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Brosnan in 87 or Brosnan in 95
I have just watched the making of The Living Daylights and as you all know Brosnan was very nearly Bond in that 1987 release. I was just wondering if there is anyone who would've prefered that Pierce had started his tenure then, Do you think Pierce would've been good in TLD and his performance would've been a better debut than GE. Do you think he would've played the chracter differently in 1987 and maybe have been a darker Bond than he actually portrayed from 1995-2002, or do you think he would've took to the same approach and basically done a Connery and Moore combined performance. Brosnan gets quite a bit of flack on here i have noticed but i personally think he is alright and it was other things which hampered his films after GE so basically what i am saying is would Pierce have benefitted if he started in 1987 when a lot of the original Bond team was still in place. I also wonder if he had done TLD what direction would LTK have gone in.
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Comments
Having seen Taffin and Live Wire he certainly wouldn't have had the chops to play Bond back then. In Taffin he played a troubled debt collector (quite a meaty role) and his performance was often laughable.
True he had his flaws during his actual run but it would have been worse in '87 (IMO).
I think even Brosnan himself once admitted losing out to Bond back then was a blessing in disguise for him.
That is the thing because it didn't happen and Dalton was really good and he took it in a slightly different direction when you now think of if Brosnan had been Bond in TLD your automatically comparing him to Dalton. What i am trying to say is do you think Pierce would've been better or worse in TLD than he was in GE. And do you think Pierce woud've done a different take on the chracter than he did from 95 onwards.
I think you're right i think he would've played it pretty similar to how he portrayed Bond in GE which IMO is his best performance, i personally would've liked to see Brosnan in a film scripted by Richard Maibum and produced by Cubby.
Although to be fair he does look pretty good in the Fourth Protocol. I dont think it would have been a disaster but I think things worked out for the best - and if it had happened there would have been no Tim so its a 'no' for that alone.
His TLD screen test doing the Tatiana bed scene is on the extras and its not bad but also not brilliant. Out of interest how old was he in 87? Around 30?
Saying that I did like him in The Fourth Protocol in '87 so perhaps with a better director he could have been good but, as @Wizard said, he probably would have looked even more "male model-y" than he sometimes did.
@BAIN123 that is intresting that even Pierce has said he didn't think he was ready for it.
Sharky beat me to it!
In the above clip the girl is Alison Doody (aka. Miss Jenny Flex from AVTAK). In Around the World in 80 Days he was with Patrick MacNee and Chris Lee (who also appeared in Death Train) and in a few episodes of Remington Steele he was with his own wife Cassandra Harris (Countess Lisl of course).
I agree with you. As much as I would have loved to see Pierce Bronsan as 007 in The Living Daylights, everything worked out in the end. :)
I'll take option c) Dalton starts in 1987 and continues through the 1990's, before passing the torch over to another actor that wasn't Brosnan, somewhere roundabout 2000.
I'm not sure Brosnan is the only Bond actor with a "TV" manner about him.
I must admit I think Dalton also has a rather "made for TV" quality (perhaps even more so than PB?). Most of the stuff he's been in during his career has been television based - both before and after Bond. The main difference is that Brosnan was/is the "lighter" of the two. Kind of in the same field as Moore.
Interesting point. Would Brozzas tenure have survived the 6 year hiatus? He wanted the part so much theres no way he wouldve quit like Tim but also LTK would have been a radically different film and with Remington Steeles popularity its a fair surmise that Brozza would have brought in better figures than Tim domestically (although with the crippling competition in 89 still a significant drop on TLD). Difficult to say but I dont think there would have been the same appetite for change.
I don't mind him in TND. And though it might have been interesting to have Dalton from 1987 to 1995, Brosnan in 1997 with Dalton returning in 1999, I would have preferred Dalton to steer the good ship Bond though the 1990's.
Dear Mr @Bain123 Tim Dalton back in the 70's and 80's was seen as one of England's finest actors. Do you actually have any idea what Shakesperian training involves for actors?
It is the hardest training for any actor/actress. It is the equivalent of what classical musicians go through and far exceeds most pop artists ranges. You are confusing populist culture with actual talent.
