as a special correspondent of The Times. His experiences were written up in One's Company (1934). He then went overland in company of Ella Maillart from China via Tunganistan to India on a journey written up in News from Tartary (1936). These two books were combined as Travels in Tartary: One's Company and News from Tartary (1941). All three volumes were published by Jonathan Cape.

According to Nicolas Clifford, for Fleming China “had the aspect of a comic opera land whose quirks and oddities became grist for the writer, rather than deserving any respect or sympathy in themselves”. In One's Company, for example, Fleming reports that Beijing was “lacking in charm”, Harbin was a city of “no easily definable character”. Changchun was “entirely characterless”, and Shenyang was “non-descript and suburban". However, Fleming also provides insights into Manchukuo, the Japanese puppet state in Manchuria, which helped contemporary readers to understand Chinese resentment and resistance, and the aftermath of the Kumul Rebellion. In the course of these travels Fleming met and interviewed many prominent figures in Central Asia and China, including the Chinese Muslim General Ma Hushan, the Chinese Muslim Taoyin of Kashgar, Ma Shaowu, and Pu Yi.

Of Travels in Tartary, Owen Lattimore remarked that Fleming, who "passes for an easy-going amateur, is in fact an inspired amateur whose quick appreciation, especially of people, and original turn of phrase, echoing P. G. Wodehouse in only a very distant and cultured way, have created a unique kind of travel book". Lattimore added that it "is only in the political news from Tartary that there is a disappointment," as, in his view, Fleming offers "a simplified explanation, in terms of Red intrigue and Bolshevik villains, which does not make sense."

Stuart Stevens retraced Peter Fleming's route and wrote his own travel book.

World War II
Just before war was declared, Peter Fleming, then a reserve officer in the Grenadier Guards, was recruited by the War Office research section investigating the potential of irregular warfare (MIR). His initial task was to develop ideas to assist the Chinese guerrillas fighting the Japanese. He served in the Norwegian campaign with the prototype commando units – Independent Companies – but in May 1940 he was tasked with research into the potential use of the new Local Defence Volunteers (later the Home Guard) as guerrilla troops. His ideas were first incorporated into General Thorne's XII Corps Observation Unit, forerunner of the GHQ Auxiliary Units. Fleming recruited his brother, Richard, then serving in the Faroe Islands, to provide a core of Lovat Scout instructors to his teams of LDV volunteers.

When Colin Gubbins was appointed to head the new Auxiliary Units, he incorporated many of Peter's ideas, which aimed to create secret commando teams of Home Guard in the coastal districts most liable to the risk of invasion. Their role was to launch sabotage raids on the flanks and rear of any invading army, in support of regular troops, but they were never intended as a post-occupation 'resistance' force, having a life expectancy of only two weeks. Peter Fleming later served in Greece, but his principal service, from 1942 to the end of the war, was as head of D Division, in charge of military deception operations in Southeast Asia, based in New Delhi, India.

Fleming was appointed an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in the 1945 Birthday Honours and in 1948 he was awarded the Order of the Cloud and Banner with Special Rosette by the Republic of China.

Later life
After the war Peter Fleming retired to squiredom at Nettlebed, Oxfordshire and was appointed a Deputy Lieutenant for Oxfordshire on 31 July 1970.[14]

Death
Fleming died on 18 August 1971 from a heart attack while on a shooting expedition near Glen Coe in Scotland. His body was buried in Nettlebed Churchyard, where a stained glass window was later installed in the church dedicated to his memory. The gravestone reads:

He travelled widely in far places;
Wrote, and was widely read.
Soldiered, saw some of danger's faces,
Came home to Nettlebed.

The squire lies here, his journeys ended –
Dust, and a name on a stone –
Content, amid the lands he tended,
To keep this rendezvous alone.

Family
After the death of his brother Ian, Peter Fleming served on the board of Glidrose, Ltd, the company purchased by Ian to hold the literary rights to his professional writing, particularly the James Bond novels and short stories. Peter also tried to become a substitute father for Ian's surviving son, Caspar, who overdosed on narcotics in his twenties.

