I had to break the ‘Year of the Spy – 1966’ Retrospective in order to pay tribute to Roger Moore in the wake of his 89th birthday. To say that Sir Roger has a special place in our #Bond_age_ hearts would be an understatement. Roger Moore films, Bond and otherwise, have given so much to our live tweets, that it’s only fair that we give back. And by giving back, I mean digging up all kinds of random Roger Moore soundbites and video clips and oddball TV appearances and live tweeting them.
That’s the #Bond_age_ way.
Allow the man of the hour to raise an eyebrow at that suggestion:
Join #Bond_age_ for @PartyMoore007’s 89 Years of Roger Moore Tribute Clip-o-rama! on Wednesday, October 19th at 9pm.
John Cleese’s Unfortunately Brief Tenure as James Bond’s Quartermaster – Guilty By Die Another Day Association
Welcome Monty Python Blogathonners! Despite this piece being commissioned specifically for the Monty Python Blog-a-thon, any discussion about John Cleese’s brief tenure as Bond’s quartermaster must also include a primer on Desmond Llewelyn’s legacy as Q. So that is where we will begin, in 1963 with From Russia with Love, where Q made his first appearance and dispensed an elegantly simple attaché case.
Desmond Llewelyn appeared in more James Bond movies than anyone else. In 17 films from 1963 until 1999, Llewelyn occupied the role of Q, the MI-6 gadget lab quartermaster. Llewelyn played the crotchety uncle to Bond’s loose cannon nephew, always lecturing 007 about his juvenile tendencies.
Change in the Bond cinematic universe is inevitable and tolerated, but only with tremendous resistance. Despite witnessing five (going on six?) 007 makeovers, the public greets every new Bond with side-eye skepticism. So when Desmond Llewelyn’s Q introduced John Cleese as his successor in 1999’s The World is Not Enough, Bond fans, predictably tossed “the young fellow” some side-eye of his own. There had only been one Q, and no actor in the James Bond universe would ever be more beloved than Desmond Llewelyn.
John Cleese’s Introduction
Upon introduction, Pierce Brosnan’s Bond quipped, “If you’re Q, does that make him… R?” Eon had the good sense to introduce Cleese as “R” rather than another “Q.” Fans still rallied against the Monty Python vet’s introduction, fearing perhaps that the legendary comedian would turn Q Branch into a slapstick circus. Our first impression of Cleese as R comes with his jacket stuck in the door of a BMW. The slight gag however is not played for slapstick laughs, but rather to re-establish the Q/Bond adversarial candor. Unfortunately for Cleese, screenwriters then saw fit to engulf him in a hamster ball jacket, thus reinforcing our fears about the potential for heightened Q Branch slapstick.
The film keeps Cleese in a strict line of succession, continuing the trajectory of the oft-combative relationship between Q and James Bond. Pierce Brosnan’s iteration especially brought out the best in Llewelyn. Take for example when Q details Bond’s BMW and cell phone/remote control in Tomorrow Never Dies. Q appears as an Avis employee and asks a series of questions regarding the various levels of insurance Bond will need on his rental. The moment beautifully plays with our expectations for a Q Branch encounter, but this kind of indirect humor only works with extra-textual information gleaned from many years of cinematic repetition. Note the glee with which Brosnan flaunts his destructive tendencies, strictly for Q’s benefit.
Meanwhile, when Q introduces John Cleese’s R in The World is Not Enough, Cleese brought only his amplehistory to the table as one of Britain’s pre-eminent comic personalities. Many fans believed he shouldn’t tread on Llewelyn’s turf. No matter the reality of time and tide. Someone would eventually have to replace Desmond Llewelyn. Why not Cleese? It seemed right.
Pierce Brosnan spoke on behalf of fans everywhere:
Bond: “You’re not retiring anytime soon… are you?”
Q: “Now pay attention, 007. I’ve always tried to teach you two things. First, never let them see you bleed.