So what exactly do you mean by made for tv manner? Because it is an argument made of paper that requires little effort for me to tear to shreds. Actors work in many mediums. Cinema is just one but your success depends on money generated and Hollywood takes less risk with films than they did 20 years ago.
By implying your "Made for tv" quality, it implies you are saying Dalton is not a good actor. By all accounts professionals that have worked with him like Colin Farrell say you can learn from him.
Hollywood is all about youth and back in the seventies Dalton turned down all film work to concentrate on theatre. He wanted to be a super actor. Had he done more films then yes, he would have been famous. Directors wanted him.
Film is made at 24 frames a second whilst tv shows in the USA are 30 frames per second. But the acting standard is the same. Movie stars in general are not usually considered great actors. But they are popular and are used to bring audiences in.
Just because an actor does more television work does not mean he/she are inferior like you allege. Have you seen Dalton in the BBC adaptation of Jane Eyre? Because a lot of movie stars would fall on their swords to pull that off. It is seen as one of the best ever adaptations of the novel.
Take an actor like the brilliant Adrien Brody. He does less films now than a few years back. He was in Polanski's The Pianist but Hollywood could care less. If he fails to put bums on seats and someone with less talent than him can, then guess who will get the green light?
Tom Cruise is a movie star, but he cannot touch an Adrien Brody for range or real talent. But a Joe average cinema goer does not have the mental capacity to sink in the subtleties of a Brody.
Mr Bain, you need to really look into how the industry works. And that includes it's politics of who gets work and who does not.
And seeing as this is a public forum, you need to be fully aware of your facts rather than go by your assumptions. It's a tough world out there. :)
However, I truly wished the franchise continued in early 90's as posted before. Either Dalton or Brosnan in a very respected CR adaptation. Then Brosnan in "GoldenEye" and so on.
But TLD and LTK were perfect for Dalton - the gritty, handsome, simmering yet sensitive, wonderful Bond that was his. Timothy Dalton was, and is, a very fine actor and I am so glad he came along when he did. I wish he had done at least one more Bond film.
Goldeneye was the perfect start for Brosnan. And I thought he looked great; indeed better and more mature (which is a good thing) than he did in the 80's. That role fit him like a glove. I only wish he other films were as good.
Then there's performance. I believe that Dalton showed him what was possible and that he changed the direction that he would have gone in 87 to a somewhat more serious one (I recall reading once, and I don't know if it's true, that Campbell and Brosnan decided to copy Dalton and REDUCE Bond's dialogue in GE to make him appear tougher and more of a man of action).
Then there's his physical presence. By GE Brosnan had filled out a little but was still looking pretty manorexic. It's a real credit to Campbell that he made Brosnan believable in the fight scenes. But imagine an even skinnier Brosnan working with a journey-man director like John Glen. Nope, no way could I believe him physically as Bond at that point.
I suspect, and we'll never know, that Brosnan would have given a much lighter, Moore-ish (and Remington Steel-ish) performance if he had been cast in 87. Remember that it was Dalton who wanted the films more serious (no flying carpet, and as the scene in Pushkin's hotel room was written specifically for him we wouldn't have gotten it with Brosnan). He was also the one who started to go back to Fleming and wanted a three dimensional Bond. Had he not been able to blaze that trail I don't think Brosnan would have attempted to follow down it.
^I could have written this. To the question, would I have preferred that Brosnan start his tenure in '87, that's a big, fat, bold, resounding, no. He was good in Goldeneye (by far the best of his quartet), but Brosnan in '87 would have only meant no LTK, and I just can't fathom that. I sincerely don't think that Brosnan would have been the type to favor a more "human" approach, like Tim, or to put character development above spectacle and cookie-cutter Bond. He seemed so enamoured with the role, that the sheer excitement of "being" this character would have probably gotten to him. Also from what I gathered while watching the EON docu, he was over the moon at the thought of being more famous and richer and perhaps that would have been forefront on his mind. Tim gave us one of the most personal, intense and dramatic takes on Bond in LTK and I'll always be glad for that.
@accopola, excellent points :).