On This Day

RichardTheBruce

27th August

1947: Barbara Bach (Barbara Goldbach) is born--Queens, New York City, New York.
1967: Tom Ford is born--Austin, Texas.
1977: The Spy Who Loved Me LP soundtrack makes US music charts, later reaching #40.

1989: TV movie Goldeneye premieres starring Charles Dance as Ian Fleming.

1997: Roger Spottiswoode films the closing scene--Bond and Wai Lin kissing.
2007: Madrid filming comes to a close in Spain.

RichardTheBruce

August 28th

1970: Comic strip Colonel Sun ends its run in The Daily Express. (Started 1 December 1969. 1175–1393)
Yaroslav Horak, artist. Jim Lawrence, writer.

bond-o-rama.dk/en/jb007-dk-no-22-1971/
comicsbulletin.com/james-bond-omnibus-volume-003/

1971: Comic strip Double Jeopardy ends its run in The Daily Express. (Started 21 April 1971. 1597–1708)
Yaroslav Horak, artist. Jim Lawrence, writer.

https://mi6-hq.com/sections/comics/dj.php3
http://www.bond-o-rama.dk/en/jb007-dk-no24-1972/

1977: Following its West End run, The Spy Who Loved Me begins 2 weeks at North London cinemas.
1978: Robert Shaw dies at age 51--Tourmakeady, County Mayo, England.
(Born 9 August 1927--Westhoughton, Lancashire, England.)
2005: BBC One airs Ian Fleming--Bondmaker starring Ben Daniels.

2001: The U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals in Pasadena rejects Kevin McClory's claims on Bond.
2012: MGM and partners announce a new documentary, Everything or Nothing--The Untold Story of 007, to come available 5 October with the 50th anniversary of Bond films.
2018: National Bow Tie Day in the U.S.

RichardTheBruce

August 29th

1928: Charles Gray is born--Bournemouth, Dorset, England.
(He dies 7 March 2000 at age 71--Brompton, London.)
1942: Gottfried John is born--Berlin, Germany. (He dies 1 September 2014 at age 72--Utting, Germany.)
1979: Moonraker released in Kenya.
1984: Diamantes para la eternidad re-released in Spain.

1987: Roger Moore hosts television documentary Happy Anniversary 007--25 Years of James Bond.

the007dossier.com/007dossier/post/2013/06/12/Happy-Anniversary-007

http://www.the007dossier.com/007dossier/media/Happy-anniversary-007-1987.mp4

2017: Sir Sean Connery smiles for the James Bond Theme and a standing ovation at the U.S. Open.

RichardTheBruce

August 30

1963: Time magazine reviews the latest Fleming novel On Her Majesty's Secret Service.

footenotes.net/Pages/Bond.htm

Fate Worse Than Death
Time, August 30, 1963

ON HER MAJESTY'S SECRET SERVICE
by Ian Fleming
299 pages. New American Library. $4.50.

SOME TIME BACK, when sober-sided Britons belabored Author Ian Fleming for the consumer snobbery of his caddish hero (James Bond's car is a Bentley, his girls invariably smell of Guerlain), Fleming was unrepentant. He was sorry, he said, only for having once permitted Bond the unforgivable gaffe of ordering asparagus with bearnaise instead of mousseline sauce. But in Fleming's latest Bond bombshell, there are disquieting signs that he took the critics to heart. On page 152, sophisticated Secret Agent 007 cozies up to a blonde who smells of nothing more aristocratic than Mennen's baby powder.

For Fleming fans, who like 007 just as he is, worse is to come. Pitted once more against Ernst Blofeld, the fell master of the international crime syndicate called SPECTRE (Special Executive for Counterintelligence, Revenge and Extortion), Bond at first displays his customary stocks in trade. He uses his own urine as invisible ink, and successfully escapes from Blofeld's Alpine retreat by a daredevil schuss down the snow-covered, moonlit slope—as patrols of goons with guns set an avalanche tumbling down after him. Then, suddenly, Bond is threatened with what, for an international cad, would clearly be a fate worse than death: matrimony.

The lady is a countess named Tracy She drives like Stirling Moss and reeks of Guerlain. So far so good. But —horrors—she sometimes sounds like Debbie Reynolds. Gushes Tracy to Bond: "I've got enough sheets and pillows for two and other exciting things to do with being married." The old Bond would ordinarily give this kind of chatter some suavely short shrift. The new Bond revels in it. "Togetherness," he reflects sententiously. "What a curiously valid cliché it was!"

When Bond actually marries Tracy all seems lost. Author Fleming, however, has never been without resources. He appears deus ex machina (the machine, reassuringly, is a lethal red Maserati) on page 299 and saves James Bond from his better self.

1971: James Bond comic strip Starfire begins its run in The Daily Express.
(Finishes 24 December 1971. 1709–1809) Yaroslav Horak, artist. Jim Lawrence, writer.

1983: Octopussy released in the Philippines.
2017: Dynamite Comics releases James Bond: Moneypenny.

RichardTheBruce

August 31

1954: Caroline Cossey is born--Brooke, Norfolk, England.
1962: Chris Ware photographs Sean Connery in his own basement flat.

1972: The Daily Gleaner reports on Harry Saltzman's 26 August arrival in Jamaica.
He promises filming in Montego Bay (the fishing boat), Falmouth (croc farm, caves), Ocho Rios (the hotel).
1976: Filming of The Spy Who Loved Me begins with General Gogol's office in the Kremlin.
(Ken Adams' set, Pinewood Studios).
1979: Moonraker released in Austria.
1979: James Bond 007 – Moonraker – Streng geheim released in West Germany.