Bond: “And the second?”
Q: “Always have an escape plan.”
On that final piece of wisdom, Desmond Llewelyn fittingly presses a beep-boop button and lowers himself into the floor, his final goodbye to Bond and Bond fans everywhere. His retirement a bittersweet send-off. Three weeks after the premiere of The World is Not Enough, Desmond Llewelyn died in a car accident.
The Unfortunate Future of Die Another Day
Unfortunately for Cleese’s legacy in the James Bond universe, Q/R made his second and final appearance in the much-maligned Die Another Day. The first Bond film after Llewelyn’s passing. The perfect storm of anti-ingratiation culminated by the introduction of James Bond’s invisible car — a regularly-cited scapegoat for all that went wrong in the 20th Bond film. In reality, the Aston Martin Vanquish, retitled “Vanish” for the film, contributed to the most interesting visuals and stunts in the film.
Despite success at the box office, fans regarded Die Another Day as a certifiable stinker. Critics cited that the series had become too beholden to a culturally trending morass of surreal CGI special effects, thus supplanting the old-fashioned stunt-work for which the franchise had formerly been known. Alongside the turnover from Q to R, the Q Branch briefing scene within Die Another Day proves to be a fascinating subject for further dissection.
The scene opens with James Bond cleaning a gun at his desk. He hears a commotion outside in the hall. He steps outside. Slumped bodies, including Moneypenny’s, litter the office. Bond takes out a gaggle of heavily armed assailants one at a time until he reaches M’s office. Here he finds his boss held hostage. He fires one round through her shoulder and into her captor. She falls. Bond empties the clip, sending the evildoer flying. He freezes in midair. R steps forward through a cloud of gun smoke, already lecturing 007 about how a “perfect marksman really shouldn’t shoot his own boss” before removing Bond’s now conspicuous VR sunglasses.
“Check the replay,” Bond says. “You’ll find he’s dead, and she’s just got a flesh wound.”
Die Another Day toys with our perception of reality. Virtual reality had grown into an omnipresent technological buzzword, and Bond must always remain on the cutting edge. This, the movie suggests, is the future of cinema. Limitless scenarios no longer beholden to grounded reality. Just as the theatrical audience had recoiled at this unlimited future, so too does Bond. James goes on. “Give me the old firing range any day, Quartermaster.” To which R says, “Yes, but it’s called the future, so get used to it.”
Two things about this exchange. Bond specifically addresses R as “Quartermaster” here, suggesting the film wanted to avoid referencing John Cleese under his newly assumed role of Q proper (as he is listed in the credits), likely in deference to Llewelyn. Second, you’ll note the irony contained within Die Another Day’s notion of “the future.” We, the modern 2016 audience of this film (and the 2002 audience to a lesser degree), and Bond aligned against the falsehoods of a future guided by virtual experiences. At the time of the film’s release, Die Another Day would have presented Cleese as the mouthpiece for the presumably progressive audience. The future Q/R championed, in fact, turned against him.
Note the prominently placed alligator mini-submarine from Octopussy.
Furthermore, this conversation about the future takes place while Cleese’s Q and James Bond enter an area used for storing Q Branch “relics.” Bond plays with Rosa Klebb’s spiked shoe from From Russia with Love and the Thunderball jet pack. The audience notes the Acrostar mini-jet and the alligator sub from Octopussy in the background. This is the perpetual labor and challenge of the Bond franchise – cherishing and dwelling on the past while constantly moving forward, advancing technologies, the new faces of 007. John Cleese, vis-á-vis his VR training module, represented the bold step into the digital future of 00-training and, with a little mental leap, the bold new world digital filmmaking. Bond fans only want new if the new can be made to feel old and familiar. Thus, Die Another Day artificially surrounded Bond and Q with a basement full of nudges and winks to Bond’s past.
