The James Bond Bedside Companion

by Raymond Benson

  Ian Fleming, taking a pause from writing YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE in 1963 at Goldeneye. (Photo by Mary Slater.)

  1964 was the beginning of what could be called "the spy boom." For the next three or four years, secret agents were definitely marketable, and the media began overexploiting the genre. Ian Fleming's creation was undoubtedly the catalyst, and imitations appeared almost overnight. His books had sold an estimated 30 million copies worldwide by the summer, and it looked as if the phenomenon would never let up.

  Television was getting into the act as well. Producer Norman Felton had approached Fleming a couple of years earlier about writing a spy series for TV (the CBS deal had fallen through by 1962). Fleming wouldn't commit to the project, but supposedly gave Felton the names for his leading characters: Napoleon Solo and April Dancer. These characters would be featured on the long-running TV series, "The Man From U.N.C.L.E." Other series with spy formats followed: "I Spy" (1965) with Robert Culp and Bill Cosby; "Mission Impossible" (1966); "Honey West" (1965) with Anne Francis; and of course, "The Avengers," which began on British TV in 1961. "Dangerman," with Patrick McGoohan, ran as a half-hour show in Britain in 1960, but was expanded to a full hour in 1965. In the United States it was called "Secret Agent." Motion picture studios began spawning James Bond imitations and spoofs, most notably the two Man From U.N. C.L.E. films, To Trap a Spy (1964) and The Spy With My Face (1966). Harry Saltzman produced a series of adaptations of Len Deighton novels, starring Michael Caine as Harry Palmer. These were The Ipcress File (1964), Funeral in Berlin (1966), and Billion Dollar Brain (1968). Dean Martin became Donald Hamilton's Matt Helm in The Silencers (1966) and two others. James Coburn created an interesting character in Derek Flint in Our Man Flint and In Like Flint (1966 and 1967). Modesty Blaise (1966) featured a female agent played by Monica Vitti.

  The spy world was a glamorous image. Fashion reflected the popularity, and soon designers were creating "007" lingerie and toiletries. Magazine ads featured dashing, handsome spies holding a gun in one hand and a beautiful girl in the other. The appeal of the gadgetry in the films was also reflected in merchandising. James Bond had become England's biggest export next to the Beatles.

  The winter of 1964 was Ian Fleming's last in Jamaica. He wrote THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN, but somehow wasn't satisfied with it. He wrote to William Plomer that it needed tremendous rewriting, and that he was running out of steam. But his spirits were lifted by a surprise visit from none other than James Bond. The author of Birds of the West Indies and his wife happened to be in Jamaica at the time, and decided to drop in on Fleming. When he had read in an interview how Fleming had appropriated the name of his hero, James Bond the ornithologist was amused. Mrs. James Bond (Mary Wickham Bond) stated that the couple constantly had trouble with wisecracking porters and airline personnel. Customs officials would ask, "Not carrying any firearms, Mr. . . er, Bond?" And Bond would invariably pat his armpit and reply, "Now if I were carrying firearms, they wouldn't be in my suitcase, would they?" The Flemings and the Bonds had a pleasant visit, and Mrs. Bond later wrote an account of their "adventures" as Mr. and Mrs. James Bond in a book called How 007 Got His Name.

  In March, Fleming was advised for tax reasons to sell 51 percent of Glidrose Productions. He apparently knew his health was deteriorating; by selling more than half of the shares in his business to a public company, Glidrose would be treated as a separate entity upon the author's death. He eventually negotiated the sale with his golfing friend, Sir Jock Campbell (now Lord Campbell), chairman of Booker Brothers, McConnell & Co. Ltd. and for an estimated $280,000, Booker Brothers became co-owners of James Bond.

  YOU ONLY LIVE TWICE was published that March with jacket art by Richard Chopping featuring a toad, dragonfly, pink chrysanthemum, and Japanese character lettering. The Bookman said it "must rank among the best of the Bonds." The Daily Herald said it was "as damnably readable as ever." The book was a runaway bestseller in England. A few months later, New American Library published the book in the United States, and Anthony Boucher called it "a protracted but enjoyable travelogue of Japan, toward the end of which the author reminds himself to insert some action-adventure."

  In April, From Russia With Love premiered in the United States, again to favorable critical and audience reaction. Life magazine ran a feature on the film in their April 3 issue, as well as a profile on Sean Connery who was at the time working with Alfred Hitchcock on his film, Mamie.

