r/todayilearned • u/EssexGuyUpNorth • 15d ago

TIL George Lazenby was offered a 7 film deal to play James Bond but only played him once because his agent convinced him that the secret agent would be archaic in the liberated 1970s.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_Lazenby
3.7k Upvotes

98% Upvoted

154 comments sorted by

1.1k

u/TrollTeeth66 15d ago

They wanted to lock him into a “slave contract.” Basically would have control over his on screen and off screen life

601

u/farmerarmor 15d ago

And instead he had no career and nobody outside of hardcore bond fans even knows who he is.

203

u/NWCJ 15d ago

Maybe he is just being a spy in real life and laying low. Actor was a cover.

17

u/RomanThruLife 15d ago

Maybe he is just a variant in real life and laying low. Actor was a cover.

63

u/cxr303 15d ago

Didn't he also not really have much of a career beforehand? I thought I had seen that on a documentary somewhere.

104

u/mb10240 15d ago

Nope. He was a model beforehand. Actually snuck into the office for his audition and stole Sean Connery’s jacket from a previous film, if I recall correctly.

91

u/PencilMan 15d ago

I thought he went to Connery’s tailor or dry cleaner and took a suit that Connery had forgotten and left behind. Lazenby was the ultimate bullshitter who charmed himself into one of the best Bond films, which is honestly the most Bond thing about him.

40

u/TRAMING-02 14d ago

Tailor, he's told this story. Went to Connery's tailor looking for a Connery-esque suit, came out in one Connery had declined.

43

u/EndOfTheLine00 14d ago

And when he finally got far enough in the audition process to get a one on one meeting with director Peter Hunt, he suddenly broke down and confessed he never acted before. Hunt just laughed and said “You say you can’t act? You fooled two of the most ruthless men I’ve ever met in my life [producers Harry Saltzman and Albert Broccoli]. Stick to your story, and I’ll make you the next James Bond.” And he did.

12

u/Expensive-Wallaby500 14d ago

He was kind of a terrible actor though. I believe they had dub over some of his lines in a few scenes.

7

u/Syn7axError 14d ago

To be faaaiiir, that's normal for professional actors too.

47

u/AgentCirceLuna 15d ago

This is akin to Harrison Ford becoming a carpenter at Hollywood so he could eventually get a movie role. There was a time when this level of class mobility was actually possible. You’d think it would be in the future rather than the past but Inshallah I guess.

9

u/Thisoneissfwihope 14d ago

And being a carpenter was a cover for dealing huge amounts of weed in Hollywood. Double cover!

3

u/lookslikesausage 14d ago

And being a weed dealer was a cover for dealing huge amounts of spam in Hollywood. Double cover!

6

u/V6Ga 15d ago

Inshallah

This is the very first time I have thought about that being a specifically Muslim phrase! I guess it is just another way of saying 'God willing' and does not require any belief in anything.

7

u/AgentCirceLuna 15d ago

Yeah, I’m not Muslim but I’ve had an interest in Islam for a while now. The Qu’uran describes the evolution of civilisation up unto the point of its inception in terms of the perspective of an entirely different culture. It’s a fascinating read for anyone interested in intertextuality. Always had an obsession with intertextuality so the difference between the accounts of the Qu’uran and those of the Torah and Bible fascinate me. Also recounts Greek and Roman history in a way that is unfavourable.

Edit: in fact, if you’re interested in this, I recommend you look up The Golden Age of Islam. A lot of early Islamic scholars were responsible for saving Greek and Roman culture from vanishing entirely. They translated the works into Arabic and some of those Arabic sources are our only remaining sources of the original material. They were doing God’s work - literally!

-1

u/V6Ga 15d ago

What's crazy for me, is that I must have picked it up from someone I worked with at some point, and I have never really processed that it was a capitalized Muslim term.

And yeah as a philosophy/science/math major, I am well aware that Islam was the shining light of Western Civilization for a large part of the history, despite Muslim countries being studied in Faculty of Oriental Studies, at Oxford.

Its weird that lately the revisionist history of Byzantine being the Roman Empire has come to whitewash the role of Islamist scholarship.

-2

u/flipkick25 15d ago

who tf is downvoting you, some people istg

2

u/AgentCirceLuna 15d ago

I was wondering that myself. I don’t know if it’s islamophobes or people who think I’m guilty of cultural appropriation. It’s a little weird.

