Is Charles Gray's Blofeld in DAF based on a parody of Ian Fleming?

2

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  • Posts: 15,229
    Dragonpol wrote:
    Anyone else ever thought of this theory of mine before while viewing DAF or am I alone on this one at all?

    I think Charles Gray's Blofeld was written and interpreted as a caricature of an Englishman.
  • Posts: 2,026
    DAF is little more than of a parody of a James Bond film. Yet another example of when the producers got it wrong, they really got it wrong. Gray's Blofeld belongs in the Chewing the Scenery Hall of Fame, along with Pleasance, and the wheelchair-bound Blofeld in FYEO. As for Gray's performance as some sort studied impression of Ian Fleming, one could argue that Fleming must have been the source of everything Gray ever did. I've never seen Gray in anything that was much different from his role in DAF. I don't doubt he was a fine man, but not much range as an actor.
  • Ludovico wrote:
    Dragonpol wrote:
    Anyone else ever thought of this theory of mine before while viewing DAF or am I alone on this one at all?

    I think Charles Gray's Blofeld was written and interpreted as a caricature of an Englishman.

    Although he has a line of dialogue which pretty strongly hints that he's not English.

    Don't really go along with the theory, I'm afraid, as the lines in the script don't relate particularly to Fleming (or even a generic Englishman at all.) Gray's performance is the same performance he gives in dozens of films.

  • Posts: 15,229
    Ludovico wrote:
    Dragonpol wrote:
    Anyone else ever thought of this theory of mine before while viewing DAF or am I alone on this one at all?

    I think Charles Gray's Blofeld was written and interpreted as a caricature of an Englishman.

    Although he has a line of dialogue which pretty strongly hints that he's not English.

    Don't really go along with the theory, I'm afraid, as the lines in the script don't relate particularly to Fleming (or even a generic Englishman at all.) Gray's performance is the same performance he gives in dozens of films.

    Which line? Blofeld as a character is not British, but in DAF I always thought he was suddenly an Englishman: the accent, the mannerism, the bleeding look even. I mean, yes Savallas was American, but he looked foreign and somewhat exotic. But maybe he is just a caricature of Gray.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,343
    Ludovico wrote:
    Ludovico wrote:
    Dragonpol wrote:
    Anyone else ever thought of this theory of mine before while viewing DAF or am I alone on this one at all?

    I think Charles Gray's Blofeld was written and interpreted as a caricature of an Englishman.

    Although he has a line of dialogue which pretty strongly hints that he's not English.

    Don't really go along with the theory, I'm afraid, as the lines in the script don't relate particularly to Fleming (or even a generic Englishman at all.) Gray's performance is the same performance he gives in dozens of films.

    Which line? Blofeld as a character is not British, but in DAF I always thought he was suddenly an Englishman: the accent, the mannerism, the bleeding look even. I mean, yes Savallas was American, but he looked foreign and somewhat exotic. But maybe he is just a caricature of Gray.

    I'd imagine that it's the "Your pitiful little island hasn't even been threatened" line.
  • Posts: 15,229
    Dragonpol wrote:
    Ludovico wrote:
    Ludovico wrote:
    Dragonpol wrote:
    Anyone else ever thought of this theory of mine before while viewing DAF or am I alone on this one at all?

    I think Charles Gray's Blofeld was written and interpreted as a caricature of an Englishman.

    Although he has a line of dialogue which pretty strongly hints that he's not English.

    Don't really go along with the theory, I'm afraid, as the lines in the script don't relate particularly to Fleming (or even a generic Englishman at all.) Gray's performance is the same performance he gives in dozens of films.

    Which line? Blofeld as a character is not British, but in DAF I always thought he was suddenly an Englishman: the accent, the mannerism, the bleeding look even. I mean, yes Savallas was American, but he looked foreign and somewhat exotic. But maybe he is just a caricature of Gray.

    I'd imagine that it's the "Your pitiful little island hasn't even been threatened" line.