  In August, Ian Fleming was asked to be the next captain at the Royal St. George's golf club at Sandwich. Fleming went to his favorite hotel, the Guilford, to attend a committee meeting of the club. On August 11, he suffered his second major heart attack, and was rushed to Canterbury Hospital. His words to the ambulance attendants were typical: "I'm awfully sorry to trouble you chaps."

  At 1:00 a.m. on August 12, Ian Fleming died. He was fifty-six years old. At the memorial service held at St Bartholomew's church on September 15, William Plomer gave a eulogy which poignantly captured the essence of the man. It was later published privately.

  Ian Fleming never saw the full extent of Bondmania which erupted in the fall. By that time, the New York Times estimated his books alone had earned him $2,800,000. Paperback sales were tripling, and film attendance was beginning to skyrocket. The third film was almost complete, and Fleming's final novel was being revised by his literary executors for publication in the spring of 1965. In October, 1964, CHITTY-CHITTY-BANG-BANG was published by Jonathan Cape. The book, with illustrations by John Burningham, was a minor triumph in children's literature. Random House released the book in America and soon, adaptations of the story were published for "younger readers." Actress Shirley Eaton appeared on the cover of the November 6 issue of Life magazine, painted entirely in gold paint, publicizing the upcoming release of Goldfinger. When the film finally opened in December, the James Bond boom broke through the ceiling.

  The year 1965 saw an avalanche of James Bond toys and merchandise. The Milton Bradley Company produced jigsaw puzzles and board games based on Goldfinger and Thunderball, as well as on James Bond 007 himself. Multiple Toy Makers manufactured a replica of the James Bond attaché case with sniperscope and plastic daggers in the lining. Gilbert produced a number of items, including James Bond and Oddjob action dolls (the latter could throw his bowler hat), as well as four-inch plastic figures of Bond characters and miniature set-pieces. Gilbert even produced a "James Bond 007 Magic Set," which had nothing to do with Bond per se, but was simply a box of magic trick toys with James Bond and spy-related designs. The Philadelphia Chewing Gum Corp. sold a pack of James Bond 007 Bubble Gum trading cards featuring scenes from Dr. No, From Russia With Love, and Goldfinger. A further set was produced a year later featuring Thunderball. For the adults, Weldon, Inc. created 007 pajamas and a complete line of 007 sleepwear, and the Colgate-Palmolive Co. manufactured a line of toiletries, including "007 Talc." Once the juvenile market was tapped, James Bond was very big business indeed.

  Multiple Toy Makers' shoulder holster and "missile" gun— "Bond's P.A.K. [Personal Attack Kit]." (Reprinted by permission of Miner Industries, Inc.)

  Multiple Toy Makers' attaché case patterned after the one used in From Russia With Love. (Reprinted by permission of Miner Industries, Inc.)

  The by-products of "Bondmania" (Photos by Pamela Cunningham Hampton)

  A.C. Gilbert Co.'s Oddjob dolls. The one on the right tosses his bowler hat by spring action. (Reprinted by permission of Gabriel.)

  A James Bond "Spy Watch," made by A. C. Gilbert Co. (Reprinted by permission of Gabriel.)

  "Action figures" of Dr. No, Oddjob, and Goldfinger, plus a moving laser beam table with James Bond strapped onto it! Made by A. C. Gilbert Co. (Reprinted by permission of Gabriel.)

  Battery-operated Aston Martin. Made by A. C. Gilbert Co. (Reprinted by permission of Gabriel.)

  Bubble-gum trading card box. (© Copyright 1965 by the Philadelphia Chewing Gum Corp., used by permission.)

  Bubble-gum trading cards. (© Copyright
1965 by the Philadelphia Chewing Gum Corp., used by permission.)

  Ever since Kevin McClory had obtained the film rights to THUNDERBALL, he had been anxious to begin production. The only problem was that Eon Productions had the market monopolized. Sean Connery was the only James Bond as far as the public was concerned, and McClory had trouble finding a suitable actor for the role. At one point, McClory approached Richard Burton to consider playing Bond, and reportedly, the actor was very interested. McClory says that while he was in the midst of his plans to launch his own production, he was approached by Broccoli and Saltzman about a deal. Perhaps the Eon producers felt that a rival 007 picture would be damaging to their own series. Cubby Broccoli flew to Dublin where he and McClory met at the airport. Here, the deal was made to make Thunderball, the fourth James Bond film, which Albert R Broccoli and Harry Saltzman would present, but Kevin McClory would produce. In actuality, the film was produced by all three men, but because of McClory's legal victory in 1963, it was he who received full credit. McClory claims that as a condition of the contract, the copyright to the film rights to the THUNDERBALL novel and screenplays related to the film would revert back to McClory ten years after the domestic release date of Thunderball. He agreed not to make further Bond pictures based on "The Film Scripts," during this period.