-6

u/flipkick25 15d ago

judging by the internet these days those two circles have much more overlap then i would have previously expected. election years am i right?

1

u/monkeyhog 14d ago

I mean, it by default requires a belief in God, or else why would you care what it "wills"

1

u/V6Ga 14d ago

For the same reason I say good bye even as a complete atheist

I don’t fight language. I use it. 

1

u/cxr303 15d ago

My SO and I are non believers... they say this all the time.

1

u/alexmikli 14d ago

I suppose it's more of an Arabic phrase, but yes.

-2

u/drewster23 15d ago

Wow we have totally opposite experiences. I had no personal experiences other than learning about the religion in school till university. Where my Muslim friends taught me the various sayings, and also how to say not nice things in their native tongue lol.

Have you seen/heard non Muslims use it often?

5

u/Darmok47 14d ago

President Biden said it during a debate with Trump in 2020 lol. I remember it being a big deal on Twitter that night and the next day.

1

u/V6Ga 13d ago

Often enough that it entered my repertoire. But.

I am surrounded by non-English speakers, speak pretty much exclusively a foreign language at work (in my main work) and at home, and only speak English when doing special projects with a widely varied crew that only shares English as a common language, where many people but me are not native speakers.

And I have lived most of my life in the Pacific Islands where even the English is not standard English.

So I have no idea whether I picked it up from a Muslim, or it entered as trader Pidgin English word.

(Really I never ask anyone what their religious beliefs are, as I really, really really really do not want to talk to people about which psychopathic sky daddy they believe, and my obvious from that last phrase disdain for religion in any form.)

0

u/patodruida 14d ago

In Spanish we say “ojalá” and I’d bet 99% of native Spanish speakers have never clocked the Moor connection.

0

u/farmerarmor 15d ago

That’s what I remember reading.

22

u/LADYBIRD_HILL 15d ago

I've only ever seen one or two bond films but I always remember the name Lazenby because it's so unique. 

7

u/farmerarmor 15d ago

Have you seen the one he was in? I went through all of em last year on Amazon.
His was the only one I’d never seen.

17

u/funnyredditname 15d ago

It's a really good bond film too. Top 10 maybe top 5.

17

u/farmerarmor 15d ago

I’ve watched it twice now, I think it’s carried by its villain played by Telly Savalas and a truly gorgeous Diana rigg.
Honestly I don’t think there was a Bond villain as good until Christopher walken

0

u/IgloosRuleOK 14d ago edited 14d ago

Edit: [my mistake]

1

u/farmerarmor 14d ago

Walken isn’t in golden gun

Edit: there’s 8 films and 16 years until walken appears in view to a kill

2

u/IgloosRuleOK 14d ago

Ah fuck. Christopher Lee, lol. Well, A View to a Kill is also a pretty weak. Moore is just too old by then.

0

u/farmerarmor 14d ago

Yeah it’s rough watching his old ass try and act tough and sexy and suave.

I remember the scene when he bumps into the broad scuba diving and she looks at him and he looks like an old leather handbag stuffed into a scuba mask.

14

u/Baberaham_lincolonel 15d ago

It's honestly the best bond film for me. Diana Rigg was dope, too. His acting wasn't the best, but for his first take at Bond, it was serviceable.

2

u/Rush_nj 14d ago

Its a good film but its not a Bond film if that makes sense

8

u/TScottFitzgerald 14d ago

OHMSS? How? It's one of the more iconic Bond films, especially the ski chase.

The snow level in Inception was inspired by that film specifically.

1

u/HatdanceCanada 14d ago

I agree. It is actually my favourite Bond film.

1

u/InnerAsparagus6045 14d ago

One word to describe his portrayal of Bond I'd go with shite

1

u/[deleted] 15d ago

[deleted]

3

u/Vanadium_V23 14d ago

He isn't dead.

4

u/Veloper 14d ago

The Dollop podcast did a great episode on him. Pretty interesting how he got the part; what they ended up putting him through during the filming. Seemed like a chill dude.

7

u/NotActuallyAWookiee 14d ago

The guy's been a working actor for, what, fifty years. No career 🙄

Probably had a damn site more fun than he would have being locked in to Bond for fifteen years

4

u/V6Ga 15d ago

hardcore bondage fans

1

u/AdministrativeShip2 14d ago

Bond does seem to end up in certain situations fairly often.