Peter and Celia Fleming remained married until his death in 1971. He was survived by their three children:

Nicholas Peter Val Fleming (1939–1995), writer and squire of Nettlebed. He deposited Peter Fleming's papers for public access at the University of Reading in 1975. These include several unpublished works, as well as the manuscripts of several of his books that are now out of print. Nichol Fleming's partner for many years was the merchant banker Christopher Roxburghe Balfour (b. 1941), brother of Neil Balfour, second husband (1969–78) of Princess Jelizaveta of Yugoslavia. Nettlebed is now jointly owned by his sisters.

(Roberta) Katherine Fleming (b. 1946), writer and publisher, is now Kate Grimond, wife of Johnny Grimond, foreign editor of The Economist. Johnny is the elder surviving son of the late British Liberal Party leader Jo Grimond, and grandson maternally of Violet Bonham-Carter, herself daughter of the British Prime Minister H. H. Asquith. Kate and John have three children, Jessie (a journalist), Rose (an actress turned organic foods entrepreneur) and Georgia (a journalist at The Economist online).

Lucy Fleming (born 1947), now Lucy Williams, is an actress. In the 1970s she starred as Jenny in the BBC's apocalyptic fiction series Survivors. She was first married in 1971 to Joseph "Joe" Laycock (d. 1980), son of a family friend Robert Laycock and his wife Angela Dudley Ward, and was on honeymoon at the time of her father's sudden death in Argyllshire. Lucy and Joe had two sons and a daughter, Flora. Flora and her father, Joe, were drowned in a boating accident in 1980. At the time of their deaths Lucy and Joe were separated on good terms. Lucy later married the actor and writer Simon Williams. Her sons are Diggory and Robert Laycock.

Peter Fleming was the godfather of the British author and journalist Duff Hart-Davis, who wrote Peter Fleming: A Biography (published by Jonathan Cape in 1974). Duff's father Rupert Hart-Davis, a publisher, was good friends with Peter, who gave him a home on the Nettlebed estate for many years and gave financial backing to his publishing ventures.

Legacy
The Peter Fleming Award, worth £9,000, is given by the Royal Geographical Society for a "research project that seeks to advance geographical science".

Fleming's book about the British military expedition to Tibet in 1903 to 1904 is credited in the Chinese film Red River Valley (1997).

Quotations

"São Paulo is like Reading, only much farther away."
– Brazilian Adventure

"Public opinion in England is sharply divided on the subject of Russia. On the one hand you have the crusty majority, who believe it to be a hell on earth; on the other you have the half-baked minority who believe it to be a terrestrial paradise in the making. Both cling to their opinions with the tenacity, respectively, of the die-hard and the fanatic. Both are hopelessly wrong." – One's Company

The recorded history of Chinese civilisation covers a period of four thousand years.
The Population of China is estimated at 450 million.
China is larger than Europe.
The author of this book is twenty-six years old.
He has spent, altogether, about seven months in China.
He does not speak Chinese.
- Preface, One's Company

Fleming's works
Fleming was a special correspondent for The Times and often wrote under the pen-name "Strix" (Latin for "screech owl") an essayist for The Spectator.

Non-fiction

1933 Brazilian Adventure – Exploring the Brazilian jungle in search of the lost Colonel Percy Fawcett.
1934 One's Company: A Journey to China in 1933 – Travels through the USSR, Manchuria and China. Later reissued as half of Travels in Tartary.
1936 News from Tartary: A Journey from Peking to Kashmir – Journey from Peking to Srinagar via Sinkiang. He was accompanied on this journey by Ella Maillart (Kini). Later reissued as half of Travels in Tartary.
1952 A Forgotten Journey – A diary Fleming kept during a journey through Russia and Manchuria in 1934. Reprinted as To Peking: A Forgotten Journey from Moscow to Manchuria (2009, ISBN 978-1-84511-996-6)
1953 Introduction to Seven Years in Tibet by Heinrich Harrer published by Rupert Hart-Davis, London
1955 Tibetan Marches – A translation from French of Caravane vers Bouddha by André Migot
1956 My Aunt's Rhinoceros: And Other Reflections — A collection of essays written (as "Strix") for The Spectator.
1957 Invasion 1940 — an account of the planned Nazi invasion of Britain and British anti-invasion preparations of the Second World War. Published in the United States as Operation Sea Lion
1957 With the Guards to Mexico: And Other Excursions — A collection of essays written for The Spectator.
1958 The Gower Street Poltergeist — A collection of essays written for The Spectator.
1959 The Siege at Peking — An account of the Boxer Rebellion and the European-led siege of the Imperial capital.
1961 Bayonets to Lhasa: The First Full Account of the British Invasion of Tibet in 1904
1961 Goodbye to the Bombay Bowler — A collection of essays written for The Spectator as 'Strix'.
1963 The Fate of Admiral Kolchak — a study of the White Army leader Admiral Kolchak who attempted to save the Imperial Russian family at Ekaterinburg in 1918.

