Bond. Well, nearly...

[Gary Oswald]

Discuss @RyanF 's latest article here

 

[Heavy]

Fun fact: Oliver Reed played a James Bond-like character in 1969, the same year as On Her Majesty's Secret Service, in the Basil Dearden adaptation of Jack London's The Assassination Bureau, starring opposite Diana Rigg and Telly Savalas. That might give an idea of how he would have approached the role.

I've heard a few other things about the Moore replacements. One thing is that Broccoli went off Brosnan quite badly after the first attempt to get him in the role fell through and was keen to give the part to Liam Neeson, who declined because he wasn't interested in being in action films (ironic). It's going solely by Wikipedia, but apparently if anything had prevented Brosnan from playing in GoldenEye, Paul McGann would have stepped into the role.

 

[RyanF]

Fun fact: Oliver Reed played a James Bond-like character in 1969, the same year as On Her Majesty's Secret Service, in the Basil Dearden adaptation of Jack London's The Assassination Bureau, starring opposite Diana Rigg and Telly Savalas. That might give an idea of how he would have approached the role.

I've heard a few other things about the Moore replacements. One thing is that Broccoli went off Brosnan quite badly after the first attempt to get him in the role fell through and was keen to give the part to Liam Neeson, who declined because he wasn't interested in being in action films (ironic). It's going solely by Wikipedia, but apparently if anything had prevented Brosnan from playing in GoldenEye, Paul McGann would have stepped into the role.

I had seen both the Neeson and McGann things but wasn't able to find much to back them up, otherwise would have included them both in these articles - particularly McGann seeing as he is the man who missed out on Bond but got the Doctor, sort of the opposite of Brosnan.

 

[Heavy]

I had seen both the Neeson and McGann things but wasn't able to find much to back them up, otherwise would have included them both in these articles - particularly McGann seeing as he is the man who missed out on Bond but got the Doctor, sort of the opposite of Brosnan.

I know you mentioned McGoohan turning down the role because he thought James Bond was "too promiscuous" in a previous article, but my favourite is one that you haven't covered yet: Michael Gambon. If you are familiar with the story about the reason why Michael Gambon declined to play James Bond and how Broccoli reacted to it, you will understand why it entertains me.

 

[Alex Richards]

'What James Bond needs is more yellowface' feels like an incredibly 60s take on the franchise.

 

[Charles EP M.]

"This picture of Idris Elba taken in 2018 by Harald Kricher and licenced under the Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 generic licence is entirely unrelated to the content of this article"

Glorious.

 

[SenatorChickpea]

You know, you could have quite a bit of fun doing a Shuffling the Deck thing with the Bond movies, if it hasn't been tried already.

Oliver Reed might not have made a successful Bond, but by God he'd play a fantastic 1970s Alec Trevalyan.

 

[Geordie]

Poor McGann. Almost Bond, almost Sharpe. Got The Doctor, but there's a big asterisk next to it.

I meant to put a little aside in about him being James Bond in my Prime Minister Hugh Laurie Thing, but I forgot. Even in other TLs, he's the nearly man.

 

[RyanF]

Poor McGann. Alost Bond, almost Sharpe. Got The Doctor, but there's a big asterisk next to it.

I meant to put a little aside in about him being James Bond in my Prime Minister Hugh Laurie Thing, but I forgot. Even in other TLs, he's the nearly man.

Even extends to roles he did get, in Alien 3 as released his character simply disappears halfway through the film after getting some development that is never followed up on. In the assembly cut his character's obsession with the monster eventually leads to him committing murder to free it and his own demise.

 

[Charles EP M.]

a Shuffling the Deck thing with the Bond movies

Stirring The Martini

 

[Geordie]

Stirring The Martini

Shaking, shurely?

 

[RyanF]

Stirring The Martini

Shaking, shurely?

I've got one ready just needs to have it's footnotes added - stay tuned. Will say that there are still six EON Bonds, but only two of which are OTL.

 

[RyanF]

And here it is!

 

[TR1996]

Was Adrian Paul, of the Highlander TV show, ever actually considered, or is that just internet scuttlebutt?

 

[Jared]

Was Adrian Paul, of the Highlander TV show, ever actually considered, or is that just internet scuttlebutt?

There can be only one... Bond.

 

[M_Kresal]

It's going solely by Wikipedia, but apparently if anything had prevented Brosnan from playing in GoldenEye, Paul McGann would have stepped into the role.

Poor McGann. Almost Bond, almost Sharpe. Got The Doctor, but there's a big asterisk next to it.

Only a couple of years late seeing this! I got the chance to ask McGann about this when I got to interview him on-stage at Con Kasterborous 2015. He flat out said it wasn't true but one of the other McGann brothers did audition for the part.