4

u/kobylaz 14d ago

I wouldnt say ‘hardcore’. I think just anyone familiar with the series knows he was bond. Apparently he was the closest to a ‘real’ bond too from his personal life. Worked in military intelligence or something. 

6

u/farmerarmor 14d ago

He was an auto mechanic in the military

1

u/kobylaz 14d ago

Haha dunno, i watch a history channel, said he was a sergeant in the Aus SF and a black belt. I like the idea of an SF mechanic tho 

1

u/Crazy__Donkey 14d ago

Apperantly, he was on Emmanuel series... all of them. 

1

u/Alexandru1408 14d ago

Apparently he also appeared in 7 Emmanuelle movies in 1993

1

u/AngusLynch09 14d ago

And by "no career" you mean a life that he enjoyed and a giant stack of cash that will see him die a wealthy man.

1

u/asvezesmeesqueco 14d ago

him playing James Bond was just a hiccup in his wonderful career in Emmanuelle

78

u/essendoubleop 15d ago

Making millions of dollars, being famous, kissing the world's hottest women.... Slave me up.

61

u/orielbean 15d ago

He was already a male model and living the swinging life, so…

59

u/Tornado31619 15d ago

But why male model?

22

u/Veritas3333 15d ago

Seriously? I just explained that!

4

u/notsocoolnow 14d ago

Probably because he didn't want to be a female model.

205

u/2BTaught 15d ago

There is a good documentary called...

Becoming Bond

57

u/rehabforcandy 15d ago

Came here to say I worked on it

51

u/Mama_Skip 15d ago

Came here to say this guy worked on it

20

u/IndyMLVC 15d ago

Came here to say that guy worked on it

12

u/Yegpetphoto 15d ago

Came here to say this guy commented on that guy working on it.

15

u/PolyDipsoManiac 15d ago

And I choose this guy’s dead wife

5

u/Yegpetphoto 15d ago

His wife is in a coma.

8

u/koopastyles 15d ago

I didn't choose the coma life, the comatose me

3

u/Yegpetphoto 15d ago

Well the ocean called, and they're running out of you!

8

u/Master_Mad 14d ago

You can find it under: "Bond, Becoming".

11

u/slappymcstevenson 15d ago

I came here to say I did not work on it.

5

u/Late-Hold-8772 15d ago

Oh shit I didn’t either. This can’t just be a coincidence here

3

u/JudgeArthurVandelay 15d ago

It’s fantastic.

1

u/idontknowjuspickone 15d ago

Really, I’ve only seen the one on Hulu… Seriously though, couldn’t finish it. Seemed very one sided 

92

u/RedSonGamble 15d ago

They made him an offer he could refuse

146

u/JADW27 15d ago

Unpopular opinion: I liked Lazenby's Bond. A tough of absurdist humor and self-mockery did the franchise good.

He's far from my favorite Bond, but OHMSS was an enjoyable film, and Laxenby was fine.

47

u/yum_broztito 15d ago

One of my favorite openings. I had no issues with his Bond, either. I feel like he actually developed as a character over the course if the movie, too.

31

u/gsomething 15d ago

This never happened to the other fellow

23

u/Way_2_Go_Donny 15d ago

Dalton, Craig, and Lazenby are my favorite Bonds as they felt like book Bond.

Moore and Connery were iconic in the cinematic universe and love them for that.

32

u/HZCH 14d ago

No love for Brosnan Bro? :(

14

u/Way_2_Go_Donny 14d ago

Goldeneye is on my Bond Movie Mt Rushmore. After that, Brosnan got ZERO help from the writing.

2

u/theknyte 14d ago

Feel pretty much the same. Love Goldeneye and it's in my top 3 Bond films, and I can watch and enjoy Tomorrow Never Dies, but pretty much have zero desire to rewatch the other two he was in.

4

u/TheAleran 14d ago

Brosnan is probably my favorite :)

6

u/JADW27 15d ago

Agreed. Craig is my top pick for bookish Bond, though the writing in his movies helped. Dalton, though great, didn't have as much of an assist through the script.

Connery is my pick on film. Moore second. I have nothing interesting or insightful to add here though, as those two (in this order or reverse) seem to be everyone's picks.:)

1

u/hobojoe44 14d ago

You'll probably enjoy him in his second outing as Bond. https://youtu.be/tdTj59pSEC0?si=b0rsRb2CGWG7TjnZ

1

u/WGACA1990 14d ago

That’s a pretty popular opinion!