Fiction

Books
1940 The Flying Visit – A humorous novel about an unintended visit to Britain by Adolf Hitler. Illustrated by David Low.
1942 A Story to Tell: And Other Tales — A collection of short stories.
1952 The Sixth Column: A Singular Tale of Our Times
The Sett (unfinished, unpublished)

Short fiction
"The Kill" (1931)
"Felipe" (1937)

1973: John Barry conducts the Los Angeles Philharmonic at the Hollywood Bowl--"The James Bond Suite".
1979: Moonraker released in Sweden.

1979: The Moonraker soundtrack long play (LP) record makes the music charts.

1982: Octopussy films the auctioning of The Property of a Lady.

1988: The Licence to Kill production relocates from Mexico City to Key West, Florida.

2014: Tom Pevsner dies at age 87--Fife, Scotland.
(Born 2 October 1926--Dresden, Germany.)

Tom Pevsner

See the complete article here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tom_Pevsner

Born Thomas C. Pevsner, 2 October 1926, Dresden, Germany
Died 18 August 2014 (aged 87), Fife, Scotland, United Kingdom
Nationality British
Alma mater University of Cambridge
Occupation Assistant film director and producer
Years active 1953–95
Parent(s) Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, Lola Pevsner

Tom Pevsner (2 October 1926 – 18 August 2014) was a British assistant film director and producer whose career spanned more than four decades.

He was the second of three children born to Sir Nikolaus Pevsner, an architectural historian of Russian-Jewish origin. The family emigrated from Germany in 1933 to escape the Nazi regime.

He served in the British Army from 1944 to 1948 before studying modern languages at the University of Cambridge, where he was a member of the St John's College Film Society. He was editor of The Cambridge Review; after graduating he went to work at the Film Finance Corporation.

Tom Pevsner's s notable credits include assistant director on The Ladykillers (1955) The Longest Day (1962) and The Private Life of Sherlock Holmes (1970) and as producer for Dracula. He worked as associate, then executive producer on every James Bond film from For Your Eyes Only to GoldenEye. His contribution to the Bond series is acknowledged in the later Bond film Spectre, when Q states that he is staying at a hotel named Pevsner.

He died in 2014 aged 87. He was included in the In Memoriam tribute during the broadcast of the 87th Academy Awards on 22 February 2015.

Tom Pevsner (1926–2014)

Second Unit Director or Assistant Director | Producer | Production Manager
https://www.imdb.com/name/nm0678932/?ref_=nv_sr_srsg_0

RichardTheBruce

August 19th
[41 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1940: Jill Arlyn Oppenheim (Jill St. John) is born--Los Angeles, California.
1942: The Dieppe Raid in Northern France targeting cipher codes and Enigma repair parts, as planned by Ian Fleming and Admiral John Godfrey, plays out as an unnecessary (but still valuable) failure.

Ian Fleming, Real-Life Secret Agent and World War II Commando

By Neely Simpson. Jan 21, 2015

See the complete article here:

https://blog.bookstellyouwhy.com/ian-fleming-real-life-secret-agent-and-world-war-ii-commando

Before he was Ian Fleming, author of the James Bond novels, he was Commander Fleming, an intelligence officer in the Royal Navy and right-hand man to Admiral John Godfrey, Director of British Naval Intelligence. As such, Fleming was responsible for the creation of what came to be known as Assault Unit 30 (AU 30), a top-secret British commando unit specifically formed to gather intelligence. Fleming proposed the concept of AU 30 to Admiral Godfrey in a March 10, 1942 memo titled, "Proposal for Naval Intelligence Commando Unit."