1991: Guns N' Roses performs their live version of "Live and Let Die" at Wembley Stadium, London,
used on the B-side of the single.

1997: Diana, Princess of Wales, dies in a Paris car crash.

RichardTheBruce

September 1st

1943: Don Stroud is born--Honolulu, Hawaii.
2012: Hal David dies at age 91--West Hollywood, California.
(Born 25 May 1921--Brooklyn, New York City, New York.)
2014: Gottfried John dies at age 72--Munich, Bavaria, Germany. (Born 29 August 1942--Berlin, Germany.)
2013: Wing Commander Kenneth Horatio Wallis dies at age 97-- Reymerston, Norfolk, England.
(Born 26 April 1916--Ely, Cambridgeshire, England.)

James Bond Pilot Ken Wallis Gets Lifetime Award
Kenneth Horatio Wallis, DSO MBE DEng CEng FRAeS PhD

Autogyro Little Nellie with its creator and pilot, Ken Wallis

Born 26 April 1916: Ely, Cambridgeshire
Died 1 September 2013 (aged 97): Dereham, Norfolk
Allegiance United Kingdom
Service/branch Royal Air Force
Years of service 1939–1964
Rank Wing Commander
Unit No. 268 Squadron RAF
No. 103 Squadron RAF
No. 37 Squadron RAF
Battles/wars World War II
Awards Distinguished Service Order
Other work Leading exponent of autogyros

Wing Commander Kenneth Horatio Wallis DSO MBE CEng FRAeS RAF (26 April 1916 – 1 September 2013) was a British aviator, engineer, and inventor. During the Second World War, Wallis served in the Royal Air Force and flew 28 bomber missions over Germany; after the war, he moved on to research and development, before retiring in 1964. He later became one of the leading exponents of autogyros and earned 34 world records, still holding eight of them at the time of his death in 2013.

Early life
Born on 26 April 1916 at Ely, Cambridgeshire, Wallis developed a practical interest in mechanics, building a motorcycle at the age of 11. In 1936, he was inspired by a demonstration by Henri Mignet of his Mignet HM.14 Pou-du-Ciel ("Flying Flea"). Using only Mignet's book, Wallis gathered the materials required, and started to build his own Flying Flea. He abandoned construction because of widespread adverse publicity about fatal accidents that implied inadequate design of the type.

Wallis took an interest in powerboats which he kept up until 1957, when he won the 56-mile (90 km) long Missouri Marathon.

Military career
Wallis was keen to join the RAF, and applied for their Volunteer Reserve Service, but he was turned down due to a defective right eye. Consequently, he obtained a private flying licence which required only a certificate signed by his GP. Wallis obtained his A Licence for dual and solo flying in a record 12 hours. In 1938, Wallis tried to join the RAF again, this time with the newly formed RAF Short Service Commission Scheme, but again failed the eye test. In 1939, he was called up to RAF Uxbridge, and again was sent for a medical. When it came to the eyesight test he managed to pass, as Wallis later recalled, "I did the first line with my good eye then they covered it up and asked me to read the bottom line with my bad eye, without them realising I just turned my head slightly so I could again see with my good eye – I passed it with Above Average Eye Sight!"

Wallis's military career started with Westland Lysander patrols in the RAF. In 1942, he was transferred to RAF Bomber Command, flying Wellingtons near Grimsby. Wallis subsequently served in Italy and on secondment to the US Strategic Air Command, where he flew the massive Convair B-36, that had six piston engines and four auxiliary jet engines. Thereafter, he was involved in research and development, and was awarded a number of patents on his inventions. Wallis left the RAF in 1964, retiring to Norfolk.

Autogyros
Wallis produced autogyros for, in his own words, "reconnaissance, research & development, surveillance and military purposes", and his designs were not available for enthusiasts as he considered that although the design is simple it has to be built to the appropriate standards. His contribution to autogyro design included the "offset gimbal rotor head".

Wallis worked as Sean Connery's stunt pilot in the 1967 James Bond film You Only Live Twice, where he flew one of his WA-116s named Little Nellie.

Production was at Cambridge by "Wallis Autogyros Ltd." run by his cousin.

In 1970, Wallis provided camera footage from one of his autogyros in a search for the Loch Ness Monster.

In 1970 it was announced that Airmark would produce his autogyro design with a certificate of airworthiness (C of A), that being essential for commercial use of the autogyro. Expected price was around £3,000.

Between 2006 and 2009, Wallis took part in filming for Into the Wind, a documentary by Steven Hatton featuring the experiences and memories of wartime members of Bomber Command. The film, released in 2012, features Wallis demonstrating several of his autogyro designs.

Wallis was the President of the Norfolk and Suffolk Aviation Museum, and Patron of the Wolf Preservation Foundation.

a 1:24 scale plastic model kit of Wallis' WA-116 Little Nellie autogyro as portrayed in the 1967 James Bond film, You Only Live Twice, was released by the Airfix company.

Autogyros and aircraft

Wallbro Monoplane Replica
Wallis WA-116 Agile
Wallis WA-117
Wallis WA-118 Meteorite
Wallis WA-119
Wallis WA-120
Wallis WA-121

Recognition
Wallis was the recognized world record holder for many categories of autogyro records over the years, and was also recognized as the oldest pilot to set a world flight record at the age of 89. Wallis held most of the autogyro world records during his autogyro flying career. These include the Fédération Aéronautique Internationale time-to-climb, a speed record of 189 km/h (111.7 mph), and the straight-line distance record of 869.23 km (540.11 mi). On 16 November 2002, Wallis increased the speed record to 207.7 km/h (129.1 mph).