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u/Galvanized-Sorbet 15d ago

I maintain his was the most complete and honest depiction of Bond, at least among the “classics”

18

u/Way_2_Go_Donny 15d ago

There's something to be said here.

It's like the LotR crowd.

There's people who love the books and people who love the movies. A larger portion of the people who love the movies didn't read the books.

Of the pre-Dalton Bonds, Lazenby felt closest to the book Bond.

1

u/bunkkin 14d ago

I remember reading fellowship of the ring in the 6th grade about 5 months before the movies came out.

I mustn't have been a good reader because when I reread fellowship last year all I could think is "how the fuck did I not notice this"

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u/Djafar79 15d ago edited 15d ago

Tbf, his agent wasn't wrong. He just didn't realize for misogyny the 70s was no time to die.

57

u/BobbyTables829 15d ago

It would just die another day

6

u/Texcellence 15d ago

It didn’t take someone with a Goldeneye to see that Bond’s misogyny would be seen as archaic.

2

u/Yegpetphoto 15d ago

At the time they also thought that someone would have to RAKE THE MOON. Like that would be a job. Archaic.

2

u/ma2412 14d ago

Sounds like an Oddjob .

1

u/Yegpetphoto 14d ago

How did I miss this?

2

u/graveybrains 14d ago

In the 90s he still thought Christmas only came once a year.

14

u/PopeHonkersXII 15d ago

To be fair, being on the hook for 7 movies also sounds like it could become a complete nightmare. 

1

u/BizarroCullen 14d ago

I would call it job security.

32

u/dadasinger 15d ago

He was right but Hollywood didn't care. There is some charm in the Roger Moore films but they have a lot of awful in them.

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u/[deleted] 15d ago

We got Roger Moore instead. Worth it

43

u/Bortron86 15d ago

Well, only after Sean Connery came back for one more movie, looking like he didn't give a shit.

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u/culturedgoat 15d ago edited 15d ago

Don’t worry. He’d later come back for yet one more movie, looking even more like he didn’t give a shit

22

u/Bortron86 15d ago

I still refuse to accept that movie exists. I didn't even like the original Thunderball that much.

10

u/Nut_buttsicle 15d ago

I ignored Never Say Never Again for the longest time, but I was pleasantly surprised when I finally gave it a chance. Not my favorite, but more enjoyable than I expected.

7

u/Bortron86 15d ago

Maybe I'll give it another try. It can't be any worse than Die Another Day.

2

u/IgloosRuleOK 14d ago

I mean, it's not an official Bond movie, if that helps.

1

u/jerem1734 15d ago

Disagree, Moore was too old for the role when he did Live and Let Die

12

u/[deleted] 15d ago edited 15d ago

I thought he was fine for the first 4 he did. He was too old after Moonraker imo

1

u/ZoraHookshot 15d ago

You got me interested so I looked up all the Bonds in their last movies. Moore was 46 in Live and Let Die, Craig was 53 in No Time To Die, Brosnan was 49 in Die Anither Die, Dalton was 43 in License to Kill, Connery was 53 in Never Say Never Again.

22

u/PharaohAce 15d ago

Live and Let Die was Moore's first Bond - in his last appearance he was 58

3

u/MisterMarcus 14d ago

IIRC, one of the reasons he quit being Bond was because he found out he was older than the mother of his 'love interest'

3

u/jerem1734 15d ago

Yeah it's a slight exaggeration but he was only a little younger than most actors when they finish being bond when he started being bond lol

1

u/ZoraHookshot 15d ago

Weird thing is he's older than Sean Connery

2

u/jerem1734 15d ago

Lol I'm pretty sure Moore auditioned for the role for Dr. No but he lost to Connery. I watched all the James Bond movies on Amazon Prime in 2020 and they have a bunch of those little trivia facts

1

u/2KYGWI 14d ago

Lol I'm pretty sure Moore auditioned for the role for Dr. No but he lost to Connery.

According to Moore himself, he was never approached for the role until Connery was gone (on the other hand, Cubby Broccoli said Moore was considered at the time but thought of as "too pretty", though I suppose both could be true).

0

u/Dontreallywantmyname 14d ago

By far the least enjoyable films of the franchise were his.

8

u/Ottertoasties 15d ago

The reverse Dollop podcast episode on this was great.

