The Jeff Marshall CBn Interview

Many Bond fans are familiar with the art of Jeff Marshall — from his terrific James Bond lithographs to 007 item packaging like the Corgi collectable boxes. What Bond fan may not know is that you may actually have seen his work in other places besides the Bond world (check out some examples in CBn’s Jeff Marshall Gallery).

Now CBn brings you a chance to know more about the mysterious artist behind the canvas.

Could you tell us a little about your artistic background?

I graduated in 1981 from the Art Institute of Philadelphia. I have been in in advertising from that time and have enjoyed every minute of it. Today, I am a Senior Vice President, Creative Director at DePersico Creative Group outside Philadelphia, PA. I direct the overall creative product at DePersico. It is my responsibility to ensure that all work is strategically on target, brand consistency is adhered to, and brand awareness is continually increased.

I have worked at Depersico for over 17 years. I have been Creative Director since 1998. Prior to coming to DePersico, I worked at Sulpizio Design in Philadelphia and The MCS Group in Media, PA where I honed my creative skills on food and non-food accounts such as Melitta Coffee, Wyeth Pharmaceuticals, Merck, and Smith-Kline Beecham. I have been very lucky and won creative awards including Art Directors Club of Philadelphia, The Paperboard packaging Council, Print magazine and Philly Gold Awards. I combine my love of baseball and art to create custom illustrations of many players on the Philadelphia Phillies team past and present. Of course, my James Bond work holds a most sacred place in my heart.

What inspired you to begin creating 007 lithographs?

It might be the posters from the late 80’s Bond films. After Licence To Kill, I had nothing to lose. All joking aside, I love movies and movie posters. That combined with my over the top mania for the Bond films was something that was just bound to happen.

What media(s) do you use?

Pencil, Watercolor, Mac!

What are some of the things you do or think about regarding Bond before you start to work?

For any project I try and research it first. I find a comfortable place to start to doodle and create. My work with films, T.V. and individual star portraits becomes very personal, something I want to see. Something that comes from inside out. A visual place that touches an emotion. The Connery films are emotionally different for me from the Moore, Lazenby and Dalton movies. My first films where with Connery. When I picture his image as Bond, I still hear the Barry music, I feel the explosions and remember all the hours spent with my Father in the theater, both of us enjoying the hell out of all of it. I’m not disrespecting the other films or actors. Every film is filled with classic moments and very fond memories.

Run us through you process of creating one of your posters?

Sketch, sketch, sketch! Sit and stare like a zombie. With any piece of art,there is a unique beat. My job was always to find an alternate visual appeal for fans, so that they could connect, get to that happy place. As I sketch and get comfortable I start to pick on individual images and render away. They don’t always work and I have thrown away so much more than I
have ever put on paper, but the process is electric. When I get comfortable with some of my art, I scan and start to build in the computer. This gives me the ability to edit, colorize and create multiple variations of what was in my mind initially.

While working on a James Bond piece, are their any special 007 rituals you do?

Oh my yes! The assigned film, soundtrack is always on in the background. Lots of stills and reference. (never enough reference!) The making of documentaries are always inspiring. The films where blessed with so many great creative minds that had an amazing collaborative synergy to make things happen. That is real inspiration.

Having done so many Bond posters now, do you find yourself constrained by your original format?

I think the only boundaries are with deadlines, lack of reference and of course talent. I fantasize about Donald Smolen back in the day, setting up photo shoots of the various stars for his illustrators reference. Visiting a location during a shoot. No wonder the early campaigns where so imaginative and breathtaking. The illustrator, art director was a very integral part of the overall taste and feel of the movie experience. My job was different in that I did not have to sell the film, the lithos are a tribute to the film and the person that holds a certain title or era dear.

Is there a certain Bond actor that is easier to create the pieces for more than others?

Connery, he is an amazing looking man. What carries over into his film performances is seen in any reference I have of him. He projects and creates the character of Bond like no other. I really enjoy all the other actors, but I guess my first images of Bond are of the Connery Bonds, it is a very personal feeling. I do love Pierce as Bond as well. The few attempts I have made of Pierce have turned out well. He just works for me. From his Remington Steele days, I imagined him as Bond. Very handsome with this amazing under coating of honesty and approachability.

Do you find your art suits a particular era of the Bond films or do you think it works equally well for the entire series?

I have my favorite lithos from each era. I like the Dalton lithos as much as the From Russia With Love litho. Not all of them have been gems, but that’s what keeps me going. A big criticism of the films is that they have not changed that much over all of the decades. The formula is set and that is it. Well to me, that makes each adventure timeless, and with that in mind, this first series of illustrations seem to work no matter what year the original film was created.

It seems the 007 Femme Fatales receive more attention in your pieces. Is this something you do consciously, is it a product of inspiration or is there another reason?

I think the ladies are such a big part of the films identity that they have to be in the forefront. Maybe it’s me, but showing them off a little, brings me back to when the films where a little sexier.

Are there any specific pieces that you favor more over others?

From Russia With Love, Diamonds Are Forever, A View To A Kill, and Licence To Kill.

Of course I’m very fond of The Spy Who Loved Me litho because of the Roger Moore, UNICEF connection. I remember the first time when Lee Pfieffer told me about the possibility of that union, so exciting. It was a very special experience.

What’s the story behind the Special Edition Casino Royale video art?

The Casino Royale DVD was another great SpyGuise project. Lee and Ron wanted to re-release the successful video they had created a few years back with the addition of a Barry Nelson interview and a few other goodies.

Personally, It was a ton of fun doing a 50’s retro design (floating heads and all). It would have been great hearing what Nelson had to say about the production and some of the other aspects of his long career. I was lucky enough to have met him and I hope that someday, those interviews get out so we can share in this little piece of history.

I once saw a spec poster you did that featured Pierce’s Bond in grey tux and a parachute in freefall? When did you do this, and is there a story behind it?

It was one of those things when I had a little down time I wanted to see a Bondian moment recreated in poster form. I always thought Brosnan driving the motorbike off the side of a mountain-chasing a plane would have been a blast of a teaser poster for GoldenEye. Brosnan in Q’s mini jet boat
from The World is Not Enough would have been fun too. I still love all those great 60’s posters.

Do you have any future plans to create posters for the Brosnan films? Or now the Daniel Craig Film(s)?

I always had several GoldenEye pieces of art. I did one for my son Christian’s room a few years back. Pierce is just so darn handsome, he makes a great subject. As far as Daniel Craig goes, I’m excited to see if the series can approached from a slightly different direction. He has some great features to take advantage of. I wish him and the entire production the best of luck. I’ll be sketching him when I have some down time.

Are your posters licensed by Eon? If not, how do you deal with copyright issues?

All of the posters that SpyGuise sells are licensed and part of the ‘James Bond Official Limited Edition Lithograph Collection.’

Many fans would like you to do the official poster or DVD cover for the Bond series, from your point of view how likely do you think that dream is?

That is very kind. I’m always happy to hear that the art has been well received. An artist needs an audience to create with, it is a very special bond. As far as me doing any future Bond work other than personal. The likely hood is probably not. I do art for friends and charity work now. I’m currently involved with a group who is raising money for Ovarian Cancer.

Are their any Bond related projects that you’ve just finished and/or are currently working on?

Nothing new on the horizon, but never say never. It might be a good time to thank everyone for their support and interest in the artwork. When I had my website up, I communicated with so many fans of the art that became friends. They would often share there first experiences with the Bond films, who was their favorite 007 and of course a certain amount of bashing of various films. I also have not mentioned the men behind the James Bond Lithos. Lee Pfieffer and Ron Plesnarski did all the leg work in the early stages with Eon and promoted the heck out of the lithos during their run. They are a great team filled with many exciting and unique visions. SpyGuise really sets the standard for the spy collector and memorabilia enthusiast.

If someone is interested in purchasing your art work how can they go about doing so?

They can reach me via my daytime e-mail address: [email protected]. I will answer all requests and questions regarding my illustration work.

To discuss this interview visit this thread in the CBn forums, the largest 007 forum on the net.
Jeff Marshall portrait by Evan Willnow with sincerest apologies.

The John Cork CBn Interview

First off, what do you think about the announcement of Daniel Craig as James Bond in Casino Royale?

I’m thrilled with the casting, not only because I think he is the best choice, but because it means this movie is getting made. Craig is an experienced and very talented actor. He brings an edge to the role that will be very interesting to watch. Most exciting is that the filmmakers are not simply resting on the monumental success of the last four Bond films. They are pushing the series forward, taking risks and trying new things. In so many ways, this is like Dr. No all over again. We have a clean slate, no baggage. We have an original Fleming novel that has never been filmed by Eon productions. We have a commitment to the core of what Fleming wrote. Casino Royale is a great novel, one of the most influential spy novels ever written. It contains the essence of what makes Bond the Bond we know. If they get it right—and I think they will—the movie will be spectacular. Casting Daniel Craig, I feel, was both necessary and brilliant, because it strips away the past. He isn’t so young as to make Bond seem naïve or innocent. But he isn’t too old. The honing of the character that is an essential part of the story can still be believable. The past—as great as it was—is dead. Craig is Bond. Long live 007.

Okay, let’s get the “controversy” out of the way. Not long ago you were quoted in the Houston Chronicle as calling some Bond fans “pathetic, pasty-skinned, wifeless guys who sit in their apartments in London with nothing better to do than make up crap.” Care to elaborate?

I said nothing of the sort! I said that those who have nothing better than to make up rumors and post them on the internet were of this ilk. Not that there is anything wrong with being pasty or wifeless. I could probably use some sun myself. I think the key word might have been pathetic. True Bond fans don’t need to make up rumors. They are better than that.

In the early ’90s Variety reported that you had made a deal with Eon to develop ideas for what was then “Bond 17.” How did this deal come about?

I was working as a screenwriter. I had met Timothy Dalton and Barbara Broccoli at a screening of a film I wrote and told them that the reason I became interested in filmmaking was because of my love of the Bond films. We had a nice conversation. Quite some time later—a year and a half, I think—I called my agent to ask her what was happening with the new Bond film since legal entanglements had been cleared up between MGM and Danjaq/Eon. She called me back and said, “They are interviewing writers. You have a meeting with them.” I was thrilled. I went in and had a meeting and, as a result, was one of three writers hired. Michael France was always the writer working on GoldenEye. The other writer and I were working separately on treatments for future films. I never worked out a story, but I felt like I got along very well with Barbara Broccoli and Michael Wilson. It was a wonderful experience. I have tremendous admiration for the writers who hammer out a great, filmable Bond story. I was cut out for different things.

Can you share with us any details at all about what your Bond treatment was about? I heard it was called, Shaken Not Stirred. True?

No. Never had a title. We never even agreed on a storyline! I wouldn’t even say I ever had any good or memorable ideas.

Tell us about how you came to be so involved in the productions of the Bond DVDs?

I received a call from someone at MGM saying my name had been suggested by Danjaq, and asking if I would be interested in working with them on the DVDs? This was in 1999. I had previously been involved with the LaserDiscs of Goldfinger, Thunderball and GoldenEye, and that had grown out of my work with the IFF and my time working with Michael Wilson, Barbara Broccoli and Cubby Broccoli on treatment ideas that never got fleshed out.

Was Eon reluctant to let you feature cuts scenes on the DVD documentaries.

Eon has been incredibly supportive of everything we have done on the DVDs. In many ways they have gone to the mat, dug deeper and helped far, far beyond the call of duty. Of course they approve the final materials, so they can say no. They very rarely have said no on the DVDs.

Was there anything you wanted to include in the DVDs that you either didn’t have the time to prepare or were not allowed to use?

Let’s put it this way: There is always more you can add. I can assure you, items were not excluded for lack of support from MGM and/or Eon.

Are there any plans of doing a “proper” DVD presentation of 1967’s Casino Royale and/or Never Say Never Again?

I have no idea. I was slightly involved in the Casino Royale release by MGM (I conducted the interview with Val Guest and helped arrange the CBS version appearing on the DVD). I’d love to do a documentary on the madness of the ’67 Casino Royale.

Will you be involved in any future DVD reissues? When do you think we might see new 007 DVDs?

I will likely be involved. Can’t comment further…

How did you come to write James Bond: The Legacy?

I got a call from someone at Eon one day asking me if I wanted to write a book on the Bond films. I said yes, and asked if I could bring in Bruce Scivally as my co-author. It is all in the introduction to the book. We had to meet with the head of Boxtree and submit a writing sample, but that was it.

How about Bond Girls Are Forever? How did the collaboration work between you and Maryam d’Abo?

Similar situation. I got an email from Boxtree asking me if I would be involved. I was touring to promote Legacy. Maryam was a dream to work with. She had already made a great documentary on being a “Bond Girl” and her interviews set the tone for the book. I can’t say enough about her.

What exactly did you do for the new Scene it? 007 Edition trivia game?

Bruce Scivally and I wrote some draft questions. In short, we didn’t do much. The creators of the game have such a good product that all we did was give them some trivia. It was interesting because the game needed to be able to be played by both Bond fans and your average movie fan. I hope it did well for the company. It looks great and I think it is a lot of fun.

What do think of some of the more experimental things going on in the non-cinematic Bond world at the moment. I’m thinking in particular about the Young Bond books series and the remaking of From Russia With Love as a video game?

I think SilverFin is great. But, I hasten to add, I loved Raymond’s books, too. I think it is interesting that at this point in the world of Bond, there is a great interest in the origins of 007. I have little knowledge of the From Russia With Love video game except that a friend called me from the big video game convention a while back and was screaming into his mobile phone that it looked great. He is only a very casual Bond fan. That’s probably a very good sign.

Speaking of Raymond Benson, he used your name as 007’s alias in Doubleshot? What did you think about this? Was it a surprise? Or did Raymond “clear” this with you first?

First, I was thrilled beyond belief that Raymond used my name in Doubleshot! I couldn’t have been happier. Second, Raymond did not clear this with me first. He didn’t need to. He knew it would be something that would bring a big smile to my face.

What happened to Goldeneye magazine?

Well, it is a sad story. I was trying to get it out and not doing very well between work and other obligations. The last issue came out when The World Is Not Enough opened. Shortly after, Ian Fleming Publications became interested in sort of taking over the magazine. I had most of an issue put together and someone over there said, “no, I’m 80% sure we’ll get this together in the next six weeks.” So I stopped working on the next issue. Well, the 20% chance won out, they got out of the magazine business, and their (the IFP’s) priorities changed. All of this happened with the best of intent, but as the months went by, the magazine somewhat died for me. I was starting Cloverland (my company) and I didn’t have time to pursue the magazine. I looked for others to edit the magazine, and finally found someone who was willing and I thought able. This was after the release of Die Another Day. I sent an email to Eon to see if they had any objection. They said they would rather the IFF not publish a magazine anymore. I totally respected their reasons (which I think had to do with being able to license official publications). We always said we could only publish if Eon supported that. Once they felt they couldn’t support the idea, it was totally over for me.