Wallis received the MBE in 1996.

In July 2013, Wallis received a campaign medal for his 28 bomber missions over Germany during World War II.
Later life

He was married to Peggy Stapley, a Women's Auxiliary Air Force veteran, from 1942 to her death in 2003. Wallis died on 1 September 2013, aged 97. Prior to his death, he was living in the quiet Norfolk village of Reymerston.

Old Buckenham Airport held a memorial event on 29 September at the request of the Wallis family: "A Celebration of the Life of Wing Commander Ken Wallis". It had been expected that about 500 people would attend, but an estimated 3,000 to 4,000 attended the event.

RichardTheBruce

September 2nd

1980: The For Your Eyes Only film production officially starts with three days of filming the St. Georges
in the North Sea.

RichardTheBruce

September 3rd

1943: Valerie Perrine is born--Galveston, Texas.
1963: Serena Gordon is born--London, England.
2008: Charlie Higson's Young Bond novel By Royal Command published by Puffin Books.

2015: A new poster for Spectre showcases classic Bond elements and The Day of the Dead.

RichardTheBruce

September 4th

1977: The Spy Who Loved Me starts its South London booking.
1993: Hervé Villechaize dies at age 50--North Hollywood, Los Angeles, California.
(Born 23 April 1943--Paris, France.)

RichardTheBruce

September 5th

1939: George Lazenby is born--Goulburn, New South Wales, Australia.
1968: Richard Maibaum finishes the script used to film On Her Majesty's Secret Service.
1979: 007 Contra o Foguete da Morte (oo7: Contra or Death Struggling) released in Brazil.

1988: Gert Fröbe dies at age 75--Munich, Bavaria, West Germany.
(Born 25 February 1913--Oberplanitz, Zwickau, Saxony, Germany.)
1993: Claude Renoir dies at age 79--Troyes, Aube, France. (Born 4 December 1913--Paris, France.)
2006: John McClusky dies at age 83--Hatfield, Hertfordshire, England.
(Born 20 January 1923--Dennistoun, Glasgow, Scotland.)
2012: Designing 007 – Fifty Years of Bond Style finishes its run at the Barbican Centre, London.
Following cities: Dubai, Paris, Madrid, Melbourne, Mexico City, Moscow, Rotterdam, Shanghai, Toronto.

2018: Dynamite Comics releases James Bond Origins #1.

https://syfy.com/syfywire/exclusive-jeff-parker-on-007s-formative-years-in-dynamites-james-bond-origin






Alternate covers.

RichardTheBruce

September 6th

1955: Raymond Benson is born--Midland, Texas.
1976: Naomie Harris is born--London, England.
1979: 007 – Aventura no Espaco released in Portugal.
2007: Charlie Higson's Young Bond novel Hurricane Gold published by Puffin.

2008: Jack White and Alicia Keyes film a video in Toronto.

RichardTheBruce

September 7th

1951: Chrissie Hynde is born--Akron, Ohio
1994: Terence Young dies at age 79--Cannes, Alpes-Maritimes, France.
(Born: 20 June 1915-- Shanghai, China.)
2003: Warren Zevon dies at age 56--Los Angeles, California.
(Born 24 January 1947--Chicago, Illinois.)

Zevon Diagnosed With Lung Cancer
https://rollingstone.com/music/music-news/zevon-diagnosed-with-lung-cancer-248846/
Veteran singer-songwriter’s disease untreatable
By Andrew Dansby - September 12, 2002

Warren Zevon has been diagnosed with lung cancer, and the disease
has advanced to an untreatable stage. The fifty-five-year-old
singer-songwriter received the news last month and is currently
spending time at home with his children and in the studio recording
new songs.

In keeping with the acerbic wit found in his songs like “Life’ll
Kill Ya” and “I’ll Sleep When I’m Dead,” Zevon said of his
diagnosis, “I’m OK with it, but it’ll be a drag if I don’t make it
till the next James Bond movie comes out.”

Nearly three years ago, Zevon released the eerily prophetic
Life’ll Kill Ya, with several songs addressing death and
illness. “Sickness, doctors, that scares me,” he told Rolling
Stone at the time. “Not violence — helplessness. That’s why I
turn to violent stories, I think.” At the time, Zevon said the
songs were not inspired by any sort of health scare. “It’s kind of
the fun of it, pretending to deal with something that you don’t
want to, and try to laugh about it. I mean, I’ve had guns in my
face, I’ve been robbed, but the doctor stuff — it’s too much for
me.”

Zevon began his career in the late Sixties as a session man and
songwriter for the likes of the Everly Brothers and the Turtles. He
also penned Linda Ronstadt’s 1978 hit “Poor Poor Pitiful Me” and
scored one of his own that same year with “Werewolves of London.”
In May, Zevon released his eleventh studio album, My Ride’s
Here, which featured collaborations with writers Hunter S.
Thompson, Carl Hiaasen and Paul Muldoon. Rhino Records will release
a new anthology of his work, Genius: The Best of Warren
Zevon, on October 15th.

2012: Press release announces the future Skyfall world premiere (23 October) at the Royal Albert Hall, London.

RichardTheBruce

September 8th

1967: Casino Royale released in Australia.

Daybill

2015: Sam Smith announces he's written and will sing the title song for Spectre.
2015: Anthony Horowitz's Bond novel Trigger Mortis published by Orion. Audio book voiced by David Oyelowo.