The idea for AU 30 came out of a British intelligence crisis happening in 1942 for which Fleming sought a solution. Code-breaking specialists working in a secret location in Buckinghamshire called Bletchley Park had had - until 1942 - great success breaking coded messages sent by German Enigma Code machines. The Enigma machines had been invented by a German scientist, and the Germans wrongly believed the codes from Enigma machines were unbreakable. Essential to the war effort, the intelligence from the code-breakers of Bletchley Park kept British forces informed about the latest German military tactics. However, in 1942 the Germans advanced their technology, upgrading the Enigma machine to a 4-rotor wheel and leaving Bletchley Park code-breakers in the dark.

On August 19, 1942 Allied forces launched an attack on a German-occupied port in Northern France called Dieppe. Over 6,000 troops, predominantly Canadian, were deployed, and nearly 60 percent of those troops were killed, wounded, or captured. The Dieppe Raid, as it would come to be known, was considered a spectacular failure. Critics through the years said it was badly planned and of weak military strategy, leading to needless loss of life. The official objectives of the raid were to boost morale and to demonstrate to their allies Britain's commitment to opening a western front. However, new details brought to light by military historian, David O'Keefe, reveal that the primary and top-secret objective of the raid was to provide a diversion for Ian Fleming and Admiral Godfrey's newly formed 30 Assault Unit to steal cipher code books and spare parts of the German Enigma machine for the code-breakers of Bletchley Park.

A hotel in the town of Dieppe had been serving as the base for Nazi operations, and a German radar station was located in the cliffs around the port. The Dieppe Raid was 30 Assault Unit's very first mission; the hotel and the radar station were their primary targets. However, they were unsuccessful. Ironically, and perhaps tragically, a mere two weeks following the raid, the Bletchley Park code-breakers were able to break the new German Enigma codes without the cipher code books and spare parts housed in Dieppe.

Despite the nonsuccess of the Dieppe Raid, both Winston Churchill and Lord Mountbatten defended the raid years later saying that the lessons learned at Dieppe ultimately led to the victory of D-Day. Even though their first mission failed, Assault Unit 30 had great success throughout the rest of World War II, participating in both the invasion of Normandy and the liberation of Paris.

Lot 461
FLEMING (IAN)

See the complete article here:

https://www.bonhams.com/auctions/18992/lot/461/

Naval jacket worn by Fleming during the Dieppe Raid of 1942, whilst he was serving in the Naval Intelligence Division
Sold for £ 13,750 (US$ 17,983) inc. premium

22 Nov 2011, 10:30 GMT

London, New Bond Street

FLEMING (IAN)
Naval jacket worn by Fleming during the Dieppe Raid of 1942, whilst he was serving in the Naval Intelligence Division, a double-breasted navy blue jacket with deep red lining, eight buttons, stretched fabric collar and pocket trims; together with the accreditation card of John F.C. Bryce, as a foreign correspondent on the North American Newspaper Alliance, SIGNED BY FLEMING in his capacity as European Vice-President (2)

Footnotes
COMMANDER FLEMING'S NAVAL JACKET. At the outbreak of war Ian Fleming joined the Naval Intelligence Division, where he was "quickly promoted from lieutenant to commander. He liaised on behalf of the director of naval intelligence with the other secret services. One of few people given access to Ultra intelligence, he was responsible for the navy's input into anti-German black propaganda" (ODNB). Primarily based at the Admiralty's Room 39, Fleming accompanied the allied troops as an observer on the "Dieppe Raid", an assault on the German held port carried out on 19 August, 1942.

Provenance: Gifted by Ian Fleming to Ivar Bryce, a friend since his school days at Eton. Fleming dedicated Diamonds Are Forever to him and borrowed his middle name (Felix) for James Bond's best friend, CIA agent Felix Leiter. The dust-jacket of Diamonds featured an illustration of a diamond known as "Afghanistan" which belonged to Ivar's third wife Jo Bryce, and many of the local names in the book are based on Bryce's farm in Vermont where Fleming was a regular visitor; Bryce's niece Janet married David Mountbatten, third Marquess of Milford Haven, and the jacket is being sold by his great nephew, Lord Ivar Mountbatten.

Exhibited: For Your Eyes Only: Ian Fleming and James Bond Exhibition, Imperial War Museum, April 2008-March 2009.