Is the Ian Fleming Foundations still active?

The IFF is still active, although all the heavy lifting is done by Doug Redenius, who has been managing our vehicle collection and putting together the fabulous events which have raised money for some very wonderful charities.

What would you say is your fondest Bond-related memory or event?

My fondest memory would be my honeymoon at Goldeneye in Jamaica. Nothing beats the reality of true love.

Oh wow, honeymoon at Goldeneye! Can you tell us more?

What is there to tell? It was a dream. We awoke in the morning and put on Noel Coward music and slow danced in Fleming’s living room. We ate lunch in the sunken garden. I wrote postcards at Fleming’s desk… the same desk where Sting wrote many of the songs for ‘Synchronicity’. Chris Blackwell gave me the greatest honeymoon anyone could have—Bond fan or not.

How has getting married and raising a son changed your feelings towards James Bond, the ultimate bachelor.

Bond has always been a fantasy. I’ve never owned a gun. I’ve never been much of a drinker. I don’t drive a sportscar, and I was never one who tried to have a girlfriend in every port. But I do love the window into the elegant, exotic, dark and dangerous world that Bond provides. I love the way my passion for Bond leads me into other worlds—the plays of Noel Coward, the art of Lucian Freud, the books of Peter Fleming and Patrick Leigh Fermor… Bond has taken me places and provided me adventures that are wonderful. Through Bond, I have learned to explore the world and embrace life and adventure. Bond was a role model of self-confidence when I was an adolescent. I remember once at summer camp when a group of kids were having some fun at my expense. Their bunks overlooked the bathroom cubical in our cabin, and they were blocking the door and then spitting on the unlucky cabin-mates who had to use the facilities. This day, it was my turn to be spat upon. I remember being there, feeling totally powerless, and then asking myself, what would James Bond do? While there were no great heroics, I figured out a way to climb up the wall and turn the tables. No kid ever got spat on in the bathroom cubical again. As far as Bond’s sexual prowess goes, everyone wants to be desirable. Every male wants to have the confidence to approach a woman he finds attractive. Being married and raising a son only means I found that woman to approach. Nicole is my Bond girl for life. Having a son only means I hope to instill confidence and a spirit of adventure into him. Fatherhood is the greatest adventure. I want him to grow up feeling the world is his oyster, that he can do anything he sets his mind to. Those are qualities that lie under the surface of Bond, the qualities I think are important in his lasting appeal.

The world of online fandom can be pretty opinionated and sometimes downright hostile towards Bond screenwriters, authors, etc. What do you say to those opinionated fans who might be reading this interview now?

People have opinions. Fans have invested a lot of passion. I respect that. I don’t go onto the message boards (I can only think of two exceptions where someone alerted me to something I went and checked out), so I don’t see what people post, and I never post. But I would say this: It is easy to be a lot nastier in a posting than someone would be face to face. It is easy to make assumptions that can be wrong and easier to criticize than it is to create. But it is also important for anyone to understand that the passion (or hostility) comes out of a love of Bond. Fleming’s fictional world tapped into something for those fans, and I hope that whatever pleasure they have from 007 is still there, regardless of whatever debates they get into with other fans.

If Eon wanted to understand the fans—their wants, needs, expectations, etc—I expect they would turn to you as someone with a foot in both worlds. Can we turn that around and ask you to help us fans understand Eon a little better?

Eon doesn’t need to turn to me! I don’t claim to understand “the fans”! Who are “the fans”? They are oodles of individuals who have opinions that are vastly different from each other. The ones I’ve met are great. But there are no insights I have. As far as understanding Eon—why is there a need to understand them? Is it so one can figure out who might be cast or what direction the next film might take? Watch the movies. Play the games. Enjoy Bond. The future will be here all too soon. Enjoy today. To paraphrase (with apologies to Ian Fleming and Jack London) I will not spend my days trying to predict the future, I will enjoy my time.

Finally, are you still a Bond fan?

What an odd question! Of course. I was flying from Ecuador to Lima, Peru today and my wife showed me an article in (of all things) Vogue (I think it was the July issue) about a house in the Bahamas. She thought the pictures reminded her of Firefly (Noel Coward’s house in Jamaica) in a way. I started reading the text and the husband was remembering falling in love with his wife on a diving trip. He compared her to Honey Ryder. Later, I was flipping through the in-flight magazine (LAN Airlines), and there was a very short article on Bond’s martini. I loved it. Before I came on this trip, I read some books, but none with more interest than Patrick Leigh Fermor’s Three Letters from the Andes. Why? Because Fermor was a great friend of Fleming’s (and a great adventurer and writer). I was in south Florida before that, and I had to go by a used bookstore and get copies of Live And Let Die and Goldfinger—just to re-read the Florida sections. And, of course, while in Miami, I stayed at the Fontainebleau. Bond flows in my blood.

To discuss this interview visit this thread in the CBn forums, the largest 007 forum on the net.

John Cork Related Items (from Amazon.com)…

• Bond Girls Are Forever
• James Bond: The Legacy
• The Long Walk Home (screenwriter)
• Scene it? 007 Edition

John Cork Related Items (from Amazon.co.uk)…

• Bond Girls Are Forever
• James Bond: The Legacy
• Scene it? 007 Edition

The Henry Chancellor CBn Interview

Historian Henry Chancellor was the first author to be given unlimited access to the archives of Ian Fleming Publications for a publishing project. After getting a peek inside the vault, Chancellor spent about a year creating a tome that is part biography of Fleming, part biography of Bond.

CBn spoke to him about his new book James Bond The Man and His World, as well his work on Ian Fleming: Bondmaker.

First, can you tell us a little bit about yourself, your interest in Bond and how you came to write this book?

You probably know from the publicity blurb a little bit about me. I came to write this book largely as a result of my previous book, Colditz: the definitive history. My publisher mentioned to me that the Fleming Estate were thinking of opening up the Fleming Archive and could I think of a way of turning it into a book. He probably suggested it knowing of my interest in spies, intelligence, etc. So I produced a book proposal and luckily for me they liked it.

What were the benefits and drawbacks of hiring someone primarily known as a World War II historian and documentary producer, rather than a ‘Bondologist’, to write this book?

I never pretended that I was a Bondologist—though now I probably am, whatever that means. I am certainly a huge Fleming fan. To write the kind of book I wanted to write I cannot honestly think it would have been of any advantage to be a signed up Bondologist. There seemed no point in trying to replicate John Griswold’s book, or any other book that provides the minutiae that is of interest only to the fan. My book was supposed to be broader and more contextual, and to start at the beginning with a blank sheet of paper was not a bad place to start. Though knowing about the Second World War was quite useful, as so much of Bond was inspired by Fleming’s war years.

Was it difficult switching gears from conventional history, like Colditz, to examining the fictional world Fleming created, where influences and origins may be a lot less clear?

Not at all. Fleming may have written fiction, but 95% of it was based on fact that had been filtered through the prism of his imagination and then polished up a bit. Trying to work out where these facts came from and how he used them is part of the process. Obviously it is difficult to pin point the precise way in which his creative juices worked, but my instinct was always to go back to the man himself. Understand Fleming, and you understand Bond.

When word first reached the Bond fan community that your book was coming out, a lot of people wondered how it would be different than Raymond Benson’s James Bond Bedside Companion. Were you conscious of the similarities and what steps did you take to differentiate your work from his?

When I begun I was aware of the pitfalls of this. I had a look at it and then deliberately returned it to the library. Six months later I took it out again, having finished my book, and saw that there were some elements in common; we both had chapters on Fleming, we both had a biographical description of Bond, we both had book synopses—but all of these are pretty much essential elements to a book of this type. Beyond that, there is not much similarity because I am only concerned with the literary creation, and mined the archive to do just that. In fact, I think my book is more like a biography of Fleming, seen through the eyes of his alter ego , 007.

When I helped with the preliminary organization and preservation of the IFP archive in 1994, I was amazed at the depth of correspondence between Ian Fleming and his fans. What was your favorite discovery within the IFP archives?

The letters are fantastic. How interesting it is that Fleming was so attentive to his fans, and was so influenced by them. My favourite letter was from a Berta Ruck in Wales, who was 82, and read James Bond aloud to her husband who was 86 and now blind. Both had been reading thrillers since the 1890s and were absolute Bond fans—so much so that they had to ration themselves to 10 pages a day. Her description of their daily dose of Bond while sitting in front of the fire was hilarious, and Fleming wrote back to say it was the nicest fan letter he had ever received.

How closely did you work with the book’s designer? Were there many images that had to be left out due to space constraints?

The designer has done a fantastic job, and my only contribution to that was to suggest good images from the archive and others—such as pictures of Aleister Crowley that I felt would be useful. I would say that everything from the archive has not been seen before. And inevitably some images had to be left out—not many though.

So much of the world is familiar with James Bond because of the films. What sort of assumptions did you make about your audience’s familiarity with the Bond novels?

None. Or rather some, because there are plenty of people who do not know that James Bond films are based on novels in the first place. So I assumed that they had heard of the novels and probably knew they were written by Ian Fleming.

Did you have a favorite Bond novel before you wrote this book, and did your research alter your appreciation of it?

My favourite book before was From Russia with Love. Afterwards I still like it—even though much of the documentary Russian section at the beginning is complete fiction.

You were a consultant to the recent BBC biography film on Ian Fleming. Can you tell me about that work and what was your opinion of the final product?

I was really there to tell them who I thought Fleming was, what kind of a man he was, and why he wrote James Bond. They did not have time to read all the books, biographies, search the archives etc so I just pointed them in the directions they wanted to go. Whether they succeeded or not I leave that for you to decide.

So Colditz, James Bond, what’s next for Henry Chancellor?

There’s a thread there. Escapers and secret agents. I’ll let you know.

A big thank you to Henry Chancellor for granting this interview, and to Lucy Dixon for facilitating it. James Bond: The Man and His World is now available for purchase at Amazon.co.uk.

Discuss this interview in the CommanderBond.net Forums.

Related articles

• ‘James Bond: The Man and His World’ – A CBn review by Charles Helfenstein
• ‘James Bond: The Man and His World’
• New James Bond ‘Companion’ Coming in Fall
• IFP Confirms New Books & Fleming Biopic

The Samantha Weinberg CBn Interview

Samantha Weinberg (a.k.a. Kate Westbrook) is the author of the new novel The Moneypenny Diaries, the first in a trilogy of books chronicling the heretofore untold adventures of M’s popular personal secretary. Until now, Miss Moneypenny has only been a figure behind a desk with a particular fascination for an agent with the number 007. But now she has a first name (Jane), a rich past (colonial Africa), and quite a few “Bondian” tales to tell of her own. The Moneypenny Diaries also reveal exactly what happened to 007 during those dark days between On Her Majesty’s Secrete Service and You Only Live Twice. We even get to see Bond and Moneypenny join forces and play a major role in the real-life Cuban Missile Crisis!

So how did a journalist and an award-winning author from Wiltshire come to write The Moneypenny Diaries and become the first woman ever to pen an official adventure of Agent 007?

Thanks to our friends at Ian Fleming Publications, CBn has been granted the extreme honor of being the first James Bond website to interview the author behind the pseudonym, Kate Westbrook.

First off, tell us a little about yourself and how you came to write The Moneypenny Diaries?

It was two years ago, almost exactly, and arose out of a casual conversation with my agent, Gillon Aitken. He had just been taken on by IFP to act as a consultant for future literary projects and he asked, almost in passing, what I thought about the idea of Miss Moneypenny becoming the central character in a book. I remember exactly where I was when he said it; you could almost call it my Kennedy assassination moment. I replied immediately, that it was a terrific, fantastic idea, that any writer would jump at it, me especially, and how about the fictional diaries of Miss Moneypenny? I think he had already floated the general concept with IFP, who had reacted with enthusiasm. I spent the next month or so re-reading all the Fleming books and developing a brief outline, which we gave to IFP soon after the new year. They liked it, thank goodness, were willing to take a risk on someone who had never written a word of fiction before, and here I am…

Miss Moneypenny is, arguably, as well known as the character of James Bond, yet we know nothing about her. Did this “blank slate” make your job easier, or were you intimidated that there was an expectation you might fail to meet?

Are you kidding? Hardly a day went past when I didn’t, at some point or other, quake at the thought of the huge responsibility that I had so blithely taken on. I was a Bond fan before—though not then a fanatic—and I’m sure that I would have bristled at the idea of someone taking a character that I thought I knew and, to all intents and purposes, reinventing her. I tried to make her as attractive and compelling as I could, stayed away from any personality warts, but even then… I still wonder at my bravery/foolhardiness.

How did you arrive at the name Jane? What other names did you consider?

I thought about it quite a bit, and played around with a number of names. She was called Rosemary at an early point—after Irene Moneypenny’s beloved pet goat—and before that, Gilda (guilder-moneypenny—sort of word association). But, in the end, I plumped for plain Jane, reasoning that if I had the surname Moneypenny, I wouldn’t have wanted to saddle my offspring with a polysyllabic first name.

Moneypenny’s memories of her childhood in Africa are very beautifully done. What made you decide to give Moneypenny this background?

That came almost immediately. I didn’t want to make her a caricature of what you might expect her to be—jolly hockey sticks, inherited pearls, daughter of landed gentry and so on. I wanted her to have an inner strength, with a touch of suppressed wildness, that would have prepared her for the adventures I was going to send her on. Talking to a couple of wonderful women who worked for SIS around that time, I discovered that a colonial background was not uncommon—indeed, it was to a degree encouraged, for those very reasons. On top of which, I’ve spent a lot of time in Africa—both of my parents are South African and I worked as a journalist in southern and eastern Africa for several years—so it was a world with which I felt comfortable.

Why did you choose 1962 as the first year of The Moneypenny Diaries and decide to set the action around the true events of the Cuban Missile Crisis?

From the outset, I was determined to stick as closely to Fleming’s Bond as I could, yet at the same time, to anchor the diaries in real historical events. The Cuban Missile Crisis was the first to come to mind. Then, when I re-read the books, looking for a gap in the time-line into which I could slot this adventure, Bond’s ‘gap year’, mentioned at beginning of You Only Live Twice, jumped out of me. Not only did it seem to take place conveniently in 1962, but I liked the idea of this more vulnerable Bond, of being able to make him more sympathetic to a contemporary audience—without denying the essence of Fleming’s creation.

Star Wars authors often comment on how Lucasfilm gives them a list of areas they should avoid in their novels—the origins of Yoda, for example, is off-limits. Did IFP present you with any similar guidelines or restrictions?

