The "Other Fella" Breaks His Half-Century Silence....
"Actually, it DID happen to me." Finally, the truth.
shareWHAT did happen to him?
WHICH other fella?
Is there a link?
Just curious...
He's shopping his story around to the highest bidder, so we'll have to wait and see. If Dame Rigg knew she took it to her grave.
shareAha.
What's funny is..in the usual Hollywood tradition...there are contradictory stories here (and I'm talking about Lazenby right?):
ONE: Lazenby VOLUNTARILY quit as Bond after one movie.
TWO: Lazenby was INVOLUNTARILY FIRED as Bond after one movie.
One thing that makes sense that I have read/seen in some brief Lazenby interviews is that he -- somewhat correctly -- saw James Bond as "over and done" by 1970.
ALL the big TV spy series of the 70s were off the air by 1970: The Man From UNCLE, I Spy, The Wild Wild West, Secret Agent, Get Smart(almost), The Avengers(Steed/Peel). I think Dean Martin quit Matt Helm after The Wrecking Crew in 1969. There were no more Our Man Flints with James Coburn.
And "action cops" like Dirty Harry and in The French Connection were gonna be hot.
So maybe that would SUPPORT the idea of Lazenby quitting.
As it turned out, James Bond survived and carried on with the much more silly Roger Moore films in the 70's, each spoofing some other bigger hit: Live and Let Die did Blaxploitation and Shaft; The Man With the Golden Gun did Kung Fu and Enter the Dragon; The Spy Who Loved Me did Jaws; Moonraker did Star Wars.
Oh - just making sure here - I was riffing off Lazenby's line "This never happened to the other fella". I wasn't being serious. I'd imagine younger people watching these movies out of context and out of order might not get the significance of that line and wonder what he meant. I thought it would be funny if "the other fella" was really Bond's hair dresser or stock broker or something like that.
On a serious note, if what Lazenby said was true that agent who was advising him made one of the worst mistakes for their client in the history of talent agents. I think Lazenby cited the success of Easy Rider as the logic used to arrive at the conclusion that "Bond Is Dead". They would have had no way of knowing about the success of Dirty Harry and The French Connection as they hadn't been released yet. In many ways, Dirty Harry and Popeye Doyle were more anti-Hippie than not. It is possible, however that Steve McQueen's "hippie cop" routine in Bullitt may have been present on their minds.
Maybe Lazenby went to one of those crazy cult communes in Laurel Canyon and heard this: "Peter Fonda is its father, not Connery. BOND IS DEAD! Hail Hippies!" However, to paraphrase Mark Twain, "Reports of Bond's death were greatly exaggerated." God could have told them that from personal experience if anyone had asked.
I'm glad we're getting this all cleared up, christomacin. I realize that I took your rather cryptic one-liner and went all over the place with it but...I was curious.
And I DO love that line "This never happened to the other fella." It was one of the great fourth wall breakers in movie history,not at all cheap, designed(I think) to relax the audience into accepting the loss of the only James Bond they'd ever had, for most of the 60's -- Sean Connery. (I know, I know, Barry Nelson played Bond on TV, but that doesn't count.)
I've seen some photos of Lazenby -- around the early 70's? -- where he had LONG hair. Full hippie. Bond's hair could grow "longish" but not like that. So maybe Lazenby WAS behind his one-hit wonder status. And yet: Roger Moore came to the Bond part from the TV show "The Persuaders"(with Tony Curtis) and he had fashionably long hair on that series BUT (said the press) he had to get something like three haircuts to get his hair nice and short for Live and Let Die(and then he slowly grew it back out over the years in the role.)
In between Lazenby and Moore, we DID get Connery back, but it was almost cruel: just one movie, that's it, he's BACK...he's GONE. Like a lost lover who reconciles with you for a one night stand -- and leaves again. Almost permanently that time. But...never say never again.
Oh, well. Bond lives. (As I type this, Daniel Craig is done playing him but SOMEBODY will return.)
And I'll just have to leave your cryptic quote "as is." I'll remain intrigued.
Happy New Year
I compounded my sin by making an obscure Rosemary's Baby reference as well.
Happy New Year to you, as well.
The other fellow was Sean Connery. It was a joke from the movie that broke the fourth wall.
shareOh - just making sure here - I was riffing off Lazenby's line "This never happened to the other fella". I wasn't being serious. I'd imagine younger people watching these movies out of context and out of order might not get the significance of that line and wonder what he meant.
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That's a great point about "out of context." AT the time...1969, it was a brilliant line because (again) we were so ready to be disappointed that Bond would never be Sean Connery again (we were wrong, but we didn't know that at the time.) Lazenby acknowledges it up front.