Through no fault of his own, John Cleese has been judged guilty by association with Die Another Day. By merely aligning with “the future” in the film, he’d been deemed persona non grata by fans and, perhaps, ultimately by the James Bond production team. After the critical failure of Die Another Day, James Bond waited four years to return to theaters in Casino Royale, not coincidentally Ian Fleming’s very first Bond novel, and without the aid of a quirky Q Branch.
John Cleese, Pierce Brosnan and the invisible Aston Martin “Vanish.”
And now for something completely different…
Eon reacted to Die Another Day’s perceived failuresby “rebooting” the franchise and returning to Bond’s roots, to Fleming’s earliest work. In this new Bond film, they did not write a part for a Q Branch quartermaster. Nor would there be room for Q’s “future.” During production, director Martin Campbell said Casino Royale would be “grittier and more realistic” and that they’d be “getting away from the huge visual effects and comic relief.” John Cleese’s Q represented the direct link to elaborate visual effects and comic relief. The future had become the past. Q would not reappear as a character until Skyfall in the form of a quite serious Ben Whishaw.
In the years since Cleese last donned the quartermaster’s lab coat, the comedian has been predictably critical of the Bond franchise’s dour emulation of the Jason Bourne movies and reportedly longs for a return of the British class humor inherent to early incarnations of the character. Cleese speaks for many Bond fans who also wish the series would return to those frivolous adventures filled with humor and unnecessary gadgets. The trick, as ever, would be finding the middle ground. The trick, as ever, would be finding that old familiar sweet spot of humor, adventure and glamour and passing it off as “new” rather than the “future.”
Unfortunately, James Bond never offered Cleese the opportunity to make the role of Q his own. The World Is Not Enough‘s screenwriting team did him a great disservice by punctuating his first scene with a hamster ball pratfall Using some of the curmudgeonly persona he’d perfected in Fawlty Towers or Clockwise would have made him a welcome foil for any James Bond — even one more fully grounded by a measure of reality.
#Bond_age_ celebrated Sean Connery’s birthday a little early in order to accommodate a screening of ZARDOZ into the live tweet schedule. But it is August 25th that belongs to Slouchy. You’ll find plenty of websites celebrating the big day with facts you didn’t know about Sean Connery or favorite Sean Connery quotes. I struggled to decide how best to celebrate this birthday. We joke about Sean and use the “Slouchy Bond” nickname because it’s fun to joke Sean Connery’s place in the James Bond universe because, well, it’s less interesting to cite Connery as the best Bond.
The fact of the matter is that he is the best Bond. He and Terence Young molded Fleming’s prose into the most famous hero in the world. Later on in his career as Bond, the relationship between the man and the films turned rather sour. I can’t blame him, honestly; the script for You Only Live Twice should have felt like sandpaper between his nether regions.
If you want to learn more about his potential career as a footballer or his rumored encounter with Lana Turner’s gangster boyfriend, I trust you’ll know how to find Wikipedia. Right now, however, I’d rather share an interview from 1964 that still finds Connery talking about the success of James Bond with much respect for the franchise. It seems more fitting for #Bond_age_ to celebrate the life and times of Sir Sean Connery with a moment reflecting the man’s sincerity and intelligence at a moment when everything was right in the world of Bond.
He has a reputation for being a brute in a suit. Sometimes, likely due to his Diamonds Are Forever contract demands, he has the reputation for being a bit of a scrooge or a premadonna. From what I’ve read, it seems more like Sean Connery is a man of principle. He’s true to his beliefs. He’s confident and cocksure, perhaps to a fault. He’s a man who could tell 1000 tales, and we’d listen intently to every single one.
From everyone at #Bond_age_, happy birthday, Sean Connery.
The year was 1966. The year prior, Thunderball had just become the biggest James Bond in history (and held its title until Skyfall). The cinemascape had become saturated with spy flicks — both sincere… and not so sincere. If I had to pinpoint one year as the pinnacle of IMPOSTOR! that year would be 1966. Our Man Flint. Quiller Memorandum. Modesty Blaise. Funeral in Berlin. Just to name a few. On February 18th, 1966, Dean Martin appeared in The Silencers, the first of four appearances as Matt Helm.