From the outset, it appeared that we were reading off the same—metaphorical—page. I was always determined to focus on the literary Bond and to set the diaries in a period, Cold War context, which was what they were looking for. It was a happy example of productive synergy and I feel constantly lucky and privileged to be working with such a supportive bunch.

At one point you have your narrator write that the “the intertwined connections threatened to short-circuit my brain.” Is this how you felt in trying to create a piece of fiction, posing as fact, that purports to reveal the facts behind a work of fiction? (Apologies if this question short-circuits your brain.)

Exactly! On several occasions, I had to retire to a dark room with a couple of aspirin and a damp flannel on my forehead. How was I going to get around the books? The films? Could I really make Jane Moneypenny’s father disappear in a operation planned by Ian Fleming himself? Was I crazy to try to muddy fact with fiction to such a degree? Still—to stretch a metaphor—I ploughed on.

Are you familiar with The Authorised Biography of 007 by John Pearson, which takes a similar “true fiction” approach to 007?

I wasn’t—until a couple of months ago, when I read about it on CBn (yes, I’m often floating about here, though have yet to summon the courage to sign up as a member). I very much enjoyed it, but I’m relieved that I hadn’t known about it before.

When I first heard about this book, I expected James Bond would remain conspicuously “off-camera.” He would be referred to, but never really a part of the story. Was this idea ever considered, or from the beginning was it planned to have 007 an active participant in The Moneypenny Diaries, going on original adventures, etc?

I never considered leaving 007 out of it. How could I? He’s central to who Moneypenny is and what she does. Besides, I thought it would be fun—if challenging—to look at him from a female perspective.

The Moneypenny Diaries tells the full story of what happened to Bond following Tracy’s death in OHMSS. However, this is James Bond at a time in his life when he is not at the top of his game; he’s in a serious depression throughout much of the novel. Was there ever a concern about how the casual Bond fan—one who may only know Bond from the movies—would react to this unfamiliar characterization of 007?

Yes, I did worry about it. But it was there in the books—so it was a part of how Fleming conceived Bond’s character. There are several examples of his more contemplative, unsure side, from Casino Royale onwards, and I thought these made him more appealing, more real, rather than less so. I love the films, but I find the books much more interesting, and I hoped—hope—that The Moneypenny Diaries might persuade some film fans to go back to Fleming’s original works.

This is one of those “only a picky Bond fan would notice” questions, but in your footnote about SPECTRE the word “Terrorism” is omitted from the acronym? Was this an editorial decision, or a printing error?

Neither, I’m afraid. My mistake. Sorry! It will be rectified for the paperback.

You say Bond’s housekeeper May had known Bond since childhood and cared for his dying uncle. Is this from Fleming, or is it a sly tie-in with Charlie Higson’s current series of Young Bond novels?

From SilverFin – I thought it might be fun to make some reference to it.

At one point in the diaries Miss Moneypenny is armed by Major Boothroyd and learns to shoot on the SIS target range. It all feels very authentic. How did you research this? Did you have a similar learning experience, or have you had experience with guns?

I try to research everything, to as greater degree as I can; a residue from my journalistic/non-fiction past, I suppose (or maybe indicative of a deficit of imagination?). For this book, I traveled to Cuba, Miami, Washington, Scotland and Switzerland—where I stayed with the real Sir Peter Smithers. For the shooting lessons, I first went to my local police station, in Devizes, Wiltshire, where I got a thorough briefing from the armourer, Ken Hedges (Boothroyd’s deputy is named after him). He showed me all the different guns, including the Baby Browning, hidden in a book, and demonstrated how to load and clean them. However, since handguns are outlawed in this country, I wasn’t allowed to shoot one. For that, I went to a range outside Miami, when I was there last November. To a great degree, Miss Moneypenny’s experiences and feelings as she shot the guns, were my own.

I enjoyed the characterization of Major Jack Giddings, agent 006, and the rivalry between he and Bond. Was this a nod to Alec Treveylan from the film GoldenEye, or is the use of “006” purely coincidental?

If it was a nod to GoldenEye, then it was a subconscious one. I think 006 is mentioned in one of the novels—but I thought I had come up with the rivalry myself!

The Moneypenny Diaries reveals the existence of “X-Section,” a secret SIS interrogation center where Rosa Klebb died of a heart attack. Is X-Section your invention, or did it come from research? Is it a set-up for something that’s yet to come?

It’s a bit of both. I was inspired partly by the ‘Soft Man’ and the ‘Hard Man’ in You Only Live Twice. But the naming of the section (after X-examination) and its deeper function are my own. And yes, it might well resurface in the volumes to come…

There is a delightful entry in the diaries where Moneypenny relates what happened to some of the more famous “Bond Girls.” Solitaire married an American magician; Tatiana was given a new identity and government job, etc. Was this your idea, and how did you decide on these stories?

Guilty—and I have to admit, that was one of my favourite sections to write. I just sat down and dreamed up their fates. So glad you enjoyed it—I had all of the girls in it at one point, but my editor thought it was overkill. Maybe I’ll be able to pick them off the cutting room floor for the next book?

It’s a basic assumption (born more of the films than books) that Miss Moneypenny is secretly in love with 007. Yet in reading The Moneypenny Diaries, I sometimes felt it was the other way around—that James Bond secretly yearns for the “simple life” with her. In your mind, is Moneypenny in love with James Bond, or is he in love with her? Or is this all about how things can be seen differently from a different point of view?

Is any relationship that simple? Do you think the film Miss M was really in love with James Bond—or was it also fun flirtation for her, a chance to play to his vanity? That’s how I chose to view it—they were close, liked and admired each other greatly, and sometimes wished it went further… (and maybe it still will?). I believe it’s a complex relationship, based at some fundamental level on their shared experience of losing both parents before their time. James Bond occasionally yearns—especially when, as in this case, he is not at the top of his game—for less ‘splendid protuberances’ on which to lay his tired brow. Moneypenny, cut off from her home, without children or family apart from Helena, enjoys being needed and is flattered by the attention of a renowned heart-breaker. But, I always feel, she thinks of him as a boy. Although she is younger than him (and that, incidentally, is the reason for making her join the SIS at a later date than Fleming’s books implied, to give her the energy and bravery to tackle scary situations—not, as it has been suggested, to fit in with the timescale of Mau Mau), she is wise beyond her years.

Do you, or have you ever, kept a diary?

I don’t now, but I have, sporadically, since childhood, particularly when traveling. I sometimes find half-filled books, and am both full of envy for my younger self who had the time and energy to write them, and embarrassed by the purpleness of my prose.

Sorry if this is off-topic, but it is the question on lips of all Bond fans at the moment: What do you think of Daniel Craig as the new 007 and could you envision him as the James Bond of The Moneypenny Diaries?

I’m rather in favour of him, despite his apparent press conference nerves. He’s a good actor, I think he looks the part (as long as his hair is dyed) and if the script’s as good as it’s meant to be, I think he will mark a welcome return—for me, anyway—to the rather less smooth Bond I have in my imagination.

In this same vein, did you picture in your mind any of the actresses who have portrayed Miss Moneypenny when you were writing this book?

I tried not to, but it was hard. Although the character I created looked nothing like her in my mind, Lois Maxwell’s face kept popping up. She was my first Moneypenny, and thus hard to banish.

IFP and the publishers launched a clever ad campaign that concealed your identity and the fact that The Moneypenny Diaries was a work of fiction. Was this the plan for the book from the beginning, and how far were you asked to participate? Were you able to reveal to friends and co-workers that you were “Kate Westbrook”?

From the beginning, it was my plan to push the Diaries as close to reality as I could—while remaining true to Fleming’s works. That was Kate Westbrook’s role; to enable the actual diary entries to appear authentic, without having to include extraneous background. Once Kate was installed as editor, it seemed a fun idea—and we all agreed, IFP, Gillon and my editor—to try to make her a plausible person, a bridge, as it were, between the fiction and reality. If the reader started to believe in her existence, then might they not begin to question whether Miss Moneypenny was real too? It was a bit of fun—and one that we all entered into. I got a Kate Westbrook e-mail address and whenever I saw or spoke to my editor or anyone at IFP, referred to myself—and was referred to—as ‘Kate’. This even stretched to wearing a wig and coloured contact lenses for media interviews and at the launch party! Apart from family and close friends, I told no one what I was working on (this is not as hard as it might sound—we live in a rural area and when I’m working, I tend to go into a sort of self-imposed purdah). There was also, however, a more legitimate side to it; so much of a spy’s work is carried out in the shadows; they have cover names and legends, they live secret, obscured lives. I was just echoing their existence, entering into the spirit of things.

You have the narrator say that “Bond” is not the real surname of agent 007 and the diaries do not reveal it. Have you privately decided what his real name is and will you ever reveal it?

No, and I haven’t decided yet.

The novel ends with many cliffhangers. Can you share with us any hints of what to expect in Miss Moneypenny’s 1963 diary?

As you say, there are a couple of on-going story lines that I am bound to follow—Miss Moneypenny is going to keep on her father’s trail, for instance, there has to be some resolution over the Prenderghast affair and, of course, Bond does return, with a bang, at the beginning of The Man With the Golden Gun. I don’t want to give too much else away, but she will definitely be getting out of the office again, and probably heading eastwards, towards the Iron Curtain.

Thank you very much for you time. We wish you continued success with The Moneypenny Diaries and all your future endeavors.

Thank you. Great questions. I enjoyed it immensely!

Samantha Weinberg has worked as a journalist in southern Africa, the United States and London. She is the award-winning author of Last of the Pirates: the Search for Bob Denard, the international bestseller A Fish Caught in Time: the Search for the Coelacanth and Pointing From The Grave which won the 2003 CWA Gold Dagger for Non-fiction. She lives in Wiltshire where she is currently at work on the next installment of The Moneypenny Diaries.

Purchase The Moneypenny Diaries from Amazon.co.uk.

Discuss this CBn interview in this thread on the CBn Forums.
Thanks to Zoë Watkins and Evan Willnow.

Related Links

• IFP Declassifies ‘The Moneypenny Diaries’
• ‘The Moneypenny Diaries’ Published
• ‘The Moneypenny Diaries’ Cleared for Release
• ‘The Moneypenny Diaries’ Declassified

The Michael Di Leo CBn Interview

Thank you for agreeing to the interview. First, tell us a little bit about yourself. How did you become a Bond fan?

My parents were big movie buffs and Bond fans, so we were always going to the movies on the weekends when I was a kid. I saw Diamonds Are Forever upon its original release in 1971 (I was only 4 years old) and have been hooked on Bond ever since.

What inspired you to create the book?

Well I had always dabbled in writing and finally decided that it was time that I try my hand at writing a book. Naturally, since I’ve been obsessed with Bond since the age of four, 007 was the obvious subject for me to take on.

Why did you decide to go with ranking certain elements of the James Bond films as opposed to the approach of giving information about the films?

I just felt that books like Benson’s Bedside Companion and Rubin’s The James Bond Films had already done that (superbly), so I didn’t feel I could bring anything to the table that they hadn’t already done so well in their books. However, with 19 films in the can (at the time of writing), no one had ever done a book that ranked all of the elements of a Bond film and I though it would be alot of fun to do so.

What did the research for this book consist of? How long did it take you
to write it?

Not much research was needed at all. Just watching the films. And since I have seen each one over and over again since I was a child, I did not have to watch the films again to create my rankings. Once I chose a scene for ranking on one of the lists in the book, I would then watch that scene before writng about it. The book took me two and a half years to write—not that it should have, but in the course of writing it I got engaged, married, switched jobs, etc. There were so many things going on in my personal life at the time that kept getting in the way, but I kept plugging away until it was finished.

Did you watch the James Bond films multiple times while writing? Were there any specific Bond films you focused on more than others?

I didn’t have to watch the films multiple times, just the particular scenes I was writing about. I can run the films in my head (as I am sure many Bond fans can) like videotape, just from having seen them so many times.

Did you devise a certain system for picking the Top 5 of the elements
listed? Were there any specific “rules” you had?

Once I chose a topic, I would literally just start in my head with Dr. No and run straight through to The World Is Not Enough and jot down all of the instances that a particular “subject” (i.e. “villain deaths&edquo;) ocurred. Then I would look at that list and wittle it down, crossing out the ones that I wasn’t particularly fond of until I got the list down to the five best. Of course sometimes I might get it down to seven that I really liked, and then I would just mull it over and force myself to get it down to five. That’s why on some of my lists I have an “honorable mention“ list. Those are the ones that finished 6th or 7th on my list.

What decided which list categories would make it into the book? Were there any lists you originally had in mind, but dropped?

I think in doing a book like this, some of the categories are obvious (best villains, best henchmen, best girls, etc.). The fun for me was coming with categories that were not so obvious. So I really enjoyed categories like “Helicopter Explosions” and “Why Don’t They Just Shoot Him?” Plus I wanted the book to be somewhat lighthearted in tone, so categories like those helped me achieve that goal. Where else but the Bond series can you come with a category entitled “Helicopter Explosions”? There were not categories that were dropped. In fact when I signed my deal with my publisher, he asked me to put more categories in the book than were in my manuscript. So I actually had to rack my brain to come up with a few new ones before publication.

Were there any goals you set while writing the book?

Nothing more that finishing it and getting it published. Any sale numbers or money made was just going to be gravy for me.

What was your favorite part in writing this book, and do you have a favorite section?

Definitely chapter 1, where I rank and review each film. I know that any serious Bond fan has their favorites and their not so favorites and has probably at one point or another ranked the films from best to worst, but to do it in writing, for the world to see, well that was a challenge but it was great fun at the same time.

Which listing has proved to be the most controversial among Bond fans?

Chapter 1 again. I mean think of it, if you are a Bond fan and your favorite film is near the bottom of my list, not only are you going to be unhappy with that, but you’re probably not going to even want to read the rest of the book! I had one fan who was considerably younger than me and whose first Bond film was GoldenEye. GoldenEye is to him what Goldfinger is to older fans like me. He was quite miffed that GoldenEye was not that high on my list and that Tomorrow Never Dies (which he didn’t like) was. And for him, he couldn’t get past that and even read the rest of the book. But other Bond fans, especially ones my age (I’m 37) and older, who were around back in the Connery days, very much agreed with my rankings of the films. So I found that age certainly plays a factor in how Bond fans perceive certain films.

How did you decide which photos to use?

I had in my head the photos that I wanted for each section and category. So I made a list of what I wanted to find and then went to a store in Greenwich Village in New York (I’m a native New Yorker) called “Jerry Ohlinger’s Movie Material Store” (a place I have gone to since I was a kid to buy Bond posters and memorabilia), which has one of the largest collections of movie stills in the world, and basically spent the day there, sifting through large binders of photos (the store has a large binder of stills from each film) until I found the ones that I wanted. I tried to find pictures that we Bond fans hadn’t seen before, but that was a tough chore. It was more important that the photo matched what I was writing about.