RichardTheBruce

September 9th

1935: Topol is born--Tel Aviv, Palestine.
1951: Steven Jay Ruben is born--Chicago, Illinois.
1959: Éric Serra is born--Paris, France.
1961: Neal Purvis is born--United Kingdom.
1961: James Bond comic strip From A View A Kill ends its run in The Daily Express.
(Began 26 June 1961. 922-987) John McLusky, artist. Henry Gammidge, writer.

1966: James Bond comic The Man with the Golden Gun ends its run in The Daily Express.
(Began 10 January 1966. 1-209) Yaroslav Horak, artist. Jim Lawrence, writer.

1979: Moonraker released in Spain.
2012: Ruth Kempf dies at age 97--Opelousas, Louisiana. (Born 9 March 1915.)

RichardTheBruce

September 10th

1995: Derek Meddings dies at age 64--London, England.
(Born 15 January 1931--Pancras, London, England.)
2014: Richard Dawson Kiel dies at age 74--Fresno, California.
(Born 13 September 1939--Detroit, Michigan.)
2015: Stephanie Sigman appears in Moët Hennessy's ad for Belvedere vodka.

RichardTheBruce

September 11th

1955: Ian Fleming writes "The Great Riot of Istanbul" about the Istanbul pogroms,
later published in The Sunday Times. His description: "hatred ran through the streets like lava."
1961: Bond comic strip For Your Eyes Only begins its run in The Daily Express.
(Ends 9 December 196. 988-1065) John McLusky, artist. Henry Gammidge, writer.

1967: Agent 007 - du lever kun to gange released in Denmark.

1985: Dangereusement votre (Dangerously Yours) released in France.

1993: Timothy Dalton comments in TV Guide magazine that he'll be in the next Bond film.
2001: Diamonds Are Forever and Live and Let Die released on video in Russia.
2001: Terrorist attacks this day compel Clear Channel to add "Live and Let Die" to its eventual list
of inappropriate song titles.
2008: Coca-Cola Zero's latest ad uses music from Jack White and Bond-style images.

RichardTheBruce

September 12th

1914: Desmond Llewelyn is born--Newport, Wales.
(He dies 19 December 1999 at age 85--Firle, East Sussex, England.)

Culture
Obituary: Desmond Llewelyn
https://independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/obituary-desmond-llewelyn-1133864.html
Tom Vallance - Tuesday 21 December 1999 01:02
The Independent Culture

DESMOND LLEWELYN was an actor for over 60 years, but will forever be remembered for just one role, that of "Q", inventor of countless gadgets for the spy James Bond. With an air of impatient but kindly acumen, he would introduce Bond to a batch of innocent-looking but lethal high-tech instruments in a scene that was always a highlight of each adventure.

When the producers left him out of one of the Bond movies, Live and Let Die (1973), claiming that the films were becoming too dependent on gadgetry, there was a storm of protest from fans who missed his trademark cameo. The character was restored permanently and is to be seen in the latest adventure, The World Is Not Enough. During the last week Llewelyn had been attracting large crowds at book signings for a new biography, Q: the biography of Desmond Llewelyn, written by Sandy Hernu, who described the actor as "enormously funny and entertaining and great fun to be with". She said that the man on screen was similar to the real one, except that Llewelyn hated gadgets. He once said, "In real life gadgets explode or expire as I touch them."

The son of a coal-mining engineer, Llewelyn was born in South Wales in 1914. His parents wanted him to be a chartered accountant, but a period as an articled clerk bored him, and after considering several professions he decided on a stage career and enrolled, at the age of 20, at the Royal Academy of Dramatic Art, where he studied for two years.

As he said later, "I'd tried the Church and that failed. I was too dim for accountancy, too short-sighted for the police force and an insufficient liar to make a good politician. What else was left but to become an actor? I remember Richard Burton saying to me years later that the reason there are so many Welsh actors is because the Church is not very popular nowadays." Fellow students at Rada included Geoffrey Keen, later to appear in several Bond films, and Margaret Lockwood, "to whom I quite lost my heart".

While still at Rada he made his film debut with a walk-on in the Gracie Fields film Look Up and Laugh (1935), but his first professional job after leaving the academy was with a repertory company in Southend, the first of several such companies with whom he gained experience. He was appearing in Bexhill, East Sussex (where he eventually settled) when he met Pamela Pantlin, a member of the "Women's League for Health and Beauty", and they were married in 1938.

The following year, Llewelyn was in another film, the Will Hay comedy Ask a Policeman, but his career was then interrupted by the Second World War, in which he served as a second lieutenant assigned to the Royal Welsh Fusiliers. Captured by German soldiers in France, he spent five years as a prisoner of war.

He resumed his film career with a war film, They Were Not Divided (1950), in which he was one of two soldiers named Jones, who was thus addressed as "77 Jones" - the other was "45 Jones". The director was Terence Young, who 13 years later was director of From Russia With Love, the film which changed the course of Llewelyn's career.

Llewelyn had been appearing in regional theatre and playing small film roles - he had four lines in Cleopatra (1962) - when he auditioned for the role of Q. The character is not in the Ian Fleming books, though in the first Bond story, Casino Royale, it is "Q Branch" that provides 007's gadgets, and in Llewelyn's first two Bond films his character is billed as "Major Boothroyd", becoming simply "Q" in Thunderball (1965). (In the first Bond film, Dr No (1962), Boothroyd had been played by Peter Burton, who was not available for the filming of From Russia With Love.)

Young wanted the character to speak with a Welsh accent, but Llewelyn preferred to interpret the character as "a toffee-nosed Englishman". "At the risk of losing the part and with silent apologies to my native land, I launched into Q's lines using the worst Welsh accent, followed by the same in English," he said.

