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The Many Faces of James Bond (Part 3)

This all adds up to a grand potential situation for a 'Shuffling the Bonds' - Moore starting things off, a single film from an aging and no longer acceptable Connery, perhaps Craig in the 90s?
 
This all adds up to a grand potential situation for a 'Shuffling the Bonds' - Moore starting things off, a single film from an aging and no longer acceptable Connery, perhaps Craig in the 90s?

You very easily good, as discussed in the first article Dalton and Brosnan were both considered for the role long before they got it. Arguably the most difficult to shuffle are Connery and Craig - since Connery seemed to be a perfect storm of qualities that they were looking for and saw in him that they might not see again, and Craig because he is to date the youngest person in the role. There's no one that can come after him... unless...

Moore = Connery - fist in the role a few successful films before he gets bored or Broccoli gets bored of him and he is gone before he got the role OTL.

Connery = Lazenby - basically the whole Lazenby experience maybe even to the extent of dubbing him over with an English accent, quits in disgust and the start of a downturn in the fortunes of the series.

Lazenby = Brosnan - after a few years the series comes back firing on all pistons, but increasing outlandishness and poor critical reception sees him fired at the dawn of the 1980s as they want to take it down a more serious route.

Dalton = Craig - takes the series on a more gritty route and is critically acclaimed, but a couple more hiatuses and an increasing reluctance to come back making his last effort in the early 1990s.

Craig = Dalton - hot off a few television successes, he becomes the youngest man to take the role, but continuing the trend of the Dalton films many wonder if there is a place for the series amongst so much competition by the end of the millennium.

Brosnan = Moore - an older actor, but one off a couple of roles that were Bond in everything but name, gets on well with the new generation of producers. Tries too hard in his first couple of films to keep the meanstreak of Dalton and Craig, and by the early 10s is seen as too old but comes back after some new options fall through.
 
Watching The Dirty Dozen tonight, and this is relevant, because film and television are such insular places on both sides of the Atlantic if Roger Moore were to become James Bond in 1962 and not star in The Saint the career of one of the breakout stars of this film would be radically altered.

The Dirty Dozen was filmed in England in 1966, and though half of the films eponymous unit were established stars in the US the "Back Six" as they became known were all chosen from actors resident in England. Amongst them was one Canadian actor, Donald Sutherland, and the only reason Sutherland got what would become his breakthrough performance was because of Roger Moore. Sutherland was due to appear in an episode of The Saint directed by Moore himself, and the Canadian asked Moore if he could show it to the producers of the film as he was up for the role. Moore was gracious enough to invite the producers along for a viewing of a rough-cut of the episode, they must have liked what they saw since they cast Sutherland, who would leave Hollywood for London in 1968 following the success of the film.

Without Moore acquiescing his request success might elude Sutherland for a couple more years, and also would alter the life of his son Kiefer, who might still be predisposed to follow his father into acting but being brought into acting in the UK rather than the US would give him a very different career.
 
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