You mention that your book covers the official 19 Bond films; but would any of the aspects of 1967’s Casino Royale or 1983’s Never Say Never Again have made it into your lists? Any idea where you would place them in your Rank the Bond Films list?

Well, being that Casino Royale was a spoof, I never considered including it, but if I did, it would rank near the bottom. I was never a big fan of Never Say Never Again. I remember being very disappointed by it when it came out in 1983, especially since I, like all Bond fans, were so ecstatic over Connery’s return. But I always felt the film was too light and comical and lacked the panache and style of an Eon film. I would probably rank it in my bottom third.

With that, what about Die Another Day? Where would you place that film in your ranking? Are there any lists in the book that it would have definitely made?

I haven’t thought about it too much. I think the Vanquish would make the “Best Car” list. Miranda Frost might make the “Femmes Fatales” list. I think the fencing match between Bond and Graves would definetely make the best “One-on-One Fights” category. I love that scene. As for the film, I liked it. I thought the weakest parts were the PTS and the finale, but I thought everything in between (minus the CGI stunt) was very good. I’m not sure what number I would rank it—it wouldn’t be near my top 5—but it would probably be in the top half of the list.

What was the most difficult part in writing the book?

Ranking the films and trying to explain in a short review why the film ranked where it did.

Has your view on the book changed over time? Have any passionate
arguments lately caused you to change your rankings?

Well, my top five films are rock solid and no amount of arguing would sway my position on those. Same with my bottom four. It’s the middle ten films (now 11) that you could sway me on, because I consider those middle 11 films to be pretty close in quality. So if I reviewed the list today I might flip-flop some of those middle films. Looking back now, I think I like Tomorrow Never Dies better than The World Is Not Enough, but in the book, The World Is Not Enough is higher. I’m sure over time, I might start to appreciate one of the films more than I did at the time of writing, but again I’m talking about the middle films. Nothing is going to dissuade me that Goldfinger isn’t the best or that A View To A Kill isn’t the worst.

To discuss this interview, visit this thread in the CBn Forums.
With many thanks to Michael Di Leo.

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Purchase The Spy Who Thrilled Us:

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The Graham Rye CBn Interview (Part II)

Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan… Graham Rye? James Bond actors may come and go, but for almost as long as there have been James Bond movies, Graham Rye, editor and publisher of OO7 Magazine, 007 archivist and preservationist, and past president of the James Bond International Fan Club, has been a consistently familiar face in front of every film; reporting news and sharing his insights for an international audience of devoted James Bond fans.

Now the man who published interviews with such Bond luminaries as Peter Hunt, Desmond Llewelyn, and Timothy Dalton, gets the spotlight turned on him, and shares with CBn the highs and lows of a lifetime in Bondage.

Tell us about how you came to write The James Bond Girls book?

Well, now I think of it, it was as a direct result of my association with Raymond Benson. A then-fledgling publishing company, Boxtree, was publishing Raymond’s book The James Bond Bedside Companion in the UK for the first time in 1988. Boxtree had submitted an abysmal cover design for Raymond’s book (not unusual for them) and he was not impressed, so he suggested they contact me because of my experience in both Bond and design with a view to submitting an alternative concept for the book cover. I eventually sourced, and had made, a number of items which would create a visual impression of the James Bond character, which even included the Commander’s cap worn by Sean Connery in You Only Live Twice. Shot as a still life design, similar to the Pan Books covers of the Seventies, everyone liked the test shot I supplied first, so we ran with the idea. Boxtree liked the cover so much they later commissioned me to design and shoot a cover in the same style for Dave Rogers’ excellent book ‘The Complete Avengers’.

In 1988 Boxtree were a young hungry company and were looking for new ideas, so I pitched a few concepts to them, one of them being The James Bond Girls. The other ideas fell by the wayside, although some of them surfaced later on written by other authors, which taught me a lesson—‘If you have some marketable ideas, keep your mouth shut until you’ve signed a contract.’ With the release of Licence To Kill coming up in 1989, Eon Productions’ licensing arm were happy for the project to go ahead, so I introduced Boxtree to Eon and they sorted out their deal together, while as the author and designer of that first edition I finalized my percentage of the royalties, no King’s ransom by any stretch of the imagination, in fact I made a larger profit on selling the book like any other retailer than I did as the author.

The whole experience should have been a happy one but wasn’t. Boxtree pondered for months prior to the publication date regarding green-lighting the publication of The James Bond Girls. It was their first all-colour and licensed film book and was an expensive undertaking for them. They eventually gave me something in the region of eight weeks in which to write the text, believing I’d started to write the book from the date of our initial meeting, meanwhile I’d been waiting to learn whether they were going to run with it or not and was waiting to sign a contract before I typed one word! Needless to say, with the limited time left to me, the idea of interviewing the actresses who’d brought the Bond Girls to life went straight out the window, not that Boxtree had the budget or were keen to fly me anywhere anyway. I came up with a cover concept for the book, which was bounced by the publishers because it was deemed either to be ‘too sexist’ or ‘too violent’ or ‘too sexy’ or?… etc. etc. Political correctness can really get on one’s tits! I wanted the cover to carry a classy generic image, non-specific of any Bond movie, giving the book a longer shelf life. Quite naturally Eon wanted the cover to feature their latest Bond Girls. Needless to say—I was never going to win. The book was published with little or no advertising campaign. Other than Cubby Broccoli’s prestigious introduction in the book, Eon Productions did nothing to promote the book in any way. The James Bond Girls book escaped rather than was released. I suggested all kinds of publicity tie-ins; with the Licence To Kill Bond girls while they were in London for the premiere of the film at Harrods; having Harrods window displays geared to Bond etc. etc. etc.; being allowed access to the new Bond girls for interviews. All fell on deaf ears. Nobody cared enough. Never again. If I were to ever write another book I wouldn’t entertain the idea unless I self-published, because I’d undoubtedly make a lot more money, have a lot less hassle—and not be forced to deal with so many bloody idiots.

You’ve updated your Bond Girls book several times. The last update in 1999 contained a new assortment of never-before-seen photos. Where did you find all these rare photos?

The photos basically have come from many varied areas over the years and now form an integral part of my OO7 Magazine Archive. New photographs still come in all the time from different sources.

Are there any more updates planned?

I’m afraid there are no future plans for any updated versions of The James Bond Girls published by Boxtree because the title has been ‘killed’ by Eon, who no longer want my name ‘officially’ associated with their James Bond films. I imagine Boxtree had little choice in the matter, although they’ve always been a pretty spineless bunch, because they are now the ‘official’ James Bond film book publishers. It’s all rather sad considering I brought the two companies together in the first place. Still, The James Bond Girls had a pretty good run and appeared in no less than nine different printings from 1989 to 1999. It’ll be interesting to see if the Maryam d’Abo/John Cork tome Bond Girls Are Forever matches this record.

You were directly responsible for the 1991 reprint of Kingsley Amis’s Colonel Sun, which was the first reprint of this novel in almost 20 years. How did this happen exactly?

No big deal really. Coronet, the paperback publishers at the time originally only intended to reprint the Fleming titles. But when I waxed lyrical about how great a James Bond novel it is and sent their marketing manager an old copy of the Pan edition to read, I think this did the trick. Coronet even used an airbrushed illustration of the Pan cover shot for their own edition—naughty! By the way, the oriental actor who modeled for the original Pan cover also appeared in Goldfinger, The World Is Not Enough, and Die Another Day. Coronet’s marketing manager enjoyed the book so much that he included it in their release schedule. For me, Colonel Sun is the only Bond continuation novel that successfully captures the ‘Fleming sweep’. It’s a great book, and I would urge any Bond fan that hasn’t read it yet to seek it out immediately—they’re in for a real treat! And in this post-Brosnan/Bond age it also illustrates how the filmmakers criminally overlooked this novel, which could have easily made one of the best Bond films in the entire series—a great title too!

You are also responsible for unearthing and restoring many old props from the Bond films. Can you tell us about some of these discoveries and where these props are today?

Many of the props that formed that area of my OO7 Magazine Archive were either donated by people who worked on the movies, or in some instances purchased from third parties. After the first CHRISTIE’S James Bond Auction in September 1998, not surprisingly, prop donations dried up when people began to realise their potential sale value in auction. I had a bit of a result in CHRISTIE’S 1998 auction when Oddjob’s square-crown bowler hat sold for £62,000. Imagine my surprise when I later discovered it had been purchased by Eon Productions, who only a month earlier had approached me to ask if I was interested in selling them the item. I explained to their archivist Meg Simmonds over the telephone that it was available for £25,000 (the reserve price in auction) and she said she would talk to Michael (G. Wilson) about it, but I never heard from them again about the matter.

Unfortunately due continually to having fund a struggling OO7 Magazine over the years, sadly I had to sell off all the props I’d worked hard to assemble in order to keep myself and the publication afloat. The Moon Buggy from Diamonds Are Forever and Blofeld’s Coat of Arms from On Her Majesty’s Secret Service plus a few last other small items were finally sold in CHRISTIE’S auction in December 2004. So now I’m afraid all the contents of the prop archive are now long gone, and with them my dream of personally establishing a permanent James Bond museum. The idea was to have a museum, cinema, restaurant and retail area linked to each other in the same building—‘The World of James Bond 007’ if you like. It would probably have been possible to have four separate franchise sites, one in London, two in America (on the East and West Coasts), and one in Japan. It remains a mystery to me, as it did to dear old Desmond Llewelyn, why MGM didn’t realise the financial possibilities of this project, together with the cleaning up of the film prints and re-releasing the Bond movies as double-bills. When you think how many generations of James Bond fans have never had the wonderful opportunity to see the majority of the series in the cinema, it’s criminal, and I don’t think it really makes a great deal of business sense either. When you look at what George Lucas and 20th Century Fox have achieved in new box-office takings with the various re-releases of the Star Wars saga, you’d think the penny would eventually drop with the Bond franchise holders. As great as the films can look played from DVD on a large plasma screen, until you’ve seen them in a large cinema like the Odeon Leicester Square, you’ve never seen them at all. Only a screen that size can do justice to something like Ken Adam’s volcano set in You Only Live Twice or the interior of the Liparus supertanker in The Spy Who Loved Me. I’d certainly be first in the queue to see them again at that cinema.

Another idea I committed to paper, but in reality its scope would probably make it financially prohibitive for most organisations, was a James Bond themed ride (the central attraction of a theme park based in the USA) that literally took you on a journey through Bond’s world via the memorable sets/sequences in the films. Imagine a monorail taking you on a physical journey through all the major Bond sets rebuilt that includes a stop off inside the volcano set (rebuilt at actual size) to witness the ninja assault on Blofeld’s headquarters. Having walked on the actual set at Pinewood I know how impressive a crowd-puller this would be. Perhaps this is something Sony may like to consider when they have eventually released Casino Royale?

Can you tease us with what other treasures might be tucked away inside the OO7 Magazine archive?

I prefer to keep people guessing. But needless to say, every edition of OO7 Magazine will feature a fair number of surprises.

You and The JBIFC have been involved in many major James Bond events. Can you talk about some of these events—both the successes and the failures?

During the Nineties I usually organized an event (sometimes two) every year. Mostly at Pinewood Studios, and sometimes at Planet Hollywood. Our last event was in 1999 at the Café de Paris in London. I think all of them were a huge success as far as the attendees were concerned, and I certainly used to get a kick out of seeing everyone enjoy themselves so much. But on purely a business level the events were just too labour intensive for the financial rewards. I used to consistently exhaust myself in organising each event, and after 1999 promised myself never again—and this time I meant it! While James Page of the MI6 website criticized me on various news groups for “doing bugger all for Bond fans” around the release time of Die Another Day and the ‘007’ 40th Anniversary in 2002, at that time I was trying desperately myself to die another day in both my personal and business life, and didn’t really feel it was ‘my shout at the bar’. Anyone who wanted to step up to the challenge was more than welcome as far as I was concerned. So when I attended The Ian Fleming Foundation’s ‘James Bond Celebrity Golf Classic Gala Dinner’ at Stoke Park with my wife Christina, it came as a glorious relaxation from all the hassle and heartache associated with event organisation, which on this occasion was handled with great aplomb and diplomacy by Doug Redenius.

In two of the more recent editions of OO7 Magazine (#43 and #44) I’ve written a detailed account about the history of the magazine and ‘The James Bond International Fan Club’, which features many great photographs of the people who made those events possible, both celebrities and organizers. So I hope many of your readers will invest in purchasing those two issues—hopefully more.

I’m proud of what was accomplished in that decade, and I think the two-day event we staged in 1990 at Pinewood Studios where we hired a soundstage and displayed every single James Bond movie prop in storage there is still spoken about with affection by many of those who attended. We also had a great day when George Lazenby attended our Christmas lunch themed around On Her Majesty’s Secret Service in 1994. George must have signed his autograph for nearly all-200 guests.

I’m pleased to see that other enterprising ‘young guns’ have now jumped into the vacuum created when I retired from organising events and are now holding various screenings, autograph signings and the like, and I wish them the best of luck in all their endeavors. It’s certainly good news for Bond fans.

In 2002 The JBIFC abruptly shut down, but then reopened in early 2003. Can you tell us a little bit about what happened?

Basically both my business and personal overheads became higher and higher while the incoming turnover couldn’t keep up. Add to this that the sales from our online collectables store almost totally dried up overnight for an extended period (the reason for which still remains a mystery to this day); I fell in love and got married for a second time, also inheriting three children. Unfortunately the marriage failed and the finance eventually just literally ran out. No one’s fault but my own. My own bad management coupled with some bad luck and the more-than-possible interference from outside forces undid all I’d achieved in the preceding 25 years. Success covers a multitude of blunders, and I made more than my share. I then had the agonising task of making my exceptionally loyal full-time staff member Alex-Pow Williams redundant; my personal assistant Jamie Beerman also left —and I also lost my 1,400 square foot offices and had to condense its contents into the extremely cramped conditions of my Dad’s 2-bedroom bungalow. I lost nearly everything. During this time I realized that like Hamlet, my experiences simply could not have happened to a plumber.

A few months later I was approached out of the blue by David Black, a Yorkshire businessman who also happened to be an enthusiastic Bond fan, who purchased the rights to the JBIFC name, its website, and the club’s membership database. He injected limited finance into the new business and I became able to publish OO7 Magazine once more. I published the fifth issue (#45) of the publication’s rebirth in December 2004.

Regardless of what any JBIFC member may have read in their emailed newsletter from Mr. Black, the truth of the matter is that the breakaway was entirely my decision. Unfortunately, due to David Black’s inability to live up to his initial claim of increasing the database to 10,000 club members over a two-year period—not particularly assisted by his non-promotion of The JBIFC in any marketplace whatsoever—I found it necessary to break away from the confines of my contractual agreement in order to increase the circulation of OO7 Magazine under my own initiative, thereby hopefully protecting the survival of my publication—and myself! If there’s one thing I’ve learned through this most difficult period of my life is that the golden rule is that there are no golden rules.