    Oh I don't think becomes in effect a British national in DAF. He just is a caricature of a Brit in look, accent, etc.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,343
    Yes, though Gray portrays a stiff-assed toffee-nosed caricature of a Brit in DAF.
  • saunderssaunders Living in a world of avarice and deceit
    edited May 2013 Posts: 987
    Interesting theory but I don't see it myself, if you were going to parody Fleming surely you would have a Blofeld in short sleeved shirts and shoes without laces that smoked constantly while consuming large, strong alcoholic beverages and indulging in various S&M activities. Gray's Blofeld doesn't patronisingly insult any non British race... not even the Bulgarians (surely a must for any Fleming parody!).
    My view is that EON wanted a generic Blofeld with no clearly identifiable nationality, so that wouldn't potentially upset any audience market, in much the same way as they would never use the Russians as the film's villains.
    I personally have never viewed Gray's Blofeld as English but rather as someone who emulates the snobbery and supposed superiority of the pre war British aristocracy while simultaneously despising them and their ideals ( in much the same manner of Hugo Drax in the Moonraker novel).
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,343
    saunders wrote:
    Interesting theory but I don't see it myself, if you were going to parody Fleming surely you would have a Blofeld in short sleeved shirts and shoes without laces that smoked constantly while consuming large, strong alcoholic beverages and indulging in various S&M activities. Gray's Blofeld doesn't patronisingly insult any non British race... not even the Bulgarians (surely a must for any Fleming parody!).
    My view is that EON wanted a generic Blofeld with no clearly identifiable nationality, so that wouldn't potentially upset any audience market, in much the same way as they would never use the Russians as the film's villains.
    I personally have never viewed Gray's Blofeld as English but rather as someone who emulates the snobbery and supposed superiority of the pre war British aristocracy while simultaneously despising them and their ideals ( in much the same manner of Hugo Drax in the Moonraker novel).

    Although it pains me much to admit it, I suspect that you're right there. Still, it's interesting to discuss the Gray Blofeld construct, anyway. It is odd after the Pleasance and Savalas Blofelds, to say the least.
  • Posts: 15,229
    saunders wrote:
    Interesting theory but I don't see it myself, if you were going to parody Fleming surely you would have a Blofeld in short sleeved shirts and shoes without laces that smoked constantly while consuming large, strong alcoholic beverages and indulging in various S&M activities. Gray's Blofeld doesn't patronisingly insult any non British race... not even the Bulgarians (surely a must for any Fleming parody!).
    My view is that EON wanted a generic Blofeld with no clearly identifiable nationality, so that wouldn't potentially upset any audience market, in much the same way as they would never use the Russians as the film's villains.
    I personally have never viewed Gray's Blofeld as English but rather as someone who emulates the snobbery and supposed superiority of the pre war British aristocracy while simultaneously despising them and their ideals ( in much the same manner of Hugo Drax in the Moonraker novel).

    And what is the nationality, or at least the accent, of the villain when Hollywood does not want to offend anyone? British. Not only is Charles Gray's Blofeld utterly unthreatening, he is also bland.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    edited May 2013 Posts: 18,343
    Ludovico wrote:
    saunders wrote:
    Interesting theory but I don't see it myself, if you were going to parody Fleming surely you would have a Blofeld in short sleeved shirts and shoes without laces that smoked constantly while consuming large, strong alcoholic beverages and indulging in various S&M activities. Gray's Blofeld doesn't patronisingly insult any non British race... not even the Bulgarians (surely a must for any Fleming parody!).
    My view is that EON wanted a generic Blofeld with no clearly identifiable nationality, so that wouldn't potentially upset any audience market, in much the same way as they would never use the Russians as the film's villains.
    I personally have never viewed Gray's Blofeld as English but rather as someone who emulates the snobbery and supposed superiority of the pre war British aristocracy while simultaneously despising them and their ideals ( in much the same manner of Hugo Drax in the Moonraker novel).

    And what is the nationality, or at least the accent, of the villain when Hollywood does not want to offend anyone? British. Not only is Charles Gray's Blofeld utterly unthreatening, he is also bland.

    I know, I think you've nailed it there. There has been a long trend of English character actors in Hollywood big budget films playing villains. It may have started with the Die Hard films, and it failed a bit with the likes of John Castle as Paul McDaggett in Robocop 3 for example.

    On the unthreatening point, this seems to be a motif of the later Guy Hamilton villains, Gray's Blofeld and Lee's Scaramanga are probably two of the nicest villains in the series and one suspects that Hamilton's direction to his lead actors to play it all more lightly didn't really help!
  • edited May 2013 Posts: 15,229
    I think Scaramanga was a threatening villain, actually the best thing about the movie.

    And regarding the British villains, I should be more precise: the villains themselves are not necessarily British, but the actors playing them are, and they have the accent. Blofeld in DAF does not have a British name, he may not be British, yet he has the accent.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    edited May 2013 Posts: 18,343
    Ludovico wrote:
    I think Scaramanga was a threatening villain, actually the best thing about the movie.