Though not apparent at face value, Matt Helm and The Silencers has many direct ties to the James Bond series of films. Producer Irving Allen had been a partner with Cubby Broccoli in Warwick Productions. The partnership broke up due to Broccoli’s prolonged family drama (his first wife was diagnosed with terminal cancer) and because Broccoli desperately wanted to buy the rights to James Bond. Allen had no interest in a supposed “action-adventure” film.
The pair actually met with Fleming at Cubby’s urging. In this meeting, Allen told Fleming his novels weren’t even “good enough for television.” A costly commercial failure later (The Trials of Oscar Wilde), the partnership dissolved in bankruptcy.
Broccoli, of course, went on to start Eon Productions with Harry Saltzman, shepherded to screen by United Artists. Irving Allen struck out on his own. His most notable release after the break was a wildly inaccurate historical epic about Genghis Khan. After observing Broccoli’s success with the Bond series from afar in 1962, Allen began thinking about his own spy series. This led him, eventually, to Donald Hamilton.
Hamilton wrote about a dark, brooding American spy. He was to Matt Helm what Ian Fleming was to James Bond. Each put a lot of themselves and their WWII experiences into their creations. Both were former military servants turned novelists. One American and one British. Hamilton had been a chemist in the Navy and began writing heavily during his time of service.
Hamilton’s early output belonged to the Western genre, but after the success of Ian Fleming, he began writing spy novels based on his own experiences in the War. While Fleming’s James Bond lives the life of a playboy assassin — the stuff of male fantasy, Matt Helm exists in a place of dark malaise. Helm has semi-retired from his Nazi-killing ways to a life of convenience in Santa Fe with a wife and kids. Globe-trotting to Helm meant ratty motels in the armpits of the world.
And so Irving Allen cast Dean Martin. Obviously.
Allen had a reputation for being anywhere from abrasive to a complete asshole. When Allen stumbled upon Hamilton’s Matt Helm novels in an airport, he believed Helm would be the perfect American counterpoint to James Bond. Allen purchased the rights to the eight Helm novels and found a partner in Columbia Pictures who’d also passed on Bond. The two parties were an ideal match, forged in purgatorial regret and relatively empty coffers.
Turning to A Streetcar Named Desire‘s scribe Oscar Saul and noted film noir director Phil Karlson (who’d been rejected for the Dr. No gig due to salary demands), Allen had every intention of making his Matt Helm films a goddamn series spy incarnation. Then Allen hit a snag. Tony Curtis, Hugh O’Brien, Richard Boone, Paul Newman all turned him down. Either they were involved in their own pet projects at the time or they balked at the notion of being a second-fiddle Bond. Suddenly, Allen’s goddamn serious spy series became a spoof.
If you can’t beat ’em, spoof ’em.
Dean Martin feared his film career had ended with the dissolution of his partnership with Jerry Lewis, but he still feared that Allen was either a complete buffoon or yanking his chain. Why would he — charismatic drunk and lounge singer — ever be asked to play James Bond? So Dean Martin made a number of outlandish contractual demands to test the producer. Allen accepted, much to Martin’s surprise. The script transformed from brooding film noir to Dean Martin lounge act overnight with Martin himself bringing in his Rat Pack team of writers to “Dino” it up a bit.
Instead of a married man living in Santa Fe, Matt Helm became a swinging, alcohol-fueled bachelor living in a state-of-the-art lovers paradise. James Bond as technicolor lounge lizard. Critics considered the film both an affable spoof of 007 but also a cheap, distasteful attempt to cash in on the spy craze. And that’s exactly right. The Matt Helm films are, from our perspective, 1960’s exploitation. Campy and ill-conceived, viewers are merely meant to enjoy the parade of scantily clad women and cheap, boozy gags. Despite the critical division, audiences embraced Dean Martin as Matt Helm, turning The Silencers into a $16million success (the equivalent of $120million in 2016). The film resulted a financial windfall for Irving Allen, Columbia, Dean Martin and Donald Hamilton, who saw the popularity of his books spike in the wake of the film.
