Is there a name more tattered in the annals of big-movie casting choices than George Lazenby?
Notice I say “choice” rather than “mistake,” because for all the static about the admittedly somewhat wooden Lazenby’s shortcomings, he managed to hold his own as the steady center of what James Bond fans have gradually come to recognize as one of the hidden highlights of the series, On Her Majesty’s Secret Service.
His filmmaking peers vouch that although inexperienced and not always a day at the beach in terms of temperament, Lazenby was ultimately a pro in his work habits and showed a confidence that enabled him to brazen through a rather daunting succession: replacing the world's favorite Bond while acting opposite one of the franchise's most memorable Bond girls.
That would be Diana Rigg as Tracy, the daughter of crime boss Draco (played by Gabriele Ferzetti as The Most Interesting Man In the World, 1968-style). "What she needs is a man to dominate her,” Daddy D says of his daughter, but, before we get any comments from readers of The End of Men, be advised that Tracy is more than a match for Bond. And it’s not just because The Avengers goddess Rigg —that’s the classic 1960s UK TV spy series, not the Marvel superhero costume party—is more than a match for Lazenby. It’s because the rather sharp script derived from one of Ian Fleming’s darker Bond sagas gives the debonair spy license to submit to her charms and depths. As Charles Taylor wrote of Rigg’s Tracy in Salon nearly 15 years ago, “Her presence enhances the whole concept of James Bond. For the first time, Bond has to prove himself worthy of a woman he’s attracted to.”
We meet Tracy (aka Countess Teresa) in the pre-credits action when her cardinal-colored Mercury Cougar zooms past Bond’s ride. Although he prevents her suicide in the surf and beats down two thugs who try to grab her, she zooms away, leaving a gaping Lazenby to break the fourth wall and say, “This never happened to the other fella.”
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In the making-of featurette that’s found on the Special Editon DVD and in the new 50th-anniversary box set, Lazenby calls that line “A way of breaking the ice,” and he’s right. Director Peter Hunt, who’d been an editor on previous Bond films, explains he had decided to accept that Sean Connery’s departure from the role (which would then go on to Roger Moore, et al) was a lurch. So, in order to "get on with it", he simply asked Lazenby to insert the line, which the model-turned-actor — in his first film role — had been tossing out occasionally on set.
It’s a moment not unlike one in the early innings of The Bourne Legacy, when Jeremy Renner, taking over for Matt Damon, is trying to puzzle out his place in the franchise’s deadly world. “You ask too many questions,” says his fellow operative, surely a subtle reminder from writer-director Tony Gilroy that we should simply belt in and take the ride with the new guy.
Lazenby's ride was a turbulent one, thanks in part to his back-seat driving. From the start, the producers of On Her Majesty's Secret Service had problems calibrating the neophyte’s self-importance: Though he was a tough Aussie who’d been a soldier back home before moving to London in 1963 (where he initially worked as a car salesman), Lazenby groaned about the cold Portugese surf that day he shot the pre-credits surf scene with Rigg. When he had an “I’m the star” snit one night at the Swiss location where the film’s spectacular ski chases were shot, franchise kingpin Cubby Broccoli reminded him that he wasn’t a star until the public decided he was.
That was never to be, of course.
Director Hunt decided after a frustrating hunt for Connery’s replacement that Lazenby “oozed sexual magnetism”, and Rigg personally signed off on his casting. The film’s cinematographer rather hopefully avers in the making-of short that the filmmakers thought they had found the “ruthlessness of Jack Palance and the charm of Cary Grant” in Lazenby.
Alas, the actor's unfortunate wardrobe in the movie — color-coordinated ensembles, bathrobes and frilly formal shirts — made him look more Austin Powers than James Bond, though a kilt Lazenby wears makes for a good gag. After a girl in a mountaintop harem scrawls her room number in lipstick well up on Lazenby's left thigh, a henchwoman for Telly Savalas' marginally suave Blofeld asks Bond about his physical state after a rough chopper ride up. In response, our hero admits to "Just a slight stiffness coming on.”
All carps aside, this is a boldly sui generis Bond film, one that sought to break the mold, and as Taylor notes,“breaks your heart,” thanks to the death of 007's great love. The key to its surprising emotionality is the believabity of the Tracy-James romance. Somehow, even in the corny set-up of a nighttime retreat from a blizzard in a picturesque barn, and with the supposedly licensed-to-kill Bond saying, “I love you—I know I’ll never find another girl like you”, we believe it all.
Much credit goes to Rigg for her naturalistic chops, but against the popular myth that Lazenby was hired simply as a big rangy lug stands the actual performance, in which he shows himself to be an accomplished listener. Whether it’s the troubled Tracy, her likably haute-gangster dad, or the highly watchable — if not always convincingly aristocratic — Savalas, each secondary player has a tale to tell, and Lazenby as Bond almost invariably responds with the right degree of empathy, skepticism, or gravitas. He also has the necessary gearing to pop out of a limo with the instruction, “Keep my martini cool.”
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Better yet, though, in the play within a play where Bond has to remain the starchy, asexual genealogical researcher even as he’s trying to lure some vixen into bed, Lazenby lies straight-faced when the girl reminds him he’s supposd to be uninterested in cozying up to women. “Usually I don’t,” he insists. He also tells some threatening Bluto that “Guns make me nervous,” quite a Cary Grant- style turn from a guy who, in a later scene, chokes a thug to death with the edge of a ski.
There’s even a rather invigorating bromance that deepens the film’s emotionality. How can we not be stirred when Tracy's devoted father and her desperate lover take to the choppers to wreak vengeance on her kidnapers? Moments like that seem all the better because Hunt and his cadre are willing to take the mickey, as when Bond is frog-marched into one compound by thugs. As they cross frame, we linger on a little person, a male housekeeper, who whistles the “Goldfinger” theme while sweeping up.
Lazenby, alas, wasn’t destined to be a star, and, indeed, he soon went hipster, actually stating that Dennis Hopper was the director he most wanted to work with. Based on his admitted arrogance and some advice from his agent that he now regrets taking, Lazenby turned down the chance to sign on for seven Bond films. Most of his On Her Majesty's Secret Service colleagues — including the stuntman who calls him “one of the boys,” the screenwriter, cinematographer, and director — assert that he would have done fine at that. Instead, Lazenby would grow long hair and a beard, sail around the world, publicly call Bond a brute, essay a sad series of bit parts, briefly marry former tennis star Pam Shriver in 2008, and reportedly is writing his memoir, The Other Fella.
However. If you’re looking to refresh your Bond appreciation, and especially if you skipped On Her Majesty’s the first time around because you’d heard it dismissed, give it a try. And raise a whisky (or yes, the shaken-not-stirred martini, which is obligatorily cited in the film) to Lazenby. He may not have been the immortal Bond, but, as Bond himself says of one bad guy who skis into a giant snow thrower and is ejected from its twin ports as thick, raspberry stains in the hurtling whiteness: “He had lots of guts.”
Fred Schruers, a freelance writer living in Los Angeles, has contributed to Rolling Stone, Premiere, the Los Angeles Times, and many other publications.
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