    And regarding the British villains, I should be more precise: the villains themselves are not necessarily British, but the actors playing them are, and they have the accent. Blofeld in DAF does not have a British name, he may not be British, yet he has the accent.

    Yes, well I also was referring to British accents in my post above. Sorry if this was unclear. I too like Scaramanga and The Man with the Golden Gun very much - very Flemingesque in parts!
  • Posts: 15,229
    And very different from the novel, which is maybe a blessing now: they still have the character to use, they just need to change the name.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,343
    Ludovico wrote:
    And very different from the novel, which is maybe a blessing now: they still have the character to use, they just need to change the name.

    Yes, that would be most welcome after Skyfall used some parts of the YOLT-TMWTGG story arc of "death" and rebirth, tacked onto a Bondian origin story by way of Sam Mendes.
  • Posts: 15,229
    Just finished watching The Devil Rides Out, an old Hammer movie with Charles Gray as the badguy. He could have been a really menacing Blofeld. I am still wondering why they wrote him like this.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,343
    Ludovico wrote:
    Just finished watching The Devil Rides Out, an old Hammer movie with Charles Gray as the badguy. He could have been a really menacing Blofeld. I am still wondering why they wrote him like this.

    Do you mean why they wrote him as a fey English gentleman in DAF, @Ludovico? This thread is my considered opinion on the matter. I hope to incorporate some of this stuff into my DAF film review which will be on the whole negative in tone.
  • Posts: 15,229
    More like an unthreatening one. I think writing him as am Englishman was due to some cliche and shallow perceptions of the Bond universe, with a pantomime British villain.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    edited September 2013 Posts: 18,343
    Ludovico wrote:
    More like an unthreatening one. I think writing him as am Englishman was due to some cliche and shallow perceptions of the Bond universe, with a pantomime British villain.

    This thread has made me change my avatar from Lord Rosebery to The Criminologist from The Rocky Horror Show (1978) as I think this is another great role of his. Ernst Stavro Blofeld would be an English gentleman if he was played by Charles Gray as he was typecast as this anyway, but he was obviously miscast as Blofeld, one of the major flaws of the film, in fact. Though I suppose that Mr Wint and Mr Kidd do well in filling in as villains for him, though even they are not your regular Bond henchmen. But then there is nothing regular about the film version of DAF, I suppose. It's all very strange, to say the least. It feels a bit like a more fun re-run of GF at times. They tried to re-create the midas touch here with the same crew back from the pride of the fleet that is GF, but in my humble opinion they abjectly failed.
  • I think EON were so concerned following the public response to OHMSS that they completely altered the tone of DAF, including the portrayal of Blofeld. But they shifted the tone to such an extreme that the film was horribly camp and definitely ventured into self parody.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,343
    I think EON were so concerned following the public response to OHMSS that they completely altered the tone of DAF, including the portrayal of Blofeld. But they shifted the tone to such an extreme that the film was horribly camp and definitely ventured into self parody.

    I agree. It is not the first to delve into parody of course (GF had elements of this but YOLT was the first Bond film to be a parody of what went before) and it wasn't the last either, especially as the Roger Moore era (1973-1985) was just around the corner. DAF is a very strange anomaly of a Bond film - it's about as mad as a box of frogs and then some. It is pleasingly bizarre though, as well as being highly camp - a bit like Adam West's Batman, in fact. It's all so odd with Sean Connery in the lead - he plays a very different type of James Bond character here than he did in his classic first two performances in the role.
  • Posts: 15,229
    Dragonpol wrote:
    I think EON were so concerned following the public response to OHMSS that they completely altered the tone of DAF, including the portrayal of Blofeld. But they shifted the tone to such an extreme that the film was horribly camp and definitely ventured into self parody.

    I agree. It is not the first to delve into parody of course (GF had elements of this but YOLT was the first Bond film to be a parody of what went before) and it wasn't the last either, especially as the Roger Moore era (1973-1985) was just around the corner. DAF is a very strange anomaly of a Bond film - it's about as mad as a box of frogs and then some. It is pleasingly bizarre though, as well as being highly camp - a bit like Adam West's Batman, in fact. It's all so odd with Sean Connery in the lead - he plays a very different type of James Bond character here than he did in his classic first two performances in the role.