Bond was in need of gadgets in From Russia With Love, for he had to contend with two of the most dastardly villains of the series, the blond hulk Red Grant (Robert Shaw) and the sadistic Rosa Klebb (Lotte Lenya), who uses knife-toed boots to kick her victims to death. A booby-trapped briefcase was the principal item with which Bond was equipped, courtesy of Q, who was to become a fixture of the Bond adventures (with the exception of Live and Let Die) and almost as popular a figure as Bond himself. His description of the versatile briefcase was typical of Q's briefings: "Here is an ordinary black leather case. Hidden in these steel rods are 20 rounds of ammunition. Press that button and you have a throwing knife. Inside is your AR7, a folding sniper's rifle and 50 gold sovereigns. This looks like an ordinary tin of talcum powder, but it conceals a tear gas cartridge and is kept in place by a magnetic device . . ."

Guy Hamilton directed the next film in which Llewelyn played Q, Goldfinger (1964), and the actor credits him with changing his approach to the role. "Previously I'd played Q as a toffee-nosed technician, more than slightly in awe of Bond." Hamilton changed that approach. "He said, `This man annoys you. He's irritatingly flippant and doesn't treat your gadgets with respect. Deep down you may envy his charm with women, but remember you're the teacher."

After that, Llewelyn stated, he played Q with "a veiled exasperation coupled with a humorous tolerance to 007's flippancy and aggravating habit of fiddling with the gadgets". That exasperation mounted over the years, and in Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), Q's first words to 007 were "Now pay attention, Bond", and his last, "Oh, grow up, 007!"

Asked recently which Bond he considered best, Llewelyn chose Sean Connery as "perfect", adding, "George Lazenby played it straight and rather well. Roger Moore was much lighter and more jokey. It was a rather camp portrayal, with a lot more emphasis on humour, but it worked. Timothy Dalton was Ian Fleming's Bond - a real character. His confidence and surliness were straight from the books. It was brave, but people didn't like it. Pierre Brosnan is extremely good. He has the right look and manner."

The character of Q was due to be retired after the latest Bond film, The World Is Not Enough, with his sidekick R, played by John Cleese, replacing him. The actor loved playing Q, but in recent years his private life had been marked by tragedy as he watched his wife suffer from Alzheimer's disease.

Llewelyn appeared in such television series as Doomwatch and Follyfoot and made other films, including Operation Kid Brother (1967), which starred Sean Connery's brother Neil playing the sibling of 007. Bernard Lee ("M") and Lois Maxwell ("Moneypenny") were other Bond regulars cast in this weak film to bolster its appeal. But it is for his performances in 17 Bond films that Llewelyn will have a permanent part in film history, equipping the hero with toxic fountain-pens, exploding toothpaste and dozens of similar gadgets with which to confound or exterminate his adversaries.

Desmond Wilkinson Llewelyn, actor: born Newport, Monmouthshire 12 September 1914; married 1938 Pamela Pantlin (two sons); died Firle, East Sussex 19 December 1999.

1940: Lieutenant Commander Ian Fleming's memo to Naval Intelligence Director Rear Admiral John Henry Godfrey inspires Operation Ruthless, a pursuit of the Enigma codebooks used by Nazi Germany and its navy.
1966: Bond comic strip The Living Daylights begins its run in The Daily Express.
(Ends 12 November 1966. 210-263) Yaroslav Horak, artist. Jim Lawrence, writer.

1975: ABC-TV premieres Diamonds Are Forever.

1983: Octopussy released in Barcelona Spain.
1985: A View to a Kill released in Greece.
2018: Dynamite Comics releases James Bond Origins #1.

https://syfy.com/syfywire/exclusive-jeff-parker-on-007s-formative-years-in-dynamites-james-bond-origin






Alternate covers.

RichardTheBruce

September 13th

1916: Roald Dahl is born--Llandaff, Cardiff, Wales.
(He dies 23 November 1990 at age 74--Oxford, Oxfordshire, England.)

Wednesday 12 September 2018
Roald Dahl: a life filled with tales of the unexpected
Roald Dahl was born 100 years ago in September and lived a life
scarred by tragedy and marred by his own difficult personality.
But his magical characters are more alive than ever


Roald Dahl and Patricia Neal (recovering from a stroke, hence the eye patch) in 1965, with their children Theo, baby Ophelia and Tessa, at their home in Great Missenden.

Emily Hourican - August 29 2016 2:30 AM

Roald Dahl was born 100 years ago, on September 13, to Norwegian parents in Cardiff. He died 26 years ago, yet his books, specifically his children's books, are still bought in huge numbers (over 200 million worldwide) and regularly adapted for film, TV and stage. Matilda has been playing on Broadway since 2013 and, of course, The BFG has just been released in a new, big-screen version directed by Spielberg. Roald also created a dynasty and established Dahl as a surname that manages to be both thoroughly establishment and fascinatingly bohemian.

His remarkable imagination - exuberant, vengeful, often nauseating - and ability to create characters, usually orphans, filled with a pathos that makes us burn with indignation, are what have kept Dahl's books alive, but the whiff of sulphur that always hung around the man hasn't gone away either. Because as much as he is acknowledged a wonderful writer, with a rare understanding of children's psychology, he was also a difficult, often cruel man, with a heap of unpalatable views.

Most recently, as Spielberg prepared for the release of The BFG, he was ambushed by allegations of Dahl's anti-Semitism, specifically a quote Dahl gave to The New Statesman: "There is a trait in the Jewish character that does provoke animosity, maybe it's a kind of lack of generosity towards non-Jews . . . even a stinker like Hitler didn't just pick on them for no reason."

