I really don’t know how they did not get sued over this!
Alfred Hitchcock Presents wasn’t sued over ‘Diamonds Aren’t Forever’ featuring Laz as “James…” (crash off-screen). The Master featured Laz as ‘Mallory’ (“as good a name as any”), a tuxedo-wearing, Aston Martin-driving spy.
The UNCLE producers made a point of reminding everyone that, while they were filming the Las Vegas scenes, all three actors who were playing Bond were working at it again, although they were careful; to point out that “we’re not saying he’s Bond - he’s just a great-looking guy in a tuxedo and an Aston Martin” - the same way John Hollis in FYEO was ‘the bald man in the wheelchair with a Mao jacket and white Persian cat’ but not identified by name.
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It’s very much along the lines of Mr. Bont from The Simpson’s.
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Much like DAF. SPECTRE is never mentioned. Only Blofeld. The SPECTRE logo is barely noticeable on the front of the bathosub.
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It was news to me that he was in the running for (what became) NSNA, but this is a bigger shock. Lazenby as McCall is hard to imagine, to say the least, but it’s tempting to imagine. It certainly could have taken the series in a very different direction. There are moments I can see it – when the script calls for a physicality Woodward couldn’t quite pull off – but the underlying humanism, the “soft center”? I don’t know.
I had always assumed “McCall” was an almost-anagram of “Callan”, Woodward’s earlier character who ended up doing plenty of things his later self would logically want to atone for.
I guess it may be that the general public were less aware that he had been James bond, if it had been connery or Moore doing it, it would be a different story maybe?
I remember seeing that movie and was there not a scene where the license plates changed and you hear the bond theme?
Changing licence plates on the Aston yes, but what sounds like the Bond theme only sounds ‘like’ the Bond theme. Similar guitar work, but reworked just enough to avoid copyright infringement. Still, a fun, mindless romp.
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Unbelievable as it sounds, I never saw CANNONBALL RUN. Back then I regarded it as spoof - and myself as a ‘serious’ Bond fan. I’ll have to catch it sometime…
On Lazenby: he was I dare say a nobody to most audiences, about as known for his Bond as Terence Cooper for his ‘007’. Hard to see how NEVER SAY NEVER AGAIN would have even got a budget with Lazenby. ON HER MAJESTY’S SECRET SERVICE used to be the oddball insiders’ favourite with the literary fans. It only came to wider recognition when these types gradually took over the desks in various film magazines and gave it top marks.
But Lazenby himself? He’s often regarded as a ‘missed chance’ by fans. But maybe people forget he was in a close adaptation of Fleming’s strongest book. Take that out of the equation and you end up with a less-than-average actor who just so happens to fit a certain cardboard silhouette. I doubt he would have been the right man to stand up amidst the 70s and the various challenges that came with them.
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The only rumblings I ever heard about Laz returning to the role were after Sean Connery declined (to put it politely) to do a follow-up to NSNA and McClory was looking for a viable replacement. The same rumours persisted re: Timothy Dalton (McClory always seemed to be wooing a former EON Bond). I cannot vouch for the veracity of any of these reports - they may all be rumours as far as I know.
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Even as a teenager, loving Sir Roger as Bond, I was disappointed by this film - with the rather unfunny scene in the trailer being the funniest in this „Smokey and the Bandit“-meets-many stars-mashup: Roger confronts a thug, warning him before combat that he is Roger Moore. - Who???! - Roger Moore! - The thug does not know him and clocks him one. Sir Roger‘s eyes go north and he collapses.
So… only watch it for totally mindless nostalgia. I also remember questionable scenes with the ageing Dean Martin and Sammy Davis jr. dressed as priests.
Yep.
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Oh I’m in no hurry, plenty of other things to watch first…
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If I remember correctly, Kevin McClory did try–or claimed he was trying–to get a Never Say Never Again follow up going with Pierce Brosnan in the lead after his aborted 1986 hiring as James Bond, but before Brosnan officially became 007 in GoldenEye in 1994. Or am I mistaken?
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Saw “Canonball Run” in the cinema. Not a thing I usually brag about.
It was always fun seeing Roger in anything, but by this point, the whole Hal Needham/Burt Reynolds formula was starting to wear thin, IMO. But if nothing else, it was my introduction to Jackie Chan, so there’s that.
I remember EON was not happy with Roger for participating, and I can see why: although playing “himself” as self-absorbed, a bit dim and useless in a fight is right in line with Roger’s refusal to ever take himself seriously, the gags take on a different light when he’s wearing a tux and driving an Aston Martin while a mock Bond theme plays. It feels like he’s poking fun at 007 as much as Roger Moore. And it does make it harder to take him seriously the next time he goes to bat as Bond. It was a bit short-sighted, in that respect.
Anyway the real problem with the film is that it’s just not funny. That’s not unusual when a film’s entire reason for existing is to cram as many stars as possible into two hours. As far as I can recall the “wall to wall stars” approach has only worked out well once (“It’s A Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World”). Usually, the result is more like the '67 CR. Or Cannonball Run.
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It would’ve been fun, but as David_M says:
I think it plays better with Connery, anyway. He went to Shrublands as a younger man, and he’s back there again as an older man. He didn’t change his behaviour. I think that has decent symmetry, considering Thunderball content had to be so heavily re-used.
In interviews with George Lazenby he has said that eon wanted control over what films he acted in between 007 movies, surely that would have applied to Roger Moore too?
It was true of Brosnan, so I imagine it was true of Moore. I mean, if you look at the films the other 5 did around Bond, Eon clearly arn’t too picky about what their current James Bond is doing.
Looking at the situation Eon was coming from when they hired Lazenby - Connery being massively fed up and wanting to have more time for other projects - and also taking into account what Lazenby actually was, very much a rookie in the acting department, I suppose Eon’s main concern was to secure Lazenby for their own series. That would tally with the x-films deal which would have resulted in Lazenby possibly being stuck with Bond well into the 1980s.
Moore came from the direct opposite of the scale; he was already a seasoned and extremely popular actor, as well as practically a producer on his THE SAINT and wanted to do Bond. Maybe Eon missed a beat there, didn’t extend the contract to have a veto after TSWLM or MR. Or maybe they didn’t consider it a problematic part but gratuitous advertising. NORTH SEA HIJACK and THE WILD GEESE both were playing the same field as Bond - though massively more violent. Moore was arguably more the killer in these than in his Bond persona - which was at that time more on the family-friendly scale.
Might be interesting to learn one day which projects - if any - Eon actually didn’t allow their lead actors.
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I don’t know that they ever told their lead actors they just plain couldn’t take a role, at least not something as far afield as North Sea Hijack, where ffolkes is almost an anti-Bond. I’m not even sure a contract that totalitarian in nature would be legit. But I’m sure they were sensitive to their stars milking their patented tropes and imagery; for example, the gun-held-to-the-shoulder pose on posters, or certainly Cannonball’s appropriation of the Aston Martin. If any of them had decided to take on a “side job” that had them playing a superspy, it would have gotten ugly fast.
I’d heard Brosnan had to wear his tie undone in his tuxedoed scenes in “Thomas Crown” because of his EON contract. If true, I always imagined that was was fallout from Roger’s “Cannonball” escapade. They don’t seem to have objected to Sean “dressing like James Bond” in “Woman of Straw” (right down to the white dinner jacket) but maybe that was because they got to steal the whole wardrobe for Goldfinger!