1967: The You Only Live Twice soundtrack debuts on the top 40 Billboard 200 album chart, eventually reaching 27.

1981: James Bond comic strip Doomcrack ends its run in The Daily Express. (Started 2 February 1981. 1-174)
Harry North, artist (known for Mad magazine parodies). Jim Lawrence, writer.

Tamil Comic
https://tamilcomicsulagam.blogspot.com/2010/01/?m=1

1983: Octopussy released in Norway.
1988: Licence to Kill films OO7 and Felix chasing Sanchez by chopper.

2014: Jimmy Fallon challenges Pierce Brosnan to a game of GoldenEye 007, N64 style.

2015: Pierce Brosnan comes clean about the knife in his luggage discovered by airport security.

Pierce Brosnan on knife incident: 'It wasn't for hunting, it
was for my art supply'
The Irish actor was at the premiere of his new movie No Escape when he was asked about the controversy

See the complete article here:

https://www.irishmirror.ie/showbiz/irish-showbiz/pierce-brosnan-knife-incident-it-6280406

By Keeley Ryan | 19 AUG 2015

Pierce Brosnan (Image: XPOSUREPHOTOS.COM)

Pierce Brosnan insists the knife he tried to bring on a plane wasn't for hunting - it was for his art.

The Irish actor was at the premiere of his new flick No Escape earlier this week when he was asked about the customs controversy.

The former James Bond star told news show Extra that he wasn't trying to smuggle a weapon onto a plane - but that the knife was for his art, not hunting.

He said: "I'm a painter. I'm an artist, so I had my pencils.

"The knife just went into the bag - you want to keep your pencils sharpened."

Pierce Brosnan was searched by TSA after finding a knife with him while with son Paris Beckett
at Burlington Airport, Vermont. TSA stopped him for a second scan of his carry on briefcase (Image: INF)

Reports suggested that the 62-year-old star tried to board a flight with a 10-inch hunting knife in his carry-on luggage earlier this month.

Pierce Brosnan is best known for playing James Bond in the films GoldenEye, Tomorrow Never Dies, The World is Not Enough and Die Another Day.

Since then, he has starred in films such as The Thomas Crown Affair, The Ghost Writer and Mamma Mia.

2021: Orion Books releases a 40th anniversary edition of John Gardner's Licence Renewed.

]

RichardTheBruce

August 20th
[40 Days to No Time To Die Premiere]

1963: Ian Fleming writes "OO7 in New York" (original title "Reflections in a Carey Cadillac").

"OO7 in New York", Ian Fleming.

The Carey Cadillac, as a message had told him, was already waiting. James Bond always used the firm. They had fine cars and superb drivers, rigid discipline and total discretion, and they didn't smell of stale cigar smoke. Bond ever wondered if Commander Carey's organization, supposing it had equated David Barlow with James Bond, would have betrayed their standards by informing CIA. Well, no doubt the United States had to come first, and anyway, did Commander Carey know who James Bond was? The Immigration people certainly did. In the great black bible with the thickly printed yellow pages the officer had consulted when he took Bond's passport, Bond knew that there were three Bonds and that one of them was 'James, British, Passport 391354. Inform Chief Officer.' How closely did Careys work with these people? Probably only if it was police business. Anyway, James Bond felt pretty confident that he could spend twenty-four hours in New York, make the contact and get out again without embarrassing explanations having to be given to Messrs Hoover or McCone. For this was an embarrassing, unattractive business that M had sent Bond anonymously to New York to undertake. It was to warn a nice girl, who had once worked for the Secret Service, an English girl now earning her living in New York, that she was cohabiting with a Soviet agent of the KGB attached to the UN and very close to learning her identity. It was doing the dirt on two friendly organizations, of course, and it would be highly embarrassing if Bond were found out, but the girl had been a first-class staff officer, and when he could, M looked after his own. So Bond had been instructed to make contact and he had arranged to do so, that afternoon at three o'clock, outside (the rendezvous had seemed appropriate to Bond) the Reptile House at the Central Park Zoo.

Bond pressed the button that let down the glass partition and leaned forward. 'The Astor, please.'