And then the Go-Go Dancing Stopped.
The Matt Helm film series would continue until 1968 with the fourth and final film, The Wrecking Crew. Though the film had announced a fifth Matt Helm called The Ravagers, dwindling box office returns and his sick mother caused Dean Martin to step away from the role. Silly spoofs had also fallen out of favor. The assassinations of JFK and Martin Luther King, Jr. The Vietnam War now a fixture of the country’s collective conscience. The murder of Sharon Tate (who’d appeared in The Wrecking Crew) likely proved to be the tipping point for Irving Allen. Allen tried to revive Helm in the 1970’s but the tone of American cinema had shifted. Only Hamilton’s original Matt Helm could have a place in the dark and dour American spy films of the 1970’s. Bond, of course, endured, with Roger Moore acting as counterprogramming. But Bond is Bond and Matt Helm was Dean Martin. Allen attempted on final Matt Helm revival on television with Tony Franciosa in the lead. The ABC series lasted for 13 episodes during the 1975-1976 season before being cancelled.
Join #Bond_age_ for the live tweet of The Silencers on Wednesday, August 23rd at 9pm. Follow #Bond_age_ hashtag. An embed will appear on the website shortly before showtime.
The Silencers Clip Reel Set to the Swingin’ Score:
We like to accommodate everyone here at the #Bond_age_ HQ. So even if you don’t have the DVD for this entry in the Bond series, you can still join in the live tweet with the embed below. The For Your Eyes Only Live Tweet is a favorite event and you really don’t want to miss it. Especially if you’ve never had the pleasure.
This week in 1981, For Your Eyes Only premiered at the Odeon Leicester Square in London. This fifth Roger Moore Bond film came on the heels of the infamous Moonraker. Cubby Broccoli stated that after that far-fetched adventure tale, he wanted to bring Bond back to the basics. One of the many times during the history of the franchise where producers have channeled Ian Fleming for inspiration. For Your Eyes Only also marks the directorial debut of longtime Bond director, John Glen, who makes his first of five consecutive Bond films after serving as editor and second unit director on all of the prior Roger Moore entries.
Reviews for the film were mixed. The Guardian called it overlong and boring, despite boasting impressive stunts. The Observer cited the pre-credit sequence as the best thing about the film. Other critics felt the film lacked connective tissue or a cohesive narrative. Many cited Roger Moore’s performance as the best of his career despite panning the overall festivities. Count filmmaker Robert Bresson as one of FYEO‘s admirers saying “I could have twice in a row and again the next day.”
Whatever the critics have said, For Your Eyes Only remains a #Bond_age_ live tweet favorite and an underrated entry in the series overall. The live tweets from For Your Eyes Only gave berth to #DERP, #CaroleBouquetsMyParentsAreDeadFace and DENIS! — and other memorable #Bond_age_ memes. Plus, skiing, Grandpa Bond, “not-Blofeld,” kicking Locque’s car off the cliff and jailbait Lynn-Holly Johnson. Behind the scenes, it was on the set of For Your Eyes Only that Cubby Broccoli first met future Bond Pierce Brosnan (his first wife appears as Countess Lisl).
Though For Your Eyes Only may often be forgotten by casual fans, #Bond_age_ will remain on that wall, reminding everyone that the film is a confounding and wildly mixed bag of juvenile entertainment, serious Bondness and one of the greatest cinematic climaxes of any Bond film. It’s a helluva lot of live tweet fun.
Tune in Wednesday, June 22nd at 9pm for the 35th Anniversary Live Tweet of FOR YOUR EYES ONLY. Follow #Bond_age_ and also use the #FYEO35 hashtag.