How do you respond to criticisms on various newsgroups in the past that The JBIFC was run to meet its own aims rather than cater to the wishes of the fans?

The James Bond International Fan Club Limited and OO7 Magazine & Archive Limited are separate organizations that are organized like any other commercial enterprise. If someone purchased a Ford motor car they wouldn’t expect to have any say in running the company would they?

The new OO7 Magazine has promised to be much more aggressive, and even controversial in its editorial opinions. In that spirit, what do you think about the current Bond films and the direction the series is taking?

“Caricature is the tribute that mediocrity pays to genius.”–this Oscar Wilde quote just about sums up the current state of affairs for me. Anyone reading my article in OO7 Magazine (#41) will know exactly what I thought about Die Another Day, which I don’t want to labour here—but for me it’s still the worst movie in the series!

I like Pierce Brosnan as James Bond. He’s got all the right qualities a good Bond should have: he’s tall dark and handsome, he handles the humour well, he’s believable in the action scenes—and the cinema-going public love him! Unfortunately I don’t think the films measure up to his ability as an actor to do something more with the role than he’s been allowed to show to date. In GoldenEye, a colourless drab looking film, he was given little to do except react to the other characters and situations around him. Tomorrow Never Dies was his finest hour as Bond, and I do mean hour. The first half of the movie is the best Brosnan/Bond to date, with some nice Bondian touches, up until the model of his BMW crashes off the hotel roof through a flurry of polystyrene bricks, then the film just simply rambles until it falls apart. I thoroughly enjoyed The World Is Not Enough, which had the best narrative structure of all the Brosnan/Bond films, and the story unfolded much more in the style of a Sixties’ Bond. Although the film is uneven, it’s about 200% better than the dire Die Another Day—quasi science fiction badly executed and acted by everyone but Brosnan.

If MGM/SONY are currently trying to make James Bond a character that will appeal to younger audiences, I personally think they’re flogging a dead horse. I’m still not convinced that we’ve seen the last of Brosnan regardless of what’s been said or reportedly said and printed in newspapers, websites etc. I certainly hope he’ll return because he’s still the only man for the job! He has no natural successor. And as for the short list that’s been dragged out in various publications and on websites—it’s laughable. But when you consider the filmmakers and United Artists nearly ran with John Gavin as James Bond in 1971, and have tested James Brolin, Sam Neill, and Lambert Wilson for the 007 role in the past (shakes head in amazement and laughs demonically)—anything could happen! If they do eventually recast the role with the wrong actor (if indeed there is a right actor—and I really doubt there is after Brosnan) it could prove the death knell for the series. But anyway—how much longer can it really last? MGM/SONY need Bond—he’s their cash cow. And with Die Another Day tipping the box-office scales over the $400 million dollar mark worldwide they’re hardly going to shunt it off to the abattoir. Eon? Who knows? Do they really need the entire hassle? Personally, I’d have sooner stayed in Tunbridge Wells.

What would you do with Casino Royale if you were Eon?

I’m not Eon so I’d definitely play the game differently. I would certainly avoid the title Casino Royale like the plague in the first place. It probably doesn’t mean anything to the cinemagoing public, but if it does it’s the bad memory of the 1967 spoof version. and believe me, when the new Casino Royale movie opens, every film magazine and newspaper on the planet will resurrect the 1967 spoof by running stills of the film together with the Barry Nelson TV play alongside the new movie—not a comparison anyone will enjoy, I’m sure.

If I was in control of the franchise I’d cast Pierce Brosnan in a remake of On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and You Only Live Twice (based more on the themes featured in Ian Fleming’s novel), and film them back-to-back in the correct order—if it can be done with Lord of the Rings, I’m sure it can be achieved with Bond. Both On Her Majesty’s Secret Service and You Only Live Twice mean next-to-nothing to today’s cinemagoers, so I don’t see a problem with remakes being accepted by the general public who make up the majority of the paying audience. Some Bond fans may balk at the idea of meddling with Peter Hunt’s classic OHMSS like it’s the Holy Grail, but I think that would be denying the possibility of another great Bond film, rather like saying why on earth are they remaking The Thomas Crown Affair, they can’t possibly top the original McQueen/Dunaway version – well didn’t they just!

Re-use/arrange the original musical soundtracks (because no one is ever going to equal John Barry’s eternal scores, let alone better them—and certainly not David Arnold). Have Bond lose his memory at the end of You Only Live Twice and heading off for Vladivostok (which he sees on piece of makeshift toilet paper [i.e. newsprint] in Kissy’s outhouse as in Fleming’s novel). The result: Brosnan leaves the series on a classy high, which opens the door for Bond Actor Number Six to return as the new Bond who’s been brainwashed (hence his different appearance) and who attempt’s to kill M like the beginning of the following novel in Fleming’s series, The Man With The Golden Gun. Then to redeem himself M gives Bond an almost impossible/suicide mission which would be a completely new screen story. I’d prefer to see an older main villain, say the very classy Christopher Plummer, and an older Bond Girl, say the very sexy Monica Bellucci, and the svelte and sinister Lambert Wilson as Plummer’s henchman. For my own entertainment I’ve written a treatment with those actors in mind. I wouldn’t reproduce it anywhere because it may still prove useful as a treatment for another movie. A while back I met with Jean-Claude Van Damme and his business manager in an attempt to sell them a treatment for a movie tailored to Van Damme’s screen image. Your guess is as good as mine is whether anything will pan out or not. But knowing the business—probably not.

What are your thoughts on Ian Fleming Publication’s new ‘Young Bond’ series of novels? [Ed NOTE: This interview was conducted before the release of SilverFin.]

As I mentioned earlier, I think the whole thing reeks of ‘Harry Bond & The Whimsical Nonsense’—and desperation in an ailing literary franchise with a woefully inadequate lack of creative imagination on the part of the copyright holders, coupled with a complete disrespect for Ian Fleming’s original unique, and rather special, literary character. While I would never have the slightest objection to Charlie Higson increasing the size of his bank balance or Ian Fleming Publications accruing even more coinage to their already overflowing pot of gold, I do object to the further denigration of Ian Fleming’s James Bond character. As if the evolution of the film series through the 70s into the 2000s weren’t bad enough, eventually bringing the whole game down a peg or three, now the final nail in the coffin must surely be YOUNG BOND: SilverFin. I would urge any parent who is considering purchasing this book for their 10 or 12-year-old son to think again, and instead, look beyond this new unnecessary nonsense to the original wonderful Ian Fleming stories. Although considered anachronistic by many, including even their British publisher, Fleming’s novels remain a masterclass in concise writing, and long should have been included on the National Curriculum in British Schools, not that it would matter now, as there’s probably barely anyone left who can read. SilverFin—‘Suits you sir!’ Don’t think so.

What do you think of the new cover designs of the Fleming books, particularly the ‘retro’ covers by Richie Fahey?

I love ’em! Every so often in the sea of mediocrity perpetrated in the name of James Bond 007, something of worth is produced which is not only a joy to behold and own, but in time will become a desirable and much sought-after collectable. This set of the 14 Ian Fleming James Bond titles published by Penguin Books (U.S.) is one such case in point. Designed by Rosanne Serra and Richie Fahey in broad stylish strokes, the flair and tongue-in-cheek humour—dare-I-say-it—bordering on camp that pervade these designs, enable these covers to succeed exactly in their intended purpose—they actually make you want to handle the book to discover ‘what’s this all about!’

Significantly sexier than their Penguin Books (UK) counterparts, whose pointless abstract cover designs wouldn’t look out of place on the walls of the Holiday Inn hotel chain, Penguin Books (U.S.) have succeeded in breathing ‘old life’ back into the Bond novels with the decidedly ‘retro’ look of their new printings. I can think of no better way of introducing Ian Fleming’s wonderful novels to a friend or relation than purchasing the set as one of the most enjoyable and impressive gifts they may ever receive.

In contrast, Penguin Modern Classics (UK) should have taken heed of their American cousin’s flair for art direction. The first 10 Ian Fleming 007 titles were newly republished in June 2004 as Large Crown format paperbacks (198x129mm) and are as ineffectually designed as a glass hammer. Absolutely dreadful!

With your expertise in Bond and graphic design, what advice would you give MGM marketing in regards to designing the ad campaign for Casino Royale?

These days most all movie posters are produced using photographic reality. It’s as though if the public can’t see their favourite star’s face up there on the billboard then they’re not going to realise that they’re in the movie and subsequently won’t visit their local cinema. There may be something in that—but who knows unless someone tries a different approach. While other films fighting for their audience may need to slap retouched photographs of the main actors on their movie 1-sheet posters and mega-size billboards, the James Bond movie series is an all together different animal. I could think of nothing better than designing a campaign for Casino Royale that relies on a series of teasers and final posters that feature an illustration of Pierce Brosnan in a tuxedo holding a gun across his chest with a variety of nubile long-legged busty young ladies, similar in style to the wonderful campaigns overseen by Donald Smolen for Thunderball and You Only Live Twice. It won’t happen—but it’s nice to daydream.

What do you think of online James Bond websites like CBn? Are you concerned that fan sites are in danger of replacing the traditional fan club and fanzine?

For news, you can’t beat an Internet publication. The speed by which information can be disseminated these days is staggering. The day of the printed newsletter is long gone. Sites like CBn, and to a lesser extent MI6, seem to be the front runners these days, with MKKBB (website defunct since May 2006) having lost the high ground after kind of starting the snowball rolling, which is a shame because they really set the standard when they first appeared. Everything in a professional life, a career, is very much like a race, so you have to pace yourself, but you also have to have a great deal of stamina if you’re going to enter the race and stay the course—and hopefully win! I’ve been around for over 25 years in this business and have seen many organisations and companies, publicity managers, marketing managers, personal assistants, licensees, producers, writers, actors, you-name-it, come and go. I’m still here—so I must be doing something right.

As entertaining as many of the James Bond-related websites are in 2005, and I think they make a real and worthwhile contribution to what I can only describe as ‘the James Bond phenomenon’, I still believe that people will always enjoy handling a high-quality deluxe glossy publication like OO7 Magazine. I’m sure there’s still many subscribers whose hearts race when they hear the magazine slip through their mailbox and hit the doormat. I know mine did many years ago when my Dad took out a subscription for me to the National Geographic magazine.

Has running The JBIFC and OO7 Magazine made you a wealthy man?

Someone once wrote, “Experience is simply the name we give our mistakes.” Believe me, I’m wealthy beyond my dreams in experience. But financially, no. Just the opposite I’m afraid. It has drained my bank balance and my life-force. Everything happens to everybody sooner or later if there is time enough, and I’ve certainly had time enough in this game for everything to happen to me—and it has!

Finally, are you still a Bond fan?

I suppose I must be. I still get a great thrill out of producing OO7 Magazine and when I first see that gun barrel at the opening of every Bond film. I suppose I wouldn’t get so angry about a bad James Bond film if I didn’t care. It’s something that I’ve always loved dearly, and it’s given me so much to remember with great affection. When I sat in that dark smoky cinema in Southall over 40 years ago I could never have imagined that one day I would meet, entertain, and become friends with many of those names up on the screen. It still remains a wonderment to me. So yes—I’m still a James Bond fan, and will almost certainly remain so until my dying day, regardless of wherever the franchise holders decide they’re going to drag Ian Fleming’s James Bond character in 2006 and beyond. Just lock me in a rubber room somewhere with the first six films in the series and I’ll be as happy as only a ‘traditionalist Bond fan’ will ever be.

Thank you so much for sharing your time and answering so many questions. We all look forward to many more years of OO7 Magazine.

To discuss this interview visit this thread in the CBn Forums.

Visit the official OO7 Magazine website to purchase the latest issue, SUBSCRIBE, or buy back issues.

Related articles:

• The Graham Rye CBn Interview (Part I)
• ‘OO7’ Magazine: A Complete Bibliography
• ‘OO7’ Magazine #46 – Roger Moore Special

The Graham Rye CBn Interview (Part I)

Sean Connery, Roger Moore, Pierce Brosnan… Graham Rye? James Bond actors may come and go, but for almost as long as there have been James Bond movies, Graham Rye, editor and publisher of OO7 Magazine, 007 archivist and preservationist, and past president of the James Bond International Fan Club, has been a consistently familiar face in front of every film; reporting news and sharing his insights for an international audience of devoted James Bond fans. Along with a stable of talented contributors, Graham turned what started out as a one-page photocopied fan club mailer into a highly professional 48-page full color magazine devoted to all things Bond. Twenty-six years and 46 issues later, OO7 Magazine is still going strong, even in an era when James Bond websites provide Bond fans with an endless supply of news and rumor daily.

Graham is also the author of The James Bond Girls, a definitive look at the lovely ladies who have shared screen time with 007, many of whom Graham counts as personal friends. As a 007 archivist and preservationist Graham and the JBIFC have rescued many famous Bond props from extinction, including a decaying Diamonds Are Forever Moon Buggy. He even owned Oddjob’s hat!

Now, for the first time, the man who published interviews with such Bond luminaries as Peter Hunt, Desmond Llewelyn, and Timothy Dalton, gets the spotlight turned on him, and shares with CBn the highs and lows of a lifetime in Bondage.

To start, can you tell us a little about yourself? Where did you grow up, and what’s your life like outside of James Bond?

I was born September 13th 1951 in Southall, West London where I lived until my first marriage in 1972 when I moved to Finchley, North London, until the marriage broke up in 1976. When I’m not occupied producing editions of OO7 Magazine, which mostly fills my calendar for the year and has generally taken over my life since 1983 (each issue can take anything from 12 to 14 weeks to produce from scratch), I like reading, cinema, theatre, music, dance, dining out, and shooting and riding when I get the opportunity. I used to take photographs for pleasure and draw and paint a bit, but unfortunately have long since seen the time for such esoteric pleasures dwindle to no time at all. While working in London in the late Sixties I would often spend my lunch hours in the National Gallery, the British Museum or other art galleries scattered around town. I very much miss these times.

I left school in 1968, and a week later got myself a job as a messenger boy at an advertising art studio in the West End of London, which gave me an invaluable knowledge and love of the city, and for which I was paid the princely sum of £6 per week. When I remember I would purchase my London Underground season ticket, give my Mum money for housekeeping, buy this and that—and still have enough money left over for a boozy Friday night with my old school chum and Bond fan Fred Bryant, the mind boggles. I still don’t believe the rate of inflation over the last 30 years in the UK would ever have been accepted as even-tempered as it has been by the people of this country if our currency hadn’t been decimalised. The greatest con-trick ever perpetrated on the British public by Her Majesty’s government! Now they’re trying to pull the same trick with the Euro.