'Yes, sir.' The big black car weaved through the curves and out of the airport enclave on to the Van Wick Expressway, now being majestically torn to pieces and rebuilt for the 1964-1965 World's Fair.

James Bond sat back and lit one of his last Morland Specials. By lunchtime it would be king-size Chesterfields.

1964: Singer Shirley Bassey, guitarist Vic Flick, and songwriter John Barry record the title song for Goldfinger at London's CTS Studios in an overnight session. Note the EMI producer for the recording is George Martin.

1964: Dr. No released in Belgium.

1970s Re-release

1973: Roger Moore, performing on Broadway in 'The Play What I Wrote', is photographed with Yvonne Elliman of the Jesus Christ Superstar cast.

1974: The Man With the Golden Gun films OO7 and Saida's magnificent abdomen.

1981: James Bond comic strip The Paradise Plot begins in The Daily Express.
(Ends 4 June 1982. 175-378) John McLusky, artist. Jim Lawrence, writer.

Swedish Semic Comic 1982
https://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/comics/semic_1982.php3?s=comics&id=02218

007 På Nytt, Laddat Uppdrag
(007 In New Assignment - The Paradise Plot)
[Part 1] [Part 2]

[Part 3]


https://www.mi6-hq.com/sections/comics/titan_tpp2.php3?s=comics&id=01748

1982: An Indian Airlines flight from Mumbai to New Delhi is hijacked by a militant Sikh. Among the 69 passengers is production designer Peter Lamont, set to work on Octopussy.

Commandos kill hijacker of Air India Jet

See the complete article here:

https://www.upi.com/Archives/1982/08/20/Commandos-kill-hijacker-of-Air-India-Jet/9528398664000/

By STEWART SLAVIN

NEW DELHI, India -- A pistol-waving religious zealot hijacked an Indian Airlines jet carrying 69 people Friday but was shot and killed by commandos moments before he had threatened to begin killing his hostages.

The frantic, six-hour drama ended about 350 miles north of New Delhi at Amritsar airport when two commandos and two policemen disguised as 'sweepers' entered the Boeing 737 and killed the hijacker during a brief gun battle. Police said the hijacker was armed with a .32-caliber pistol.

The hijacker, who also wielded what appeared to be a grenade, had promised to begin 'shooting one passenger every hour' unless his demands were met in the sixth hour of the hijacking.

There were no injuries reported among the 63 passengers. Among the crew of six, a stewardess was hurt when she jumped out of the plane as the shooting began, the Press Trust of India said.

An Indian Airlines officials said all those on board were 'perfectly safe.'

The body of the hijacker, identified as Museebat Singh, tumbled out of the hot and steamy aircraft three hours after the jet touched down in Amritsar, police said. Two hijacking dramas by Sikh extremists have ended in Amritsar in the last 16 days.

Singh identified himself as a member of the Sikh religious sect, which is fighting for independence in the northern Punjab state.

The hijacker stormed the cockpit of the plane, headed from New Delhi to Bombay, moments after it took off from a scheduled stop in Jodhpur, 350 miles southwest of New Delhi. He ordered the plane to Lahore, Pakistan, and presented a list of six demands, his gun trained to the head of Capt. Surendra Mohan throughout much of the ordeal.

Authorities in Lahore refused permission for the jet to land, forcing the jet to land at Amritsar.

A woman and her infant daughter, who later told police the hijacker ordered passengers to 'sit calmly,' were released. Moments later, the hijacker ordered the plane to Dubai, United Arab Emirates.

Included in the hijacker's demands was a meeting with Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, $84,000 in West German currency, and the transfer of power of the chief minister of Punjab State, Darbara Singh, to the former chief minister of state, Prakash Singh Badal, an opposition leader.

2018: Aston Martin announces they'll produce 25 Aston Martin DB5s. With gadgets, not street legal.

Aston Martin to produce 25 Bond replica Goldfinger DB5s
Cars to have gadgets seen in films, but will not be road legal; they'll cost £3.3 million in the UK

See the complete article here:

https://www.autocar.co.uk/car-news/new-cars/aston-martin-produce-25-bond-replica-goldfinger-db5s

Jimi Beckwith - 20 August 2018

Aston Martin will create 25 Goldfinger DB5s as part of its continuation projects, with these cars featuring working gadgets as seen in its six James Bond film appearances.