  In late 1964 and early 1965, Leonard Russell, features editor on the Sunday Times, commissioned a biography of Ian Fleming and engaged John Pearson, a writer who had assisted Fleming on the "Atticus" column in the newspaper, as the author. Throughout 1965, Russell and Pearson collected reminiscences and letters from Fleming's friends and colleagues, and put together the pieces of the man's many-faceted life. Fleming's personal correspondence was purchased from Anne Fleming as well. Pearson traveled all over the world to interview people like Nazim Kalkavan in Istanbul, Sir William Stephenson in Bermuda, and Richard Hughes in the Far East. The Life of Ian Fleming was published by Jonathan Cape a year later. Russell and Pearson had originally planned to share the credit on the book, but since Pearson had done all the work, Russell agreed to let him have full credit.

  Board games. (Reprinted by permission of Milton Bradley Co.)

  Colgate-Palmolive produced a line of 007 toiletries. (Reprinted by permission of Colgate-Palmolive Co.)

  Vanity Fair's Clock Radio. (Reprinted by permission of ERTL, a subsidiary of Kidde, Inc.)

  T-shirts and "diplomas" on sale at a New York James Bond Collectors Convention.

  In April, THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN was published posthumously. The jacket illustration was again by Richard Chopping, this time a wrap-around showing a gold-plated Colt .45 revolver, flies and gold bullets. Unfortunately, since Fleming had been unable to do his usual rewriting and revising, the novel was a weak entry in the Bond canon. Kingsley Amis, in the New Statesman, called it "a sadly empty tale, empty of the interests and effects that for better or worse, Ian Fleming made his own." When it was published in August in America, it was received somewhat more enthusiastically. But despite mixed reviews, the book remained a bestseller on both sides of the Atlantic for a long time.

  Almost overshadowing THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN was a book by O. F. Snelling called 007 James Bond: A Report, the first of the books about Fleming's novels. Published late in 1964, it was a best seller. In May, 1965, Jonathan Cape published the "official" study of the Bond oeuvre: The James Bond Dossier by Kingsley Amis. Amis had originally intended to write a simple article on the works, but as he states in his foreword, the article grew to formidable book length. Written with warmth and humor, Amis' book is more a series of essays on different facets of the novels than a scholarly study. Also appearing in 1965 was The Book of Bond, or Every Man His Own 007, published by Jonathan Cape in England and Viking Press in the United States. Kingsley Amis wrote this book as well, using the pseudonym "Lt. Col. William 'Bill' Tanner" (M's Chief of Staff in the novels).The Book of Bond was an amusing trivia collection with information on James Bond's tastes in clothes, food, drink, etc.

  A double bill re-release of Dr. No and From Russia With Love the summer of 1965 made more money than the films' first releases, and Thunderball, released at the end of the year, was the biggest grossing Bond film to that date. The production received the most publicity and news coverage of any of the Bond films, as over 10,000 reporters and photographers flooded the Bahamas to get a glimpse of the proceedings. Many magazines, such as Life, Saturday Evening Post, and Look featured cover stories on the film. An hour-long TV special called "The Incredible World of James Bond" was shown in the fall of 1965, featuring behind-the-scenes looks at Thunderball, plus clips from the previous three films. Thunderball had one of the biggest openings in cinematic history.

  The January 7, 1966 issue of Life magazine featured Sean Connery on the cover. But to millions of kids and adults alike, it was "James Bond." This was becoming a problem for the actor who played him. Sean Connery was rapidly losing his identity as an actor capable of other types of roles. It infuriated him when the press only wanted to ask him questions about James Bond, when he'd much rather have talked about the experiences he had making The Hill,a fine film released in 1965 and directed by his Mend Sidney Lumet But what really irritated the actor was that production of the Bond pictures almost always went over the allotted time period, a time Connery felt he could be putting to better use. In a recent interview he related that it took six weeks to film The Hill, while You Only Live Twice took six months, the time it would take to make four small films.