There’s a photograph of you as a young boy meeting Molly Peters at a Thunderball screening in 1965. Was Thunderball the movie that first ignited your Bond interest?

No not really. I was completely excited by Dr. No, there really hadn’t been anything like it before in cinema; then mesmerized by From Russia With Love (that pre-credit opening sequence was the cleverest thing I’d seen in the movies or TV at that time), and totally blown away by Goldfinger. Thunderball kind of underlined the whole Bond mystique for me; an expensive lifestyle in exotic locations surrounded by fabulous looking women, with the occasional villain having to be bumped off before everything settles down again in paradise. Although Thunderball is undoubtedly the most sophisticated and cosmopolitan of the Bond films (and the most successful, regardless of whatever the official story relates!), even then I wondered where it could go from there, and probably thought—and hoped—that Sean Connery would go on forever in the 007 role. For me, You Only Live Twice and On Her Majesty’s Secret Service are the last two films in the series that are a cohesive whole, rather than a mish-mash of hit and miss ideas strung together masquerading as a Bond movie.

How did you become involved with The JBIFC? Were you a part of it from the very start?

No, I didn’t get involved in The James Bond British Fan Club (as it was then named) until 1980. A likeable and enthusiastic teenager by the name of Ross Hendry started The JBBFC in 1979. With my experience in graphic design, I came on board to add some flair to the visual look of OO7, the Club’s publication, such as it was in those early days.

Did you ever imagine it would last 25 years?

I don’t think I’ve ever really had time to think about much else other than producing the next issue of OO7 Magazine or the next JBIFC event or whatever. They’re things I’ve always been totally committed to and involved in. When you’re simultaneously chasing a dream and running to keep up with the bills you can’t afford the luxury of contemplation. Mostly its been trying to survive, literally to put food on the table. When I look back now it really has been a fantastic journey, and I believe, in its way, a pretty incredible achievement. A lot of laughter and tears along the way, but I wouldn’t change a day of it.

Being in your position you’ve met many Bond celebrities. Can you talk a bit about the people you’ve met and some of the friends (or enemies) you’ve made along the way?

Enemies? To paraphrase Oscar Wilde: “Graham Rye is an excellent man; he has not an enemy in the world, and none of his friends like him.” Well I suppose they know who they are, but personally, I’ve never had time to waste on negativity or small and petty minded people, who mainly have their own axes to grind and agendas to amplify. Life’s too short and so are they (mostly).

Desmond Llewelyn and Maurice Binder are really the main two Bond celebrities who became real friends. They were both truly wonderful men, each of whom supported wholeheartedly what I was trying to achieve with The JBIFC and OO7 Magazine. Desmond supported our events from day one and was always there to help when he could. Maurice was very much a mentor. We had some wonderful conversations together. I still miss them both terribly.

It’s part of fan lore that The JBIFC ran afoul of Eon when OO7 published the first ever ‘tell all’ interview with George Lazenby. Is this true?

No, not really. I think the die was cast well before then. It was, and remains, a case of different agendas. From day one Eon have never believed that any James Bond fan club would necessarily be acting in their best interest, and they’re probably correct, especially if the organization is going to be independent and unaffiliated—and unlicensed. To them, control is everything, an idea that isn’t foreign to me. I certainly wouldn’t want to see a OO7 Magazine that had to seek approval from anyone, forgiveness on occasions possibly, but approval—never!

How are relations with Eon now?

With whom? What can I say? To be completely honest and very frank, if it were a divorce we’d both probably cite irreconcilable differences for the breakdown of the ‘marriage’, though we were never ‘married’ in the first place, however we have ‘dated’ on several occasions when it was convenient to do so. And too much damage has been done during the relationship for any thought or need of reconciliation. It’s always been a case of entirely separate agendas and I believe it will always remain so. I’m a loose cannon and can’t be controlled, which is probably where the problem begins and ends. I can’t work within the tight parameters of a licensed entity where every last full stop, comma and photograph has to be approved for an ‘official’ version—I leave that to others. Simple as that! What Eon’s opinion of me is, or their ‘official’ policy or stance toward OO7 Magazine and me is, I have no idea. But in recent years I have come up against deliberate blocking of me appearing on various TV programs, and I no longer receive any invitations to official events or invitations to visit the set of the latest film. So that kind of behavior tells me all I need to know, although I have no written statement of any kind from Eon Productions laying out exactly what their objections are. They’re in the business of making James Bond movies, I’m in the business of publishing an unlicensed magazine about James Bond, and never the twain shall meet it would seem. End of story.

Tell me about the step-by-step process of putting together an issue of OO7 Magazine?

The strength of OO7 Magazine has always been its balance between great photographs and strong text. As a photographer I’ve always been in love with the image, so that’s one of the main reasons why I like to use so many great shots in one issue. I have so many stills in my archive it would be a real shame not to let readers see them whenever it’s possible. Anyone regularly subscribing to OO7 Magazine over the years know they are going to see and read material in every issue they can’t access anywhere else.

It’s always frustrating to me that the still photographers on the early Bonds are mostly unidentifiable from the photographs—as I know personally how annoying it can be to see one’s work reproduced without any credit—but whenever possible the photograph is credited. I’d love to hear from some of these early Bond photographers like Loomis Dean, Arthur Evans, James and Linda Swarbrick, Bert Cann, Frank Connor, David Hurn, and George Whitear.

My ideas for OO7 Magazine always seem to come out of thin air; usually either late at night or in the wee small hours when I’m relaxing with two fingers of Highland Park malt whisky. Sometimes these ideas snowball and develop with a life of their own during the production layout of the publication—one thing leads to another and so on and so onä I started off making James Bond picture story scrapbooks as a kid, so I suppose OO7 Magazine has become the logical extension of that schoolboy hobby.

The graphic design of OO7 Magazine really sets it apart from other fanzines—in fact, I’m not even sure I should call OO7 Magazine a ‘fanzine’ but rather ‘a magazine devoted to James Bond.’ Can you tell us a bit about how the look of the mag has evolved over the years and your role in its changing design?

‘Fanzine?’ Shame on you! Well I deliberately changed the title of the publication to OO7 Magazine because I wanted to distance it from being seen as ‘just’ a ‘fanzine’, a fan-based publication, which I don’t think it has been for many years, and certainly isn’t now. It really is a magazine devoted to James Bond. If people like it then they’ll buy it, if they don’t they won’t. I’ve always believed that if you work in any creative medium the only arbiters you can use is your own taste and standards. You assemble a publication that pleases you and hope mostly everyone else enjoys it. Obviously you can’t please all the people all the time, and you’re always going to have a percentage that you can’t please any of the time (but they probably don’t buy the publication anyway!). Though over the last quarter century I’m pleased, and proud, to relate that I’ve had much more positive than negative feedback from readers. There has been some criticism regarding the retail cost of OO7 Magazine, but unfortunately this is unavoidable when producing anything in such limited quantities, your unit cost will always mean your end product will be expensive, but that said, I still believe the publication is excellent value for money for the discerning James Bond enthusiast.

With the new-look editions of OO7 Magazine starting from issue number #41 onwards, I’ve wanted to open out the editorial content of the publication so it has a broader appeal. I don’t see why a James Bond magazine needs to be dull, stuffy or anally retentive. I leave that to others. I want OO7 Magazine to be an artistically bright-looking publication with features that will be interesting, informative and entertaining to read and to look at, and if it can educate a little along the way that’s an added bonus. I also hope the publication will now appeal to less hardcore Bond fans. Basically, I have a unique knowledge of the subject and want to share it with my readers, who I hope enjoy the end product. OO7 Magazine has always set the standard, and will continue this trend as long as I’m able to maintain my current level of commitment to the publication. An infinite part-work?

The editions of OO7 Magazine from issue #41 onwards are also more considered. Because I no longer have the myriad distractions of the day-to-day running of The JBIFC, its on-line store, and the many other offshoots I was pestered with every hour of the day every day of the week, I can plan the structure of a number of issues in advance. It’s a luxury I’ve never had before and it’s much my preferred way of working.

Being a child of the Roger Moore era, I’ve noticed that OO7 Magazine seems to have a bit of a Connery bias—number of Connery covers vs. Moore covers, etc. What do you say to cranky Moore fans like myself who complain about this?

I’d say it was a very fair criticism and not at all cranky—and one I’m currently addressing [Ed NOTE: see ‘OO7’ Magazine #46 – Roger Moore Special]. Unfortunately, most of our contributors, including the current writers for OO7 Magazine, aren’t huge Roger Moore Bond fans, so it’s been difficult for a long while to feature his films with the coverage they most certainly deserve. His casting in the role undoubtedly enabled the Bond series to survive two decades. If Sean Connery hadn’t been cast in the role originally I don’t think anyone would currently be talking about BOND 21: Casino Royale. But by the same token, if Roger hadn’t been cast in 1973 I don’t think we’d have seen Timothy Dalton and Pierce Brosnan follow on to portray James Bond.

If there’s anyone out there who feels they can write and would like to showcase a Roger Moore 007 film in a positive fashion—please write to me at [email protected] (enthusiasm and a sound accurate knowledge of the subject are the key factors in writing for OO7 Magazine—don’t worry about your English grammar—that’s my job as editor to knock it into shape!)

In the beginning the club reported a great deal on the progress of McClory’s Thunderball remake, and when Never Say Never Again finally came out OO7 featured more coverage of this film than Octopussy. Was this because of the excitement over Connery’s return, or did McClory offer the club the co-operation Eon wouldn’t?

Obviously everyone was excited by Sean’s return (however short-lived both the excitement and the return was), but no, we were never afforded any special treatment by Kevin McClory, and we were unable to obtain any stills through ‘official’ channels from either Octopussy, or even two years later for A View To A Kill. However, Warner Brothers, who originally released Never Say Never Again, were incredibly helpful. I suppose it was because they felt they needed all the help they could get in opposition (which is how they felt about the situation) to Octopussy. Warner gave me total access to an unlimited number of stills and transparencies and eventually even gave me the prop nuclear warhead used in the film. They’d had it on display in the West End cinema showing the film in London’s Haymarket, and I don’t think they knew what to do with it after the film’s run. I remember it only just fit nose to tail in the company estate car I had at the time. After humping the damn thing around all over the place in various ‘moves’ over the years the prop warhead was eventually purchased by Planet Hollywood, and as far as I know is still on display in one of their restaurants.

OO7 seemed to heartily endorse Timothy Dalton’s Bond with many excellent issues and covers. Looking back, what do you think of the Dalton era now?

I think it was a valiant attempt by Timothy Dalton and the filmmakers to bring Bond back down to basics, nearer to the first two films in the series. At the time I think it was certainly the best Bond film since On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, although not really in quite the same class as George Lazenby’s one shot appearance as 007. Unfortunately with Licence To Kill I think Dalton’s influence for a darker more somber Bond backfired, and led the filmmakers up the wrong path. The film also wasn’t helped by a monumentally inadequate promotional campaign that just more or less said to the public, ‘ho hum here’s another James Bond movie.’ The James Bond of Licence To Kill, for me, is neither the Bond of Ian Fleming’s novels or the accepted movie version, the latter probably being nearer the reason for the film’s cool reception. Its international distributors UIP publicized that the film had grossed over $42,553,744 in the international market place, putting it substantially ahead of all other Bond films in the series at that time in its release. But this did little to dispel the feeling that the general public at large just weren’t on the same wavelength as Timothy Dalton’s interpretation of James Bond. Regardless of what the band of faithful believe, Timothy Dalton just wasn’t popular with the everyday cinema-going public. Regularly meeting people from all walks of life, if they discover my profession the conversation usually turns to a brief summary of who they think the best James Bond actor was, almost universally, especially from men, panning Timothy Dalton in the role, with George Lazenby running a close second. However, I still believe that The Living Daylights, Dalton’s Bond debut film, is vastly superior to GoldenEye as a first outing for a new Bond actor.

OO7 has always been a good source for news and reviews on the continuation novels. Can you tell us a little about your relationship with authors John Gardner and Raymond Benson?

Well I’ve known Raymond on and off for many years now, and even designed and photographed the cover for the UK paperback edition of his excellent ‘James Bond Bedside Companion’ in 1988. He’s also been kind enough to contribute articles to OO7 Magazine in the past, his interviews with Timothy Dalton and John Gardner both being particularly memorable. I’ve met John Gardner on a couple of brief occasions. Both authors are very nice people.

I’ve probably upset a few people in the past with various comments that have found their way into the press regarding the continuation Bond novels—but hey—if you don’t want to get burned, don’t jump into the fire! I think trying to take over Ian Fleming’s James Bond, while being an extraordinary challenge, is very much a ‘poison chalice’. It doesn’t matter what you do you’re never really going to win. The novelty of the new literary James Bond wore off on me after For Special Services, and I’m afraid nothing I’ve read since has changed my mind. The intrinsic problem of updating Fleming’s literary character is that in updating him you lose the sense that you are reading about the same man Fleming was writing about, which to me seems a pointless—and thankless—exercise. However, I understand that both John and Raymond have their own fan following, and good luck to them. I’d certainly have preferred to see Raymond continue as the Bond author than Glidrose perpetrate a series of young James Bond adventures on the world. But I suppose it comes down to basics—‘How can we make more money out of this ailing literary franchise?’ ‘Ah yes! We’ll go the Harry Potter route.’ Please God they never make any films from these books in my lifetime.

You’ve done terrific special issues on OHMSS, Thunderball, and You Only Live Twice (in two parts). Can you tell us a what inspired these issues, and have you ever considered doing a ‘special’ on one of the more recent films, say For Your Eyes Only or Licence To Kill?

Thank you. The reason for the specials produced to date was that all these films hold a certain fascination for me, as I’m sure they do for many of our readers. I’d like to do more specials, and certainly have no problem in principal with the idea of covering a Roger Moore or Timothy Dalton James Bond movie in this way—unfortunately, in practical terms these issues take around two to three times longer to produce than a standard issue of OO7 Magazine. Then there’s always the problem of finding writers of quality who can cover the various aspects of the film that you need to discuss. So, because of the problem with production time on specials, it may be a better idea in the future to integrate these kinds of specialist articles into the body of a usual edition of the magazine like I have done in recent issues. Who knows? We’ll have to see.

Was there ever anything you ran in OO7 Magazine that in hindsight you wished you hadn’t?

Probably the reverse. Sometimes I think the publication should have been more candid and aggressive with its opinions, which it is now and will continue to be in the future.

How do you respond to criticisms that the production of OO7 Magazine is uneven, with long periods between some issues?

When you’re a one-man band and you have to work within an extremely limited budget, sometimes other things take president. Simple as that. Only a major influx of a substantial amount of cash will ever remove that particular problem. However, during 2004 the publication of OO7 Magazine became far more regular than at anytime in the past. But to quote Mae West, “Anything worth doing is worth doing slowly.”

