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I don't when I'll go to the Foundation, I'm way overdue for a visit, but when I do I'll try to take a look at it.
She had a rash that Bond cured with acupuncture.
I think I've read a dozen things about this script by now, all of which become increasingly bizarre. Stuff like an anarchist group using a Swiss clinic to place bombs into celebrities and blow up landmarks I can get my head around. Then you've got weird little touches like Bond drowning a henchman in a pot of soup and seasoning it afterwards, something about the Pope being kidnapped (not even sure if this is the same script or if it was some sort of earlier treatment). The facial disfigurement is another odd one.
I do wonder if it's still around in the vaults of EON or something. I've heard people speculate that Burgess was either not taking the assignment seriously or wanted to sabotage the Bond film series in some way... for what it's worth I'm not too sure about either one, but still...
Here's what I remember from Burgess' autobiography: the villain was an Anarchist terrorist organisation not interested in money or power, as the members already had plenty of both, but in the arbitrary use of said power. Basically, they did terrorism for thrill. Their demands were in the likes of giving the POTUS strip naked live on prime time, ordering the pope to destroy the walls of the Sistine Chapel and so on. When their demands were not met they blew bombs, destroyed planes and so on. The head villain was meant to be "a gross Orson Welles in a wheelchair" (a sort of proto Stromberg?), the Bond girl had a rash that Bond cured with acupuncture, which he learned to use on himself earlier on (in the PTS?). Halfway through the movie, a bomb exploded, killing Bond and a couple of other important characters. Burgess didn't develop it further than that.
Not gonna lie, I like the idea of a weird group of rich people committing acts of terrorism for thrills. From what I understand the thing about acupuncture was used by this group to implant celebrities with these bombs at a Swiss Health clinic which I guess Bond visited after nearly dying in the PTS... not too sure though, like I said I'm only going from what I've read and put together.
The stuff about the POTUS stripping naked sounds silly, but something about it reminds me of the first episode of Black Mirror. Perhaps its a bit too outlandish for a Bond film, but there's something to it. I'm sure the idea of such a terrorist group using the threat of bombings to make a public figure do something compromising (ok, maybe not having the POTUS strip naked, but I dunno, having someone like M or the PM publicly reveal confidential/compromising Government information or something) could be adapted.
I guess there's a touch of Joker from TDK in Silva (certainly in his 'get captured to escape' plan mid-way through the film, but also the general sense of anarchism/generalised destruction of MI6). Then again I guess Ledger's Joker was also somewhat influenced by Alex from A Clockwork Orange anyway...
Honestly, I think there's some interesting stuff in the synopsis of that script. As of late the Bond series seems to have had villains who are either out for revenge or have some sort of personal connection to MI6 or Bond. Even outside of Bond there's been a shift towards villains who commit acts of terrorism in order to rectify some sort of perceived injustice, albeit through morally questionable ways (I'm thinking of The Batman in particular). Maybe it'd be refreshing seeing a group of villains who are rich, have power and simply blowing up stuff/embarrassing important figures for the thrill. In a sense it'd be rather scary (potentially anyway) as Bond wouldn't be able to reason with them and one never knows who such a group will target.
Pretty diverse topics: youth violence, Shakespeare, Napoleon, a poet trying to find beauty in a world devoid of it, Jesus Christ, Excalibur in the 20th century, nationalised cannibalism, the fall of the British Empire and the end of colonialism...
Also, it came to my mind that some of Burgess' ideas for his TSWLM script may have unvoluntarily found their way into NTTD.
That’s really interesting, thanks. A lot of stuff I didn’t know about (Henry Kissinger doing some sort of implied sex act? Like I said, sounds very Black Mirror). The weird internal politics of CHAOS sounds interesting too, albeit in a tongue in cheek way.
"On August 5th Hiroshima was blasted, with over seventy-eight thousand dead.(...)On August 8th Russia declared war against Japan and, the following day, was perhaps present in spirit at Nagasaki when seventy-five thousand were blasted. On the 14th Japan surrendered unconditionally. On the 15th everybody got drunk."
https://www.newstatesman.com/culture/2013/04/anthony-burgesss-007-obsession
https://www.facebook.com/share/p/19DLp1Xmox/
That sounds great. Are you able to attend, @Ludovico?
Unfortunately no. I'll have started my new job then and there's no way I can go up to Manchester.
That's a shame but I'm glad to hear you've got a new job. I know the last place you worked wasn't that great.
Thanks. Yeah, it was a good employer for a while, then things turned sour.
Be that as it may, I promise next time I'm there, whenever that is, I'll do my best to take a look at his TSWLM script.
That's good. Yes, a lot of jobs are good to start with and then less so as time goes on and you become part of the furniture.
That would be great if you could look at the Burgess TSWLM script for us. Does the Anthony Burgess Foundation have a copy of it?
I think they do, however not sure how easily accessible it is, especially since I left academia a long time ago. Last time, it was in 2013, I could take a look at his Jesus of Nazareth script, so who knows.
I know that spy novelist and Bond scholar Jeremy Duns read the TSWLM script somewhere and wrote an article on it. I can't recall if that was at the Anthony Burgess Foundation or somewhere else.
I reckon there has to be a copy at the Foundation.
But what I really, really, really want to find is The Worm and the Ring, which was taken off the shelf due to censorship.
I know there's a copy at the University of Austin, Texas.
I'd say so. I know that they do have books from Burgess's personal library so I'm sure they have his scripts too.
Sadly a lot of stuff to do with iconic British authors like Burgess, Fleming and others all seems to be housed in the United States. I suppose that's where the big money is though so it's maybe not too surprising.
Yes, it almost feels like a kind of cultural vandalism. It'll be a money thing though, like all these things are.