A New Model for a New Era

Seven years after taking his first bow on stage as a seaman in the chorus of South Pacific, Sean Connery was ready to strap on a Walther and slip into James Bond’s Saville Row jacket.  

In the intervening years he had honed his acting skills in repertory theatre and snagged supporting roles in a dozen films.  Where he had truly begun to shine, however, was on television, ever since starring as the doomed boxer in Rod Serling’s Requiem for a Heavyweight in 1957.  In 1961 alone he played Shakespeare’s Macbeth, Tolstoy’s Count Vronsky, and Terrence Rattigan’s Alexander the Great on the small screen, while squeezing in featured movie roles in a service comedy and a gangster film.

After bowing out of the Bond series in 1967 Sean Connery would be replaced by an Australian model with no acting experience other than one walk-on part in a cheeseparing European Bond-knock-off and a few pantomimed TV commercials for Fry’s Chocolates.  Flush with cash from his modeling career, George Lazenby dropped in on Connery’s barber and his tailor before making his well-groomed entrance at the offices of Eon Productions, where he announced his availability to replace their departing star in the next James Bond movie.

Peter Hunt, assigned to direct the sixth Bond film in the series, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, thought Lazenby just might deserve the gig simply for having conned producers Albert R. Broccoli and Harry Saltzman into believing that he was a real actor.  After agreeing to give Lazenby his shot, the Eon team put together a brilliant production with a solid supporting cast.

For the first time ever in a Bond film, audiences would hear both the archvillain of the piece and the leading lady speaking all of their own lines in English, instead of being dubbed by suitable voice actors.  In fact the only key player whose actual voice was not used in the film is Gabriele Ferzetti.  His lines as Tracy’s father Marc-Ange Draco were replaced by David de Keyser.  No other role was dubbed substantially, unless we count Bond, who is supplied with the posh, precise tones of George Baker during the sizable slice of the film when he must pass himself off as Sir Hillary Bray.

In spite of his own inexperience, underlined by the cast of veteran actors surrounding him, Lazenby does not embarrass himself in the role.  While he does not move with Connery’s effortless grace nor speak with Connery’s deadpan condescension, he does, as my son likes to point out, “Stick the landing.”  He plays a suddenly-stricken widower believably enough to permit the audience to share in his tragic loss.  

Otherwise I suspect that the Saturday Review’s dismissal of Connery’s replacement in 1969 as “a callow youth” may have been the most apt appraisal of that year’s 007.  He seems old enough to be a fledgling agent embarking on a career in intelligence work, but not one who has already saved the world several times over.

After paying Sean Connery a princely sum to start the ball rolling again in Diamonds are Forever, Eon would fall back on the redoubtable Roger Moore, three years older than Connery and already engaged in a second career of replacing other actors in popular franchises - on television. 

Thus far there have been no further experiments in manufacturing a new James Bond from scratch.