Spielberg, himself Jewish, of course, and visibly horrified, was forced to try and defend Dahl, and by extension himself, saying he had "no excuse" for not researching Dahl's public statements, but adding: "Later, when I began asking questions of people who knew Dahl, they told me he liked to say things he didn't mean just to get a reaction. And all his comments . . . he would say for effect, even if they were horrible things."


Dahl's second wife, Felicity, beneath his portrait.

It is difficult to judge and condemn the products of a previous era by our own much-changed standards. But even so, Spielberg's defence seems weak and Dahl's words far less the act of a provocateur than the musings of a bigot.

Probably the best defence - if one is to be admitted - is Dahl's own life; the many tragedies he faced, the strange mixture of courage and cruelty he displayed. Bad things happen in Roald Dahl books - James's parents die, Mr Fox gets his tail shot off, the child (never named) from The Witches spends his life as a mouse - and they are full of disgusting, terrible people, such as James's aunts, Matilda's father, George's grandmother. These people and events are faithfully rendered, with no glossing-over or soothing euphemisms, and the reason for it becomes very obvious with even a passing knowledge of Dahl's life.

He may have been dashing, handsome, brilliant - his second wife, Felicity Crosland, described him as the "sexiest seducer in Washington" - but Dahl was also known as 'Roald The Rotten'; domineering, inconsistent and driven by his memories of tragedy. Granddaughter Sophie described him as "a very difficult man - very strong, very dominant".

The little girl with the big eyes in The BFG is based on Sophie, but the book is dedicated to Olivia, Dahl's eldest daughter, who he adored and who died of measles encephalitis when she was just seven. It was a terrible loss, one that had heart-breaking echoes of the death from appendicitis, also at the age of seven, of Roald's elder sister, Astri.

A month after her death, Roald's father, who never recovered from the blow, died of pneumonia.

Roald was just three at the time. From the age of eight, he was sent off to a series of boarding schools, where he was mostly miserable and homesick. That may have been the experience of most small boys dispatched in that particularly English tradition; the difference with Roald is that he never forgot. Nor, perhaps, did he ever recover.

Reviewer Kathryn Hughes once said: "No matter how you spin it, Roald Dahl was an absolute sod. Crashing through life like a big, bad child, he managed to alienate pretty much everyone he ever met."

His nickname when young was 'Apple' because he was his mother's favourite. He wrote to her every day from boarding school, but never confessed the depths of his loneliness and misery. Instead, he put a brave face on the regular bouts of violence and ritual humiliation that were so much part of the boarding-school experience then and this daily exercise in glossing over the wretched truth may very well have been the early training in storytelling he needed.

After school, Dahl travelled the world, working for Shell oil, then joined the RAF when the Second World War broke out. A dashing, daring pilot, he spent much of the war in the US, sleeping with society beauties and passing on whatever bits of intelligence he gleaned from pillow talk. Felicity Crosland described Dahl, 6ft 6ins and a fine sportsman, as "wildly attractive and handsome, in his RAF uniform, speaking English, a fighter pilot - completely seductive. And he was charming and intelligent. A lot of women fell for him."

Dahl, in turn, fell for the actress Patricia Neal, who he met at a dinner party hosted by playwright and screenwriter Lillian Hellman. Neal's career had started in a blaze of glory - before she was 21, she won a Tony award for her Broadway debut. Then she moved to Hollywood, where she started in the film adaptation of Ayn Rand's best-selling, ground-breaking novel The Fountainhead, and fell passionately in love with Gary Cooper.

The affair lasted three years, during which time Neal got pregnant and had an abortion.

Later, she wrote: "If I had only one thing to do over in my life, I would have that baby" - but Cooper refused ultimately to leave his wife.

The Fountainhead was a disaster, followed by a couple more turkeys, and by the age of 27, Neal was back in New York, heartbroken, barely over a nervous breakdown, with her career in tatters. This was the point at which she met Dahl.

Years later, in her autobiography As I Am, Neal wrote that she knew she didn't love Dahl from the moment they married in 1953 but she wanted to have "beautiful children" with him. And initially, the marriage seemed to be working. Neal's career revived and she won an Oscar for Best Actress in 1963 for Hud. Meantime, the couple were indeed having "beautiful children", five in all: Olivia, Tessa, Theo, Ophelia and Lucy.

Seven years after their marriage, the couple's baby son, Theo, four months old, was crushed between a bus and a taxi while out with a nanny and left brain-damaged. The accident was witnessed by Tessa.

Theo had eight brain operations and Dahl, unhappy with the shunt put in to drain the fluid that clogged his brain, spent two years designing and manufacturing a better version. He decided to move the family back home to England, settling in Gypsy House in the village of Great Missenden. But just a few years later, seven-year-old Olivia, the eldest, died of measles encephalitis, a tragedy that left Dahl "limp with despair".

Patricia Neal did some of her best work in this period, then suffered a series of strokes when she was 39 and pregnant with her fifth child.

After a lengthy operation on her brain, Patricia couldn't talk or walk and was largely paralysed.

Here, Dahl showed himself to be a man of complete determination and a certain vision, but touched with coldness, even sadism.

He essentially forced Patricia to get well. If she wanted something, he held it out of reach until she asked for it. He badgered her to walk, to move, to read and memorize and forced her to do hours of painful physical and speech therapy.

For those watching, there were many pitiful moments, but in the end, Dahl's strange, stubborn insistence came good. Six months after the brain operation Neal gave birth to a healthy daughter, Lucy. Shortly after that, he decided she was ready to give a speech to a charity dinner for brain-damaged children. Although terrified, she did, to thunderous applause. "I knew at that moment that Roald the slave driver, Roald the bastard, with his relentless scourge, Roald the Rotten, as I had called him more than once, had thrown me back into the deep water. Where I belonged," she later said.