Do you have a favourite issue of OO7 Magazine?

I was very pleased with the special issue that covered Casino Royale and Never Say Never Again. I think Matthew Field did an excellent job and produced the definitive work on Never Say Never Again. And his exclusive interview with the movie’s director Irvin Kershner was the icing on the cake. I feel that issue set the record straight on the two ‘infamous’ rogue Bond movies and remains the definitive work.

I’m very proud of the double issue that covered You Only Live Twice. It was ‘a real labour of love as we say’—more like a book in the quantity of production requirements. I believe it’s the definitive work on that wonderful film. Having recently unearthed some fabulous photographs of Connery’s time in Japan on location during the shooting of You Only Live Twice, I’m itching to put out another special—perhaps for the film’s 40th anniversary in 2007? But generally my favourite issue is the last one to roll off the printing press. I’ve lived and breathed with it morning noon and night for around three months, so believe me, I’m more than a bit happy to get OO7 Magazine off my hands and out to my subscribers. By that time I have the next issue blocked out in my head and am desperate to get it down on paper. And so it goes on…

Part Two of this interview with Graham Rye will appear in one week including questions on Graham’s book, The James Bond Girls.

Continue to Part II

To discuss this interview visit this thread in the CBn Forums.
Visit the official ‘OO7’ Magazine website to purchase the latest issue, SUBSCRIBE, or buy back issues.

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• The Graham Rye CBn Interview (Part II)
• ‘OO7’ Magazine: A Complete Bibliography
• ‘OO7’ Magazine #46 – Roger Moore Special
• ‘OO7’ Magazine #45
• ‘OO7’ Magazine #44
• ‘OO7’ Magazine #43

The John Griswold CBn Interview

While books about James Bond films are plentiful, only a handful deal exclusively with Ian Fleming’s written work. 20 years in the making, John Griswold’s Ian Fleming’s James Bond: Annotations and Chronologies has been well received among Bond and Fleming scholars, though the chronologies have caused some debate.

CBn spoke with Griswold about his landmark work and the journey from idea to fruition.

Thank you for agreeing to the interview. First, can you tell us a little bit about yourself and how you became a Bond fan?

I am a person who enjoys doing analysis, research, and artwork (primarily, drawing and sculpture) and, for over twenty years, has pursued a career in computer systems design work which also tapped my creative side.

As for becoming a Bond fan, it began in 1964, halfway through the movie Goldfinger when I realized that the character on the screen, James Bond, was the same one who was in the movie From Russia With Love. Then, at the end of Goldfinger, when the words appeared on the screen that James Bond would be returning, my interest was forever cemented. The movies made me aware of Ian Fleming’s thrillers. Doctor No was the first Bond novel I read. From then on, I read the whole series.

What prompted you to create this book?

I have been analyzing and researching Ian Fleming’s Bond stories for over twenty years as a hobby and was fortunate to have had access to many of the original Fleming manuscripts. As time went on and our culture and environment changed, I became aware of the need to annotate Fleming’s Bond world to ensure that his references would not be misunderstood or unknowingly ignored. In 1993, on a part-time basis, I began consolidating my notes obtained from a variety of sources. As an analytical and curious person, I also began constructing a chronology based on the literary series as whole as opposed to viewing each book as an independent entity. In mid-2001, I began writing my book part-time. By 2002, it became a full time endeavor where I worked on it full time up to 12 to 14 hours a day, writing, researching, and crosschecking.

You mention annotated authors such as Lewis Carroll, Mark Twain, Tolkien, and Conan Doyle in your introduction—was there a work on one of those authors that served as inspiration or blueprint for your Fleming work?

To be honest, no. It was the process of annotating a work of literature that interested me. As I point out in my book’s introduction, Fleming’s Bond stories were contemporary when written, but with the passage of time, have become period pieces covering the 1950s and early 1960s. Fleming had a broad base of knowledge and utilized the knowledge of many of his friends and correspondents. References to literary works and items of historic interest lend us insight into Fleming, the man.

Did you set any goals for yourself when starting the book? For instance—was it always going to include chronologies—or was that idea added after you had started researching annotations?

By the time I actually began to write the manuscript, I had a mental outline as to exactly what I wanted to accomplish. The book that one sees is the book that I envisioned. The chronologies were always one of the goals.
For Moonraker, I did extensive analysis of the famous contract bridge game between Bond and Drax. Each hand played and their results are given. At the conclusion of the analysis, British pounds were converted to their equivalent 1953 American dollars. These amounts were then converted to their equivalent 2001 purchasing power values. This was done to demonstrate for readers as to how large the stakes had become.

To crosscheck my analysis of the location of the fictional Spectreville in Diamonds Are Forever, my wife and I went to Las Vegas, Nevada. From Las Vegas, we took Highway 95 to the Specter (Fleming spelt it as ‘Spectre’) mountain range and observed how the path of the fictional Spectreville railroad’s track could have been laid out. This path appears on a map included in the section on Diamonds Are Forever.

Maps were created for many of the other novels. Travel to the Bahamas was necessary to locate the ordnance map of New Providence Island as it was in 1959 for my section on Thunderball since many of the road names on New Providence Island have been changed and no longer correspond to those mentioned in the novel. The Sunday Times Book Publication Go Golfing in Britain (1961) had wonderful hole-by-hole graphics of the Royal St. George’s golf course for which I obtained the rights to use in my book as the Royal St. Marks golf course. The fictional Royal St. Marks golf course in Goldfinger was in reality the Royal St. George’s golf course as it looked during the time Goldfinger was set. Now readers of Goldfinger can follow the graphic hole-by-hole while reading the novel. In 2003, my wife and I were fortunate to be invited to tour the Royal St. George’s golf course. It was an exciting experience to walk from one hole to another and get the actual feel of the course.

What was the most difficult part of completing the chronologies?

The key to creating the high level chronology was to view the series of books as a whole. As noted in my book, it wasn’t until From Russia, With Love that Fleming began creating a clearer chronology of events for the books. As it turned out, it was the relationship among Thunderball, The Spy Who Loved Me, and On Her Majesty’s Secret Service that challenged me most from a chronological point of view.

Based on information contained in You Only Live Twice and The Man with the Golden Gun, one can determine that On Her Majesty’s Secret Service takes place from September 1961 to January 1962. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Fleming states that the events involving Bond in The Spy Who Loved Me occurred in October and one of the dates is Friday, October 13th. Friday, October 13th is a day in 1961. Interestingly enough, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service has a flash-forward structure. Fleming had left a space in time for the events involving Bond in The Spy Who Loved Me to fit nicely between mid-September and mid-November 1961.

Both The Spy Who Loved Me and On Her Majesty’s Secret Service had statements concerning Operation Thunderball that didn’t seem to make sense. In Thunderball, Fleming stated explicitly that portions took place in June 1959, but in The Spy Who Loved Me, Bond mentioned Operation Thunderball as having been less than a year ago. In Bond mentioned Operation Thunderball as having been about a year ago. It isn’t until the context of these statements is reflected upon that one can arrive at the conclusion that Bond was referring to when some vague information about Operation Thunderball was leaked and first appeared in the newspapers around the end of November 1960 and not when Operation Thunderball actually occurred. In The Spy Who Loved Me,, chapter 11 – Bedtime Story, October 13, 1961, Vivienne mentions the newspapers as having had some information about Operation Thunderball, and in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, toward the end of November 1961, Bond mentioned the leaks about Operation Thunderball to the Sable Basilisk.

Considering the length of time it took to work on this—was there ever a time when you thought it might never get done?

No.

Due to the Internet’s somewhat transitory nature—were you reluctant to use web sites as sources for entries or not?

With the nature of the world today, one must use qualified resources where one finds them. At one time, many books, many good books, have had a transitory lifespan. The Internet has been a great tool for locating some of these out of print books.

Contacting people with specific expertise by mail and via the Internet was extremely productive. Their generosity was greatly appreciated, and I gave full credit in the footnotes for the information they provided and listed their names on the Acknowledgements page. I have a separate binder that contains permissions for usage from people who have contributed to the book. For example: The people at the Continental Register helped me to clarify Fleming’s Bentley information, and a Scottish-based film producer and screenplay writer pointed me in the right direction for finally solving the ‘girl in the balloon bet’ mentioned in Moonraker and On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Akihiko Sato, who is a Japanese scholar, supplied the information concerning the Bar Mecca murder case, which was referenced in Moonraker.

Again, many thanks to people who were kind enough to help me in this effort.

Some entries are very detailed while others are a few words. How did you decide what topics to go into great depth on?

The entries are there to clarify the meaning of terms. On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Hopefully, I have provided enough information to inspire readers to delve further into an item of interest. It would be wonderful if an entry in the book sparked a reader’s interest to pursue further research on his or her own.

You must have spent a great deal of time getting permissions to quote for some of the entries—was there anything that had to be left out because you couldn’t get permission?

Nothing was left out. Patience and persistence were the keys. The hard part was locating the rightful owners of source material.

Did you approach Ian Fleming Publications during your research, or did you go to them after your manuscript had been completed?

The book was written in 2002. In February 2003, I traveled with my wife, Deborah, to London to present my manuscript to Ian Fleming Publications Limited (formerly known as Glidrose Publications, Ltd). I met with Kate Jones, a publishing consultant; Zoë Watkins, Publishing Manager, Ian Fleming Publications Ltd; and Kate Grimond, Ian Fleming’s niece and co-conservator of his estate. The manuscript was approved and a license was granted for its publication.

Was it a difficult decision to self-publish rather than go through a traditional publisher?

Due to the unique nature of my book, it was difficult to find an traditional publisher willing to publish it. I decided to self-publish through AuthorHouse where I would have the greatest creative control over the format of the book.

Note: In my book, book titles referenced are underlined, as opposed to being italicized, so they standout on the page. The footnote source references were placed at the bottom of pages corresponding with the footnotes on a given page to make it easier for readers to confirm my sources.

Do you have a favorite among Fleming’s novels? Do you view it differently after your research on your book?

My favorites are Doctor No, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, and You Only Live Twice. The placement of Doctor No on the series timeline was especially difficult, and I finally determined that 1956 was the best fit. While creating the detailed chronology for Doctor No, an interesting happenstance occurred by using a year 1956 calendar. The date derived for Bond and Quarrel’s arrival on Crab Key came out to be March 15, 1956. This was the same date that Fleming and Ivar Bryce arrived at Great Inagua. Fleming later used aspects of Great Inagua for his fictional island Crab Key.

Which Fleming novel was the most difficult to research, and why?

One of the most intriguing novels was You Only Live Twice. The original manuscript’s ‘Chapter 21 – Obit:’ triggered off a whole chain of thoughts and intense research as to what Fleming was possibly thinking.

In the Chapter 21 – Obit: of the original manuscript for You Only Live Twice, I found that Fleming originally stated that Bond entered ‘a branch that was subsequently to become the Ministry of Defence’ at the age of 17 in 1939. He later changed this to ‘1941’. As in the published edition, Bond’s parents are stated as having died in a climbing accident when he was 11. The fact that Fleming first used the year ‘1939’ was intriguing because if one subtracts 17 from 1939, one gets the year 1922. When you add 11 (Bond’s age when his parents died) to 1922, the result is 1933 which is the year Bond ‘bought’ his Bentley mentioned in Casino Royale. Fleming seemed to be hinting as to how Bond actually got his first Bentley, but then changed the year in the manuscript from ‘1939’ to ‘1941’ for another purpose which I touch upon. Using Bond’s November 11th birthday which was assigned by John Pearson, November 11th in the year 1921 (instead of Pearson’s 1920) can be used while still having Bond be 11 years old within the date span of January 1, 1933 to November 10, 1933. Fleming’s changing of the year ‘1939’ to ‘1941’ points to the possible origin of Bond’s fictional secret service: the SOE (Special Operation Executive) which actually existed during World War II. This issue is fully examined in my book.

Would you consider doing future volumes featuring the works of Amis, Pearson, Gardner, Benson, and Higson?

No, but it sounds like a fine project for someone else to pursue especially since these authors are still alive. I wish that I had had the opportunity to meet with Fleming.

What advice would you have for budding Fleming/Bond research authors?

If you have an idea and know its boundaries, begin to work on it. Don’t wait only to have regrets later that you didn’t try.

To discuss this interview, visit this thread on the CBn Forums.

Purchase Ian Fleming’s James Bond: Annotations and Chronologies from Amazon.com (U.S.)

Purchase Ian Fleming’s James Bond: Annotations and Chronologies from Amazon.co.uk (UK)

The Totally… James Bond CBn Interview

Choosing a favourite James Bond theme song is a lot like choosing, well, a favourite James Bond. Just as fans spend hours verbally sparring over who the best 007 is, Bondophiles will equally defend their favourite Bond theme. Be it Nancy Sinatra’s sweeping “You Only Live Twice”, Garbage’s haunting “The World Is Not Enough”, Duran Duran’s upbeat “A View To A Kill” or Madonna’s controversial “Die Another Day”, the James Bond themes each have their fans and are one of the biggest talking points of each new Bond adventure. However, for many, it is Shirley Bassey, who performed a record three title themes, who immediately springs to mind whenever the words “James Bond theme song” are uttered.

CBn spoke with Joanne Farrell, who had the honour – and challenge! – of covering not one, but all three Shirley Bassey classics for last year’s Totally… James Bond album.

Tell us a little about yourself.

I’ve been a professional actress and singer since the age of sixteen, when I left home in Manchester to pursue a career in London. I’ve worked extensively on television and in London’s West End, as well as in bands and on recordings.

How did you come to be involved on the album?

Several years ago, I was involved in a theatre production where the Musical Director was Ian Hughes. In November 2003, I was backstage at Children In Need where purely by chance I happened to see Ian, who was the Musical Director for the evening. He told me he was working on the Totally… James Bond album and was looking for someone to sing the Shirley Bassey songs. He invited me over to his studio the next week, where we sang through the songs. He decided my voice was right for the tracks and we agreed to record them in early 2004.

Tell us about the recording process.

I recorded three sessions in total. We recorded “Goldfinger” and “Diamonds are Forever” in one morning. We recorded “Goldfinger” first as it’s a big song. We recorded “Moonraker” on another day and the backing vocals for some of the other tracks on another morning.

Was it a conscious decision to have you cover all three of Shirley Bassey’s title songs?

Yes. It made sense to have the same voice. In no way did I want to try to imitate Shirley Bassey, but just have a slight flavour of the style of the songs.

Did you meet any of the other artists on the album, or attend any of their recordings?

Yes. I’ve known Zoë Tyler (“For Your Eyes Only”, “All Time High”, “You Only Live Twice”) and Nicola Hughes (“GoldenEye”) for quite some time, so hanging out in the studio was a bit of a social event for us too!