Three more cars in addition to the 25 will be created, with one being kept by Aston, one to go to Eon Productions (the firm behind the Bond film franchise) and another being auctioned for charity.

The gadgetry is being developed by Bond special effects supervisor Chris Corbould in collaboration with Aston’s Q bespoke department, having been officially sanctioned by Eon. They’ll be produced at Aston’s Newport Pagnell plant — the facility where the original DB5 was built.

The cars will be built to a specification true to that of the film car, including features such as revolving numberplates. Modifications over the original Bond DB5 are said to boost reliability and quality compared with the film props used on the original car.

Delivery of the 25 cars starts at the end of 2019, with each going for £2.75 million plus tax, putting the UK price of the car at £3.3 million.

Aston boss Andy Palmer said: "To own an Aston Martin has long been an aspiration for James Bond fans, but to own a Silver Birch DB5, complete with gadgets and built to the highest standards in the very same factory as the original James Bond cars? Well, that is surely the ultimate collectors’ fantasy. The skilled craftspeople at Aston Martin Works and the expert special effects team from the James Bond films are about to make this fantasy real for 25 very lucky customers.”

Previously, Aston produced a DB4 continuation run of 25 cars, each sold for £1.5 million before local taxes. Jaguar Land Rover's Classics division has also carried out continuation projects, starting with a run of Jaguar D-Types built in 2014, while Lister built continuation series of its Knobbly and Costin racers.

Aston produced a car in 2014 specifically for use in the Bond film Spectre but, despite wearing the DB10 moniker, it was never released to the public. That said, the car's look influenced the new Vantage.

2019: BOND 25 title reveal.

2021: James Bond Spectre experience in Rome.

James Bond Spectre Experience in Rome
Rome, Italy

See the complete article here:

https://www.airbnb.com.sg/experiences/1382507

Experience hosted by Ew
2.5 hours, · Hosted in English, German and Dutch
Committed to safety
This host has committed to Airbnb’s COVID-19 safety guidelines.
Up to 6 people
Includes drinks and transport

What you'll do
Follow in the tracks of James Bond in the film “Spectre” during his nighttime car chase in Rome. From the comfort of a sleek black van, you’ll zip around the city, experiencing the historical center’s narrow, winding streets and seeing key spots from the film.

The Eternal City is the setting for about 15 film scenes. Come with me and experience most of these locations, of which many are totally unknown. I use an I-pad to show you the reel and the real Rome location. Step onto the open-air set and relive many of these key moments. Take on the role of “Bond… James Bond” (Daniel Craig) or femme fatale Lucia Sciarra (Monica Bellucci).

I’d love to put you behind the wheel of an Aston Martin but that’s a little out of our budget. Instead, you’ll slide into a discreet, luxurious and comfortable alternative: a sleek black minivan. And since no one besides Bond should tackle Roman traffic, you’ll have a driver too.

During this evening tour (according a fixed route), experience the energy, excitement and spectacular beauty of the Italian capital after dark. And maybe even a Bond-worthy adrenaline rush. You will be 007 or a Bond girl until the bitter end when we’ll toast our evening adventures with a “shaken not stirred” Martini.
[/quote
The price is per person. If you book for three or more people, the price is lower. Feel free to ask me about these discounts.

Other things to note
During this evening tour it can be cool. Make sure you are sufficiently warmly dressed in the winter.
What's included

Drinks
A glass of Vesper Martini in a fancy bar (worth 10 euros)

Transport
Minivan with place for up to 6 people

Learn more about the host, Ew.

Meet your host, Ew
Host on Airbnb since 2019

I am trained as a historian. As a profession I am journalist and writer of 8 published books. Films shot in Italy and Italian movies are my passion. I am an expert in film induced experiences in Rome. This activity I carry out on my own.

They say I am an enthusiastic and charming personality with a great sense of humor. Let me quote what a participant recently wrote about me: "He is the ideal companion, very knowledgeable, spontaneous, natural, sensitive... it was like visiting the city with a friend. This experience will remain as one of the best and most memorable experiences of my long travelling life."

Experience cover photo

Rome's sunset is unbeatable

007 means also romanticism

Glimps of the unknown Rome

Very small groups