He may have forced Neal to get well again, but there didn't seem any way of saving the marriage. Dahl began an affair with one of Neal's best friends, Felicity Crosland, and in 1983 the couple divorced and he remarried. To Patricia's fury, their children mostly knew of and condoned the affair. Ophelia Dahl, who was 14 when her parents divorced, later said: "All of us realised that he had found the love of his life with Liccy (Felicity) and there's always a sense of relief when that happens."

Throughout, Dahl had been writing, finding early and considerable success with Charlie And The Chocolate Factory, published in 1964 and a classic ever since.

At the same time, he was also writing adult fiction, including pornography for Playboy - friend and fellow writer Noel Coward once said of his adult fiction: "The stories are brilliant and the imagination is fabulous. Unfortunately, there is, in all of them, an underlying streak of cruelty and macabre unpleasantness and a curiously adolescent emphasis on sex" - and was often very dismissive of children's literature and his own role within it.

Of course, the streak of "cruelty and macabre unpleasantness" that Coward detected was very much present in his children's books too.

It seemed also to be present in his life. As a father, Dahl was irascible and inconsistent; protective and manipulative, controlling and kind; a tough combination. Tessa, the daughter next to Olivia in age, was frequently compared with the child her father mourned so obviously - "my older sister Olivia had been the love of Daddy's life . . . both of us contracted measles, but she had died" - and always unfavourably.

"In our family, you got attention only if you were brain-damaged or dead or terribly ill. There was no reward for being normal," she once said. And so Tessa gave up on being 'normal', instead becoming wild, precocious and deeply unhappy.

In a piece written in 2012, she talks of being brought to see psychiatrist Anna Freud after Theo's accident. Freud recommended therapy for the whole family, but Dahl had a mistrust of something that he believed had left various friends unable to write because they "had all their nooks and crannies flattened like pancakes", so he insisted on medication instead. Freud refused, so Dahl found another doctor, less scrupulous, to prescribe, and Tessa, from the age of four, was medicated.

By her teenage years, Tessa was given Quaaludes, a sedative, by her father, who brought them home from America, and regularly drank alcohol with him. She had developed, she says "narcissistic character disorders" and was "the problem child who became the scapegoat." But she insists: "My parents did their best."

Tessa, like her mother, was a beauty. By her teenage years, she had become a gossip-column fixture, for dating Peter Sellers and Brian de Palma, among others. Sophie was her first child, from a short affair with actor Julian Holloway when Tessa was 19. Later, she married twice, and had three more children.

She battled drug addiction and crippling depression and began a long search for meaning, visiting ashrams, falling under the spell of various gurus.

She also began to write - articles, children's books and one novel. Dahl, although publicly supportive, was privately competitive: "After I sold my first children's book, he had struggled up to his hut with agonised hips to fetch his royalty statements - to prove to me that I would never make as much money as him, however successful I became."

And yet despite, or more likely because of, Dahl's emotional distance, he was the great focus of Tessa's life.

"I loved him with an undiluted and unmet passion. He was my major motivation as my whole life consisted of proving to him that, although my sister died, I was still worthy of life and love."

Someone once said that all siblings have different parents. Dahl was perhaps a different kind of father to his other children.

Ophelia is a social justice and healthcare advocate, while Lucy, the youngest and a screenwriter in Hollywood - she wrote Wild Child, made into a film with Natasha Richardson - remembers a generous, magical kind of parent.

"He absolutely hated children being bored. He used to say boredom was death," she recalls, and so he bought a Morris Minor for them to drive around a track he had created.

As a grandfather, Dahl seems to have hit his stride. For Tessa's daughter, Sophie, whose young life was spent trailing along on her mother's search for happiness, peace and enlightenment, he was a fixed and stable point.

"Wonderful, really wonderful," is how she describes him.

He had an old gypsy caravan in his garden, which Sophie and her friends used as a playhouse.

"It was brutally uncomfortable and really cold, but I would stay in there with my friends and so we'd have midnight feasts of chocolate in bed. Then, in the morning, we'd appear in the house and he'd make us all breakfast."

Sophie now lives in Gipsy House with her husband, singer-songwriter Jamie Cullum, and their two children.

By the time Dahl died in 1990, aged 74, 4,000 letters a week were arriving to the local post office for him. Last year, 80,000 people visited the museum dedicated to him in Great Missenden.

They don't go despite the core of darkness in his books, but because of it. The enduring magic of Dahl's world is the way it acknowledges the nasty side of life, has irresistible fun with it, then allows good to triumph.

1939: Richard Kiel is born--Detroit, Michigan. (He dies 10 September 2014 at age 74--Fresno, California.)
1983: Victory Games begins releasing its James Bond 007 role-playing games.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/James_Bond_007_(role-playing_game)

2008: Two minutes of "Another Way to Die" air on the Spanish radio show Siglo.

RichardTheBruce

September 14th

1967: You Only Live Twice released in The Netherlands.
1967: James Bond 007 - Man lebt nur zweimal released in West Germany.

1981: Sólo para sus ojos released in Barcelona and Madrid, Spain.
(Catalan title: Només per als teus ulls.)

RichardTheBruce

September 15th

1967: Elät vain kahdesti released in Finland.

1967: Man lever bara två gånger released in Sweden.

1977: Caterina Murino is born--Cagliari, Sardinia, Italy.
1980: For Your Eyes Only principal photography starts in Corfu--Villa Sylva, Kanoni, above Corfu Town
(doubling for a Spanish villa).
1983: Octopussy released in Belgium.