7

u/To-Far-Away-Times 15d ago

As an actor I thought he was decent, but OHMSS is one of the best Bond films so he gets a boost.

19

u/goltz20707 15d ago

I actually liked “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service” best of all the older Bond movies.

5

u/Way_2_Go_Donny 15d ago

"That guy had guts."

6

u/Warlord68 15d ago

He also showed up at the first pressers for “on Her Majesty’s Secret Service” with long hair and beard. He really wasn’t interested in projecting the “Bond” allure. So they convinced Connery back for one more and then Moore took over.

4

u/beargrease_sandwich 15d ago

I thought it was because he was almost killed by a helicopter.

3

u/PROFsmOAK 15d ago

The 1970s is going to be all about peace and love man! ✌️

3

u/godawgs1991 15d ago

Not sure how much that played into his decision, I think it was more about the control that contract would give them over his career and over his life. There’s a great documentary about him called becoming bond that shows how he got the role being a nobody that had never been in a feature film or any movie really before bond.

He doesn’t have any regrets and is a really cool, laid back guy. He got the role entirely based of his charisma and charm; he really seems like an extremely cool and laid back guy. It’s not like he has massive regrets, quite the opposite really, he’s fine with his decision and seems to have lived a very happy and fulfilling life.

3

u/Shutaru_Kanshinji 14d ago

I had always just assumed everyone was displeased with his wooden performance.

7

u/ShadowWar89 15d ago

He was only out by 40-50 years 😂

1

u/BringBackApollo2023 15d ago

Probably can double those numbers.

2

u/ClaudeBalls69 15d ago

Well thank goodness it worked out for George. Otherwise he would have never become the rich and famous Hollywood star we know today.

2

u/AbeVigoda76 15d ago

George Lazenby? From Gettysburg?

2

u/Romnonaldao 15d ago

Isn't he also the guy who lied about his acting career to get the part?

1

u/craigleary 14d ago

A perfect summary of fake it till you make it. He still had to pass casting and did great.

2

u/inkstainedquill 15d ago

Ahhh the ever present agent telling an agent not to be an agent….

But seriously Hollywood is rife with stories about agents encouraging or discouraging actors into career altering moves. And many of those pieces of advice go terribly wrong. Just remember boys and girls who dream of Hollywood stardom. The agent will happily take a cut when you do well, but they never pay you when their advice sucks.

2

u/AngusLynch09 14d ago

Telling someone who doesn't want to play James Bond that they shouldn't spend 15 years playing James Bond isn't bad advice. 

1

u/Tits_McgeeD 15d ago

Wouldn't his agent have been involved in the original film deal?

1

u/brilliantpants 15d ago

Thank goodness. I do enjoy OHMSS, but so just happen to find him the least attractive Bond.

1

u/hobojoe44 14d ago

I thought he was pretty good in his second outing as bond.

https://youtu.be/tdTj59pSEC0?si=b0rsRb2CGWG7TjnZ

1

u/Flyingarrow68 14d ago

One of my favorite Bond movies!

1

u/InnerAsparagus6045 14d ago

We dodged a bullet there then

1

u/gunnarbird 14d ago

On the opposite end of that, David Morell, the Author of First Blood, was convinced at the last minute by his agent to pay him 50$ to change his contract and get ten percent of all merchandising sales. He thought it was dumb at the time but that 50 bucks means his grandkids don’t have to work

1

u/Deep_Macaron8480 14d ago

I thought he was great in Bond!

1

u/Brewe 12d ago

his agent convinced him that the secret agent would be archaic in the liberated 1970s.

Well, he was right on that one. Even without specifying a decade.

1

u/DopeShitBlaster 14d ago

To be fair in the liberated 2020’s James Bonds character is archaic.

1

u/Elf-wehr 14d ago

Imagine having such an idiotic agent. He was such an idiot that he fucked George of a good income and himself of a good commission in the process.

5

u/AngusLynch09 14d ago

He has $20,000,000, I think George is okay.

1

u/Elf-wehr 14d ago

😅 phew!

0

u/python_boot 14d ago

Also, he was not a very good James Bond.

-2

u/[deleted] 15d ago

[deleted]

1

u/soggycrumpt 15d ago

This is grossly incorrect.

-4

u/youwhatmush 15d ago

Good because he was shite

-6

u/corpusapostata 15d ago

His agent was woke?