But there's more to the line than that -- at the very moment Lazenby says "This never happened to the other fellow," John Barry's score POWERS up and the image of Lazenby morphs into something unreal and "ready to lead the credits sequence" -- which, in turn, is instrumental only (no singer to distract us) as images flow across the screen from Bond adventures past - Dr. No, From Russia With Love, Goldfinger, Thunderball, You Only Live Twice. We see all the women. We see all the bad guys. But we DON'T see Bond. He's missing -- it WAS Connery. NOW it is Lazenby. Quite a brilliant credit sequence. (Later in the film, they have Lazenby open a drawer and pull out one souvenier from each of Connery's adventures, as the theme songs from them play.)
--- I thought it would be funny if "the other fella" was really Bond's hair dresser or stock broker or something like that.
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Well, without context -- it could be. Hah!
On a serious note, if what Lazenby said was true that agent who was advising him made one of the worst mistakes for their client in the history of talent agents.
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Ha. No, I'd figure that the agent wanted Lazenby to hang on to Bond at all costs(quite a commission.) The "mystery" is: did Lazenby QUIT believing that Bond was dead?
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I think Lazenby cited the success of Easy Rider as the logic used to arrive at the conclusion that "Bond Is Dead".
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Well, the movies WERE changing in a big way. 1968 brought the R and X rating. The Bond producers were set on keeping Bond "M" (as PG was first known.) I always felt that the Roger Moore Bonds almost seemed to play towards KIDS a little bit ("Jaws" as a bad guy for instance.)
But the whole TONE of Easy Rider seemed to presage change. It is said that Easy Rider made a lot of money on a low budget, but COST studios a lot of money as they made Easy Rider clones that LOST money. The counterculture was overrated as a movie subject if shown OVERTLY...they had to be snuck in via antiheroes like Serpico and Jake Gittes.
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They would have had no way of knowing about the success of Dirty Harry and The French Connection as they hadn't been released yet.
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True, but I think once Popeye and Harry hit big in late 1971 ...cops came back in BIG...spies headed out to pasture. Except Bond, James Bond -- who had really become a cultural series icon alongside Sherlock Holmes, Tarzan...and Superman(or more on point, the gadgety Batman.)
CONT
In many ways, Dirty Harry and Popeye Doyle were more anti-Hippie than not. It is possible, however that Steve McQueen's "hippie cop" routine in Bullitt may have been present on their minds.
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People should remember that if we have "comic book hero movies" today..we had counterculture movies THEN, and evidently for the same reason: to serve the youth audience.
Studios were pretty nervous on sending Steve McQueen out playing a cop in 1968 -- even McQueen himself( who had had brushes with the law and jail as a youth) wasn't initially comfortable in the part, even though he produced the movie. McQueen came to respect the police officers he met(like the real cop portrayed by Mark Ruffalo in Zodiac) and Warners sold Bullitt as indeed a movie about a "hippie rebel cop against the Man." (Recall that Bullitt's foes were middle-aged Mafia men and a conservative politician played by Robert Vaughn.)
The French Connection was about a racist, borderline insane cop who, nonetheless had a righteous sense of justice and fought pretty fair. Harry , just like Bullitt before him, but with a lot less quiet cool, fought against his bureaucratic bosses(but was pitted against a psychopath far scarier than the Mafia businessmen in Bullitt.)
All of this matched the coming of a grittier, more cynical seventies...and James Bond was really rather downgraded accordingly. The movies were THERE, but just not as important, let alone as sexual and sadistic, as they had been in the 60's.
Rather a domino effect: if Lazenby kept the role, would have everything from Diamonds Are Forever through Moonraker starred him? No Connery return, no opening for Moore...no "pay or play" payoff for John Gavin(Psycho, Spartacus) who was hired first for Diamonds Are Forever. Life is full of "what ifs."
CONT
Maybe Lazenby went to one of those crazy cult communes in Laurel Canyon and heard this: "Peter Fonda is its father, not Connery. BOND IS DEAD! Hail Hippies!" However, to paraphrase Mark Twain, "Reports of Bond's death were greatly exaggerated." God could have told them that from personal experience if anyone had asked.
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Ha. The Rosemary's Baby connection. It probably is worth wondering what happened with Lazenby. If he did NOT quit on his own, the producers may have figured it was better to cut bait sooner rather than later and go looking again. Its funny -- they made the move to American John Gavin(and signed him) before electing to put big money into bringing Connery back(perhaps UA made THAT decision.)
AMERICAN John Gavin, by the way. Evidently the producers thought that an American was worth trying. They put out public offers in the 70's to Burt Reynolds(possible, but he said no) and Paul Newman (Impossible and he said so.) I've also seen a screen test with James Brolin from the 80's.
CONT
I think I just gave Tarantino an idea for "Once More Upon A Time in Hollywood...".
"SEE George Lazenby tune in, turn on, drop out... and fight a coven of Satanists!"
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Ha. He could do the role wearing Bond's tuxedo...with long hair and love beads.
I'll bet that Tarantino has some sort of theory on Lazenby and On Her Majesty's Secret Service. That movie has a bit of a cult around it -- the best of the original Bonds. If only Connery had been in it. An epic. Emotion.
And this: OMHMSS and Daniel Craig's Casino Royale will forever be bonded(emotionally) in Bond. I trust we know why....