  It is not surprising, therefore, that Sean Connery decided he didn't want to be James Bond anymore. His announcement worried Cubby Broccoli and Harry Saltzman who signed Connery to make You Only Live Twice on a one-picture basis, releasing him from his original picture-a-year contract. With Connery secure, Eon Productions began work that summer in Japan.

  In March, Glidrose Productions released two of Ian Fleming's short stories which Jonathan Cape published as OCTOPUSSY AND THE LIVING DAYLIGHTS (generally referred to simply as OCTOPUSSY). The title story had been written by Fleming in the early sixties but never published. It was also serialized in Playboy in 1966. The second story was originally published by the Sunday Times in 1962. Richard Chopping's jacket illustration featured a scorpionfish, seashell, and flies on a wood background. The book was received only moderately well, not nearly as well as Fleming's other anthology, FOR YOUR EYES ONLY. In the New American Library edition, illustrations by Paul Bacon were added. When the 1967 paperback edition was released in both countries, a third short story, "The Property of a Lady," (originally written for Sotheby's) was included.

  Celebrated British writer, Kingsley Amis, caught reading an issue of Bondage Magazine (published by the James Bond 007 Fan Club). Amis was the author of COLONEL SUN (using the pseudonym Robert Markham) and TheJames Bond Dossier. (Photo by Raymond Benson.)

  In October 1966, Life magazine published a two-part serialization of John Pearson's The Life of Ian Fleming and ran a photograph of Ian Fleming behind the wheel of a Bentley on the cover of the October 7 issue. The book was published the same month, and remains the definitive biography of Fleming.

  While Eon Productions was busy making You Only Live Twice, another James Bond film was in production. Charles K. Feldman, who had bought the rights to CASINO ROYALE from Gregory Ratoff's widow, had finally begun making the picture. At first, Feldman intended to make a serious Bond film and even attempted to interest Broccoli and Saltzman into co-producing. When Feldman was turned down, he decided, at the suggestion of several writers, to make a James Bond spoof. Many writers worked on the script, some uncredited, including Wolf Mankowitz, John Law, Michael Sayers, Ben Hecht, Terry Southern, and Woody Allen. The film also had five directors. Needless to say, Casino Royale, released in April of 1967 by Columbia Pictures, was a mess. There are a few funny bits in the film, which starred Peter Sellers, Ursula Andress, David Niven (as "Sir" James Bond), Orson Welles, Woody Allen, and a host of guest stars including William Holden, John Huston, and Deborah Kerr. But mostly,
the plot was confusing and many of the gags never worked. Casino Royale, in all fairness, shouldn't be considered a James Bond film.

  The official Bond was back in the summer of 1967 when You Only Live Twice was finally released. It was the first film to totally throw out Ian Fleming's story, and illustrates the increasing outlandishness of the series. James Bond was disappearing as a character, and the sets and gadgets were taking over. In terms of spectacle, however, You Only Live Twice was impressive. The production values of the films showed no signs of sagging.

  Sean Connery made it clear that You Only Live Twice was his last James Bond film. The producers were then forced to begin searching for an actor to replace him in their next project, On Her Majesty's Secret Service.

  In the spring of 1968, a new James Bond novel was published, written by Robert Markham. Titled COLONEL SUN and published by Jonathan Cape in England (and by Harper and Row in the United States), it featured Salvador Dali-like jacket art by Tom Adams. Robert Markham turned out to be a pseudonym for Kingsley Amis, who had written The James Bond Dossier. It was Glidrose's original intention that other writers would have shots at writing Bond books, but they would all use the same pseudonym to avoid confusion. The book received mixed reviews in both countries, mainly because the style was so different from the Fleming books. The Sunday Times said that "Mr. Amis is an extremely gifted novelist," but went on to say that James Bond was so personal to Fleming that Amis' work "doesn't ring true." But The Listener defended the work, saying that Ian Fleming's "inheritance has been well and aptly bestowed. . . fast-moving action, a rather superior Bond-maiden, violence, knowledgeableness about guns, golf and seamanship. . . Good dirty fun." Kingsley Amis himself considered it a compliment that an American fan wrote and asked him to confirm the rumor that COLONEL SUN had been based on drafts and notes which Ian Fleming had left behind. (It wasn't) COLONEL SUN seemed to be a misfire at the time, although in retrospect it is a very admirable novel. Because of the somewhat poor reception of the book, Glidrose was silent for quite a while.