1983: 007 Contra Octopussy released in Brazil.

1983: 007: Octopussy contra las chicas mortales released in Mexico and Peru.

RichardTheBruce

September 16th

1922: Guy Hamilton is born--Paris, France. (He dies 20 April 2016 at age 93--Majorca, Balearic Islands, Spain.)
1963: The San Francisco Chronicle prints Ian Fleming's article "The Case of the Painfully Pulled Leg."

https://www.mi6community.com/discussion/16072/ian-fleming-and-the-case-of-the-painfully-pulled-leg

1966: NBC television airs the first of 28 episodes of The Girl From U.N.C.L.E. starring Stephanie Powers as agent April Dancer (Fleming's name suggestion) and Noel Harrison as agent Mark Slate.

1981: 007: Sólo para tus ojos released in Mexico.

1987: Tuer n’est pas jouer (Death is not a Game) released in France.

1987: James Bond, praktor 007: Me to daktylo sti skandali (Με το δάχτυλο στη σκανδάλη) released in Greece.
1990: Armchair Detective Library publishes a hardcover version of John Gardner's Licence to Kill novelization.

1991: The James Bond Jr. cartoon series begins with Episode 1 - "The Beginning." Sixty-four episodes follow.

RichardTheBruce

September 17th

1964: London premiere of Goldfinger at the Odeon Theatre, Leicester Square, London. Kinematograph Weekly later reports it as chaotic with 5,000 fans creating near-riot conditions drawing police reinforcements. In fact police rescue Honor Blackman from the surging crowds.

1964: BBC airs The Guns of James Bond with Sean Connery and the real Geoffrey Boothroyd.

1964: Sean Connery films The Hill in Spain with director Sidney Lumet.
1972: ABC-TV airs the first televised Bond film with the network premiere of Goldfinger. Its 49-point share and 31.1 rating remains one of the most-watched television programs ever.
1977: Älskade spion (Beloved Spy) released in Sweden.

1986: Filming of the pre-title action sequence for The Living Daylights begins in Gibraltar.

RichardTheBruce

September 18th

1959: Kevin McClory's partner Ivar Bryce writes a letter to Ian Fleming about his experience on the Queen Mary. Specifically, a screening of the Alfred Hitchcock film North by Northwest.

"It’s the most terrific Bond-style thriller - almost plagiarising – and superb. You must manage to see it somehow. It is exactly the picture we are trying to make...

Hitchcock would be worth it, if we could get him."

1967: James Bond i Japan released in Norway.

1981: 007 - Somente Para Seus Olhos released in Brazil.

2006: Construction of a new stage at Pinewood begins, to replace the structures damaged in a July fire.
2008: "Another Way to Die" premieres on The Jo Whiley Show, BBC Radio 1.

RichardTheBruce

September 19th

1963: Honor Blackman gives notice she will leave The Avengers, a secret kept until February 1964.
Her final episode "Lobster Quadrille" presents a nod to the upcoming Bond role.

1965: Goldie is born--Walsall, Staffordshire, England.
1987: 007 - Zona pericolo released in Italy.

2012: The James Bond 007 fragrance becomes available in the United Kingdom.

2015: The audio book for Anthony Horowitz's Trigger Mortis is released, read by David Oyelowo.

2017: Bernie Casey dies at age 78--Los Angeles, California. (Born 8 June 1939--Wyco, West Virginia.)

RichardTheBruce

September 20th

1955: Macmillian publishes Ian Fleming's Moonraker in the US.

1964: Goldfinger general release in the UK.

1967: On ne vit que deux fois released in France.

1967: Τζέημς Μποντ, πράκτωρ 007: Ζεις μονάχα δυο φορές released in Greece.
2006: "You Know My Name" is leaked on the internet.
2012: Heineken's Crack the Case ad promotes Skyfall starting today, Global Duty Free Day.

2017: Dynamite Comics releases James Bond 007 Kill Chain #3.

https://dynamite.com/htmlfiles/viewProduct.html?PRO=C72513026017803011

Thunderfinger

Never saw that Moonraker cover before. I like it.

Tracy

1922: Guy Hamilton is born--Paris, France. (He dies 20 April 2016

(over 2 yrs already , just insane how time flies !)

1967: Agent 007 - du lever kun to gange released in Denmark

(got a danish YOLT cinema ticket....)

September 1973 : just 2 months after Bruce Lee's passing "Fist of Fury" a hit in U.K and Eire.....

RichardTheBruce

September 21st

1961: Serena Scott Thomas is born--Nether Compton, Dorset, England.
1974: James Bond comic The Nevsky Nude ends its run in The Daily Express. (Started 13 May 1974. 2542–2655)
Yaroslav Horak, artist. Jim Lawrence, writer.

https://popoptiq.com/the-nevsky-nude/

2018: The producers announce American director Cary Joji Fukunaga is on board for BOND 25.
Plus a new worldwide release date of 14 February 2020.

peter

edit

RichardTheBruce

September 22nd

1964: The Man From U.N.C.L.E. (United Network Command for Law and Enforcement) premieres in the US on NBC-TV. Its two agents Napoleon Solo (named by Ian Fleming, who suggested some material then exited the project) and Illya Kuryakin battle T.H.R.U.S.H. (The Technological Hierarchy for the Removal of Undesirables and the Subjugation of Humanity). [Original title: Ian Fleming's Solo.]

1974: US network premiere of Thunderball on ABC-TV.
2015: Anthony Horowitz's Bond novel Trigger Mortis published in the US by Orion.