‘Bond, James Bond’, but much more

Coverage of Sir Sean Connery’s passing has inevitably been dominated by his legacy as the screen’s first and greatest James Bond. Connery’s “Bond, James Bond” moment near the beginning of Dr. No (1962) is one of the iconic moments in film history and has spawned countless knockoffs and parodies.

Perhaps the most persistent myth about Connery, who was 90, is that he was an “unknown” actor who was pulled out of obscurity by Bond producers Albert “Cubby” Broccoli and Harry Saltzman, who apparently cast him against the wishes of author Ian Fleming and distributor United Artists. But this is to ignore the fact that Connery had already established himself as a television actor, garnering critical acclaim for his lead roles in a 1957 BBC production of Requiem for a Heavyweight and in the 1961 television production of Anna. Karenina, but also appearing in a number of meaty co-starring roles in Hollywood movies, including alongside Lana Turner in Another Time, Another Place (1958).

Reportedly, it was his appearance in the Disney fantasy Darby O’Gill and the Little People (1959) that brought Connery to the attention of Broccoli’s wife, Dana, while the British crime drama The Scared Town (1961 ), in which Connery as an underworld enforcer steals the image of his nominal star John Gregson, was also evidence of a star in the making.

However, Connery was inspired to play James Bond. Connery made the role his own to such an extent that it is now impossible to imagine any of the other actors said to have been considered, including Cary Grant, David Niven, Patrick McGoohan and even Roger Moore, putting themselves in the shoes of “the gentleman agent with license to kill ”in 1962.

In this context, an important point to remember about Bond is that Fleming’s character was not a figure of the Old Etonian establishment: he is even described in Moonraker as “strange and not English.” Connery’s working-class Scottish roots – he was born and raised in Edinburgh, where his early jobs included milkman, bricklayer and coffin polisher – infused his bond with that sense of “otherness.”

In this sense, Connery’s Bond has as much in common with the external protagonists of the British New Wave (Laurence Harvey, Albert Finney, Richard Harris) as well as with the tradition of British cinematic heroism embodied by 1950s stars such as Richard Todd and Kenneth. More.

Connery’s portrayal in Dr No is jittery and abrupt: he really suited the role in From Russia With Love (1963) and Goldfinger (1964) where he dominates the screen with that indefinable quality of star “presence” that signifies everything he has. what to do. to dominate a scene is to be in it.

Beyond Bond

Bond brought Connery fame and fortune. He was paid just £ 6,000 for Dr. No, four times that amount for From Russia With Love and a record $ 1.25 million for his first Bond “comeback” in 1971’s Diamonds Are Forever (George Lazenby had taken over the role of Majesty’s On Her Secret Service in 1969).

The lucrative pay meant Connery was able to choose his roles outside of the Bond movies. In fact, his non-Bond roles demonstrate just how versatile Connery was as an actor. Alfred Hitchcock cast him as Tippi Hedren’s troubled husband in Marnie (1964), and he was featured in two films for Sidney Lumet, as the rebel with a cause in the hard-hitting military prison drama The Hill (1965) and as a vengeful cop in the Much underrated The Offense (1973).

Connery was particularly good at playing characters older than himself, including the potentate who took on Teddy Roosevelt in The Wind and the Lion (1975) and an aging Robin Hood who reflected on his own myth in the beautifully elegiac Robin and Marian (1976). He was paired with Michael Caine as soldiers of fortune in 19th-century Afghanistan in The Man Who Would Be King (1975) and was one of the leads in the cast of suspects in Sidney Lumet’s lavish adaptation of Murder on the Orient Express (1974). ).

Inevitably, there was an occasional choice from the field of the left, but even the sci-fi rarity Zardoz (1973) now has cult status. Connery said he would “never” play Bond again after Diamonds Are Forever: hence the tongue-in-cheek title of his second “comeback” of Bond Never Say Never Again (1983), a rival production outside of the Eon Production series mounted by him. independent producer Kevin McClory.

Connery won his only Academy Award, a popular choice for Best Supporting Actor for his “Irish” street cop in The Untouchables (1987), after which his career was given a second wind as the most profitable film star in his sixties. of the world in a sequence of superior adventure and prank films including The Hunt for Red October (1990), The Rock (1996) and Entrapment (1999).

By then, Connery’s refusal to disguise his accent had become something of a trademark, whatever the role. When Steven Spielberg cast him as Harrison Ford’s father in Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade (1989), he captured the idea that Connery’s Bond was the symbolic “father” of a later generation screen hero.

Feet of mud

Most stars have feet of clay – Connery was no exception. He drew controversy for a comment made in a 1965 Playboy interview that legitimized hitting a woman (“A slap with an open hand is justified if all other alternatives fail”). Their link did this on screen in From Russia With Love and Diamonds Are Forever.

He also had a public fight with Broccoli, suing the producer and MGM for alleged non-payment of the profit shares of the Bond films. Against this, Connery’s charitable work must be contrasted – he used his Diamonds Are Forever fee to found the Scottish International Education Trust to provide financial assistance to Scots from disadvantaged backgrounds to attend college and university.

Proud ‘Scottish Peasant’

Connery, who had lived in Spain and the Bahamas as a tax exile since the 1970s, was proud of his Scottish roots. Ian Fleming became enthusiastic about Connery to the extent that he introduced a Scottish heritage for Bond in later stories. Bond, “I am a Scottish Peasant and I will always feel at home being a Scottish Peasant”, from The Man with the Golden Gun, could have been written with Connery in mind, although Bond was played by his successor, Roger Moore, in that movie.

Unlike Bond, Connery did accept the knighthood, for services to film dramas, in 2000. It is widely believed that his public support for the Scottish National Party had delayed his knighthood.

Connery’s last on-screen appearance was as Allan Quatermain in The League of Extraordinary Gentlemen (2003), in which he leads a Victorian superhero team to save the British Empire. He confirmed his retirement when he received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the American Film Institute in 2006.

He died in his sleep at his home in Nassau, and is survived by his second wife Micheline and their son (from first wife Diane Cilento) Jason Connery.