    I don't think YOLT did go into self-parody though, not intentionally anyway. They made a spy fantasy with heavy sci-fi elements, which many became parodic. In DAF, they were trying to spoof themselves already.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,343
    Ludovico wrote:
    Dragonpol wrote:
    I think EON were so concerned following the public response to OHMSS that they completely altered the tone of DAF, including the portrayal of Blofeld. But they shifted the tone to such an extreme that the film was horribly camp and definitely ventured into self parody.

    I agree. It is not the first to delve into parody of course (GF had elements of this but YOLT was the first Bond film to be a parody of what went before) and it wasn't the last either, especially as the Roger Moore era (1973-1985) was just around the corner. DAF is a very strange anomaly of a Bond film - it's about as mad as a box of frogs and then some. It is pleasingly bizarre though, as well as being highly camp - a bit like Adam West's Batman, in fact. It's all so odd with Sean Connery in the lead - he plays a very different type of James Bond character here than he did in his classic first two performances in the role.

    I don't think YOLT did go into self-parody though, not intentionally anyway. They made a spy fantasy with heavy sci-fi elements, which many became parodic. In DAF, they were trying to spoof themselves already.

    Yes, that's a fine point, but nonetheless true for all that.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,343
    Any further interest on this, my hypothesis, in the OP?
  • MurdockMurdock The minus world
    Posts: 16,359
    I can see where one would make connections that Gray's Blofeld was a Fleming parody. And maybe that was on Tom Mankiwitz. But I highly doubt that Harry or Cubby would spoof Fleming. Cubby loved and respected the man and his work. He wanted to make Bond films since Casino Royale came out in 1953.
  • Posts: 15,229
    I will repeat it again: Charles Grey's Blofeld was a spoof of British villains. The only missing thing was the moustache to twirl.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,343
    Ludovico wrote:
    I will repeat it again: Charles Grey's Blofeld was a spoof of British villains. The only missing thing was the moustache to twirl.

    Yes, but isn't it interesting that he was the only Bond villain who seemed to actually be British (Auric Goldfinger and Alec Trevelyan don't count). The British were never villains in the original Fleming Bond novels and short stories either, so it is quite odd, but then so is all of the film version of DAF!
  • Posts: 15,229
    Dragonpol wrote:
    Ludovico wrote:
    I will repeat it again: Charles Grey's Blofeld was a spoof of British villains. The only missing thing was the moustache to twirl.

    Yes, but isn't it interesting that he was the only Bond villain who seemed to actually be British (Auric Goldfinger and Alec Trevelyan don't count). The British were never villains in the original Fleming Bond novels and short stories either, so it is quite odd, but then so is all of the film version of DAF!

    What is even more odd is that Blofeld is not supposed to be British either. He is the quintessential anti-British villain, in appearance and background.
  • DragonpolDragonpol https://thebondologistblog.blogspot.com
    Posts: 18,343
    Ludovico wrote:
    Dragonpol wrote:
    Ludovico wrote:
    I will repeat it again: Charles Grey's Blofeld was a spoof of British villains. The only missing thing was the moustache to twirl.

    Yes, but isn't it interesting that he was the only Bond villain who seemed to actually be British (Auric Goldfinger and Alec Trevelyan don't count). The British were never villains in the original Fleming Bond novels and short stories either, so it is quite odd, but then so is all of the film version of DAF!

    What is even more odd is that Blofeld is not supposed to be British either. He is the quintessential anti-British villain, in appearance and background.

    Yes, certainly. He's Polish or something. A very odd film that DAF, populated by very odd characters, too. It's kind of on a plane with the 1966 Batman film in terms of self-parody.
  • edited November 2013 Posts: 4,622
    Dragonpol wrote:
    .., but I have the sneaking suspicion that the Blofeld of DAF was based on Fleming by screenwriter Tom Mankiewicz as a little in-joke to refer to the light approach taken to the Fleming novels and stories from herre in in until about 1980 or so with a return to the gritty realism of For Your Eyes Only (1981),
    You might be on to something here. Tom Mankiewicz was a mischievous sort.
    Also to consider, Grey was a returning actor to the series, after his stint in YOLT. There might have been a desire just to bring him back because they liked him and wanted to work with his unique Charles Grey approach to the inconic Ernst - to create a separation from the Savalas version and the previous film, and to give a Sean a fresh take to play off against.
    And of course there was the different dark-camp tone of the new film to be considered. Grey along with the casting of Bruce Glover as Wint were IMO especially inspired choices to capture the tone of the new film.

    But I do see the Fleming similarity, especially with the English gentleman affectations (even if Ernst is decidely not English) and of course the cigarette holder.

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