Were you given any marching orders in recording the song? For instance, were you told you could play with the vocals, or to stick to the original?

It would be impossible to recreate what Shirley Bassey produces with these songs, so we decided to be a little flexible and allow me to bring some of my own style to them. It’s no use being a poor version of someone else, so I wanted to sing each song the way I felt it.

Did you hear anything specific about what Shirley Bassey said about the songs that you considered before performing them?

No. I’ve grown up listening to the songs, but never heard anything that was said about them. In a way I think it’s better sometimes to come to a piece, be it acting or singing, with your own fresh ideas. I guess it goes back to what I’ve already said about not wanting to be a lesser version of somebody else. I can’t be Shirley Bassey, but I can try to be the best I can be.

Do you have a favourite of the three that you performed, and in turn, do you have a different one in mind when performed by Shirley Bassey?

I love “Diamonds Are Forever”. I had the great pleasure of working with lyricist Don Black and performing this song in 2000, when I worked on a show celebrating Don’s music called Black Goes with Everything. He’s really cool!

I wasn’t too familiar with “Moonraker” but it really grew on me – it’s a
beautiful song.

But when performed by Shirley Bassey, it has to be “Goldfinger”. It just
blows you away. So sexy and so powerful.

Which of the three songs was the most challenging?

“Goldfinger”. It’s massive.

Were there any other 007 theme songs that you’d like to have performed?

Ha! All of them! They’re all fantastic songs.

Do you have a favourite James Bond song, out of them all?

I couldn’t possibly choose.

Who would you like to perform the next title theme?

Could you put in a good word for me?

Tell us about your other musical pursuits.

I’ve recorded tracks on several albums and I really enjoy it. I’d love
to work on more. Let’s see what the future holds.

Are you a 007 fan yourself?

Absolutely!

Tell us about your non-Bond-related work.

I work mainly as an actress. Last year I played fire-fighter Nicky Higgins in ITV’s new drama Steel River Blues about the Fire service. I also played Sarah-Jane Harvey in Crossroads and in dramas such as Cold Feet, Holby City, Waking the Dead, Heartbeat, Dream Team and lots more.

In the West End, I played Sandy in Grease, Stephanie in Saturday Night Fever, Ellie in Showboat, Janet in The Rocky Horror Show, and in Smokey Joes Café, to name but a few.

I love having the opportunity to work in a variety of fields.

To discuss this interview, visit this thread in the CBn Forums.
With many thanks to Joanne Farrell and Andy Rowe. Images courtesy joannefarrell.com.

Related Links:

• Review: ‘Totally… James Bond: The Essential 007 Themes’
• joannefarrell.com

Purchase Totally… James Bond: The Essential 007 Themes:

• Amazon.co.uk
• Amazon.com

The Charlie Higson CBn Interview

On March 3, 2005 Ian Fleming Publications and Puffin Books will release SilverFin, the first of a series of Young Bond novels written by Charlie Higson, co-creator of the hugely popular BBC comedy series, ‘The Fast Show’, and a successful screenwriter and adult thriller novelist. Today CBn has the extreme honour of being the first James Bond website to interview Mr. Higson about SilverFin and the Young Bond series.

Enjoy!

First off, can you tell us briefly how you got the job?

Ian Fleming Publications approached several writers–both children’s authors and adult novelists–in the end, I was the one they decided to go with. Exactly why is a question that only IFP can answer. But I think they were looking for someone who had a simple, direct writing style, who was a fan of Bond and who would be willing to work within the guidelines they had established for the books.

How did you go about researching life at Eton in the 1930s?

Eton is still there. Some of the buildings have been standing there since the Middle Ages. So the first place to start was at the school itself. The Flemings have a good relationship with the senior librarian there, Michael Meredith. Who has incidentally created a fine Ian Fleming archive in the library–including many first editions. I think the college is quite proud of its associations with James Bond (Ian Fleming of course went there in the twenties). Michael is a big Bond fan, and a great collector of books. He has been very helpful with my research and has been checking my manuscripts for authenticity and giving me the odd tip.

There is a wealth of material published about Eton, much of which I have read, but the most helpful book was one written by Bernard Fregusson about what it was like to be a boy at the school in the early thirties.

Will you go into the details about Bond’s expulsion from Eton at some point in a later book?

Of course I will. How could I not? I know this is going to be a sticky point about which the Bond fanatics will get most huffy–but, in my books, Bond is going to be at Eton for more than two halves! Shock horror. (A term is called a half at Eton) But, don’t worry, have patience, it’s all going to be explained in book 5–and it will work quite neatly with what Fleming wrote. I’m afraid you’ll just have to read the book to find out exactly how it works… (It will include an incident involving a boy’s maid and Bond’s removal from the school). But, do you really think that an obituary written by the head of the secret service about an active spy is going to be the whole truth?

I’m interested in how you came to use eels as such an integral part of the story. It’s brilliant, by the way…but how did it come about?

Nobody likes eels. My wife in particular has a thing about them. (Actually eels are fascinating and much misunderstood creatures, and I think I’ve given them a bad press in this book, which is a pity because they’re being wiped out at the moment.)

I needed a bad animal. Finding a new dangerous animal for a Bond project is tough (witness the killer bass in Austin Powers). We’ve had all the obvious ones–octopus, giant squid, tiger, sharks, crocodiles etc. etc. But I wanted something scary that kids could relate to and might actually think they could come across in their own lives. Eels were the obvious choice. But, as eels are fairly benign and would never attack a human, I had to make them mutated eels, which led me to some of the mechanics of the plot.

SilverFin is quite long for a children’s book–it’s actually the longest James Bond book yet written. Were you given a word restriction?

Is it longer than the Fleming books? Don’t be fooled by the page count, it’s large type for children!

(The second book is even longer, I’m afraid.)

I had no guidelines for length. I just wrote it as it came out, though it has of course been edited down and tightened since my first draft.

Kids like to be engrossed in books (Harry Potter seems quite popular, and something called Lord Of The Rings) and we also wanted to it to be clear that this was a proper novel not just a cheapo, quickie cash in, so I really wanted it to be something substantial.

Have you read any of the post Fleming novels, most notably “James Bond the Authorized Biography of 007” by John Pearson, which covers some of the same territory you cover in the Young Bond series?

No. I deliberately steered clear of anything post Fleming. My books are designed to fit in with what Fleming wrote and nothing else. I also didn’t want to be influenced by any of the other books, particularly the Pearson one (which I gather is actually rather good). One day I’ll read them. But for now my Bible is Fleming.

You choose to call him “James” throughout the novel instead of “Bond”, as Fleming, Gardner, and Benson did. Was this a deliberate choice, or, because of his age, did “James” just feel more natural?

Boys at Eton in the thirties called each other by their first names. And it just didn’t seem right to have a 13 year old boy referred to constantly by his surname in the text. I think it humanises him, calling him James, and makes him more of a real person for the young readers. OK, so he grows up to be James Bond, the icon, but he must once have been an ordinary boy.

(The girls in the films and books all call him “James” as well. It’s somehow more intimate.)

Aunt Charmian is established in Fleming, I believe, but is Uncle Max an original character? What made you give Bond a mentor who was a WWI spy?

Charmian is mentioned in You Only Live Twice. Max is my own invention.

It was decided very early on that James should very much not be a teenage spy figure; we didn’t want to go down the cheesy Cody Banks/Spy Kids route. We wanted him to be a real boy at a real school. Also, it’s clear from the adult novels that James didn’t get involved in spying until the Second World War. But I did want there to be some element of spying in the book, because that’s obviously what Bond is known for. So it felt right for him to have an uncle who had been a spy in the First World War. It gives us a taste of the world that James is going to be involved with when he grows up, and the man he is going to become.

Is the Bentley Aunt Charmian drives the same car Bond drives in the Fleming books?

It certainly is. I put an early Aston Martin in the book as well, for film fans, but I knew there had to be some mention of the Bentley for people who know Bond from the books (it also appears in From Russia With Love at the start of the movie when Connery is indulging in a spot of ‘lunch’ with Sylvia Trench). It says in Casino Royale that Bond bought himself a Bentley in the early thirties, but exactly how old he was when this happened is not definite (Fleming famously altered his timescale as he went along to keep Bond young.) But we will be covering this purchase in a later book.

Some fans have already expressed discomfort with what they sense are too many similarities to Harry Potter in the Young Bond series. Do you have any feelings or fears about SilverFin being perceived as being too Potteresque?

Oh, come on. Have they read the book?

There have been countless stories written about boys at school from Tom Brown’s schooldays onwards, you could say that they are all Potteresque! Or you could concede that they might all be different. If you write about a boy of thirteen (which is the correct age to appeal to our target audience) then he is going to be at school, there’s no way around it.

Bond was at Eton, a weird, crusty boarding school. Obviously, the success of the Potter novels meant that IFP were less nervous about whether kids of today could relate to someone at a weird, crusty, English boarding school, but otherwise there are no similarities. There are no wizards, goblins, magic spells or whatnot.

Bond has a regular set of friends at the school, but they are not a gang who go off on adventures together. James is very much his own man. Eton is the background to the books in much the same way that the secret service is the background to the adult books. It’s a springboard for adventures rather than the focus of all activity (as the school is in the Potter books).

The following question and answer contain SPOILERS. Highlight to read.

Near the end of the novel, Bond receives an injection of the SilverFin serum (meant to change people into ultimate and obedient soldiers). After the injection, Bond does undergo quite a radical change and in the end it’s said there something “cold and frightening” in his eyes. Are you suggesting that the SilverFin serum is what gave James Bond his darker, killer instincts and skills, and is this something that will be explored as the series goes on?

Do you know, I never thought of that! Honest to God, I didn’t. It’s an interesting idea… But no. I don’t want to imply that James in any way has superhuman attributes – the effects of the serum wear off. It was necessary for the action in the first book, though, for James to have some sort of help to get him through the otherwise impossible physical challenges (swimming underwater in a Scottish loch at Easter time for instance) without dying.

There are also echoes, of course, of his adult drug taking (he’s not averse to dropping a bit of speed to see him through a long night at the gaming table.) I think what has changed inside James in the book is not that he has taken this drug but that he has witnessed some awful things and seen death at close hand.

But I guess your idea might keep the websites talking for a while…

END SPOILER.

Fleming established that Bond lost his virginity–and his pocket book–to a prostitute in Paris when he was 16. Are you going to deal with this event, or Bond’s sexuality, in the later books?

I won’t be taking him that far, unfortunately. He’s only going be to about fourteen when my books finish. I’ll leave it to someone else to write about his first forays into adult sex.

Will your books become darker or more adult in tone as Bond travels into adolescence – sort of like how the Harry Potter books have matured along with their audience?

To a certain extent, yes, but not too much. I wanted to show Bond hardening and growing up through the books; becoming tougher and more cynical and disillusioned with the world. But they are designed to be a series of children’s books, and children don’t like things to change too much from one book to the next in a series. So, as long as I can write them quickly enough and not be outgrown by my initial audience, than he won’t age/change that much.

He’s going to have a very busy year!

Gardner and Benson both spoke about the difficulty of finding a title that satisfied everyone. Was SilverFin your title and your first choice? If not, can you tell us some of the unused titles?

There have been some amusing spoof titles on some of the websites and I can see how some fans might find SilverFin a little too close to Goldfinger. But I agree with B&G, coming up with a title was the hardest part. There have been too many other Bond titles over the years. We wanted something that sounded suitably Bondian but wasn’t too specific in it’s meaning. Between IFP, myself, the publishers and everyone else involved we came up with loads of titles – and in the end SilverFin was the one most of us agreed on.

You wait, after a while it’ll stand up in its own right, and you won’t think twice about it.

Some rejected titles.

My working title was ‘Out Of Breath.’ But this was a little too Elmore Leonard. Later on there were various permutations of ‘Silver’, including…

SilverBack (it’s a type of gorilla – rejected)
SilverSkin (it’s a type of onion – rejected)
SilverHead (it sounds a bit like a gay sex act – rejected)
SilverFist (it sounds even more like a gay sex act – rejected)

We’ve heard there are five books planned. Is this true? Which book are you currently writing at the moment?

That’s the plan. I have finished the first two and am about to start work on the third… which will be out in at least two years’ time…

I’m pleased to see you will be reading the SilverFin audio book yourself. How did this come about and will you be reading the future books as well?

So far I have recorded the abridged version. I don’t know if there are any plans for a full-length reading and if so who might read it.

I got the job after had to read a couple of passages for some American publicity and everyone thought it came out OK. I have a profile as a performer in Britain, so I suppose as something of a minor celebrity I was what they were looking for to read the audio book.

Whether I’ll do any more, I do know. We’ll have to see how people react to the first one. I enjoyed doing it, although I wish I hadn’t put in quite so many different accents. (My American accent is pretty rotten.)

Some fans have been hostile towards the idea of a series about a 13-year-old James Bond. Will you look at fan forums like the one here at CBn to gauge fan reactions to SilverFin? Or do you avoid the Internet and fan sites?

I look at all the websites and have been following the arguments with great interest (I occasionally join in, using a pseudonym), but it doesn’t mean I have to agree with them!

It’s useful to know what people are thinking, though, of course, these books are aimed at a younger readership than the fans who take part in the forums. It’s always interesting to see what people think. I fully understand the fans’ reservations and scorn – I’d have felt the same way if I’d heard that someone else was doing this project – but I hope I can prove a few people wrong.

(Though I do get the impression that a lot of the fanatics will be disappointed if these books are popular!)

If given the opportunity at some point, would you like to write an adult James Bond novel?

That’s a tricky one. What would you do with James Bond today that hasn’t already been done? That was the attraction of going back to the early thirties; it gives you a new canvas and you can go back to basics. But James Bond in the modern world… Hmm…

I’d love to work on a film script, but a novel, I don’t know, perhaps if it was set back in the forties during the war, on in the fifties between a couple of the Fleming books. But I haven’t been asked, so I don’t have to worry about this. Right now I’m enjoying writing the kids’ books and they’re going to keep me busy for a good few years…

Finally, can you share with us ANY details about Book 2–a title maybe?

The second book takes place largely in Sardinia and involves bandits, art theft and people smuggling. My working title was ‘Double M’, but don’t expect it to be called this when it comes out.

Book three will take place largely in the darker corners of London. Book four will be set in the Alps and book 5 in outer space (only joking).

Thank you so much for your time. Everyone at CBn wishes you the best
of luck with SilverFin and the Young Bond series.

To discuss this interview visit this thread on the CBn Forums.
Thanks to Laura Creyke, Jordan Charter, and Evan Willnow.

Purchase the UK paperback edition of SilverFin

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Pre-order the U.S. paperback edition of SilverFin (April 27, 2005)