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Do you have a personal connection to Bond at all?


26 replies to this topic

#1 ChickenStu

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Posted 22 February 2014 - 10:46 PM

Like - are you related to anyone involved in the books/films for example? 

 

My personal connection is that I am actually from Iver Heath - the town where Pinewood Studios is located and spent my younger years living about a quarter of a mile away from the studios! My whole family is from around that general area - and I think I may have some ancestors buried in the cemetery used at the start of For Your Eyes Only!

 

Considering the film history associated with that area - I'm very proud to be able to say I am from there. When I was a toddler, I used to like to run around on the patch of ground where some of the chase sequences from Goldfinger and Casino Royale were filmed (which is also the patch of ground where Michael Keaton drove Kim Basinger to the batcave in Tim Burton's Batman). My Mum took me there most sundays when the roast was in the oven. 

 

That is located in Black Park which is behind the studios. The lake there that I used to walk around every sunday with my Mum (less than 100 yards from that patch of grass) is the one that General Zod walked on in Superman II (making that poor fisherman wonder what the hell was in his coffee!)

 

The thing I find most fascinating about it all aside from the Bond connection is that goings on behind the scenes of the Carry On movies. I was actually in Pinewood last night in the audience of a TV show being made (when we were queuing up the 007 soundstage loomed before us in all it's glory, although the logo had been obscured for some reason). I was using the facilities during a break in filming and I wondered to myself "Hmm, I wonder if Sid James and Barbara Windsor ever had a quickie in this toilet?" 

 

I was also aware that somewhere on the premises was a brand new set for "the millenium falcon" which has of course been constructed for Star Wars Episode VII. I asked a security guard how far away from it I was and she replied "about two years in prison". Nice. 

Another (actually rather comely) female security guard however was receptive to my charm and pointed in the general direction of where it was and said it looked "spectacular"! 

 

I've not lived in that town for many, many years now - but I still proudly call it the place I am from and I wish to retire there. 

 

That's my personal connection to Bond. Do you have one at all? 


Edited by ChickenStu, 22 February 2014 - 10:47 PM.


#2 Catching Bullets

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Posted 24 February 2014 - 12:52 PM

My grandfather was Cubby's driver. If that counts. He spent a lot of time at Pinewood and in and around nearly 30 years of Bond movie making.



#3 ChickenStu

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Posted 24 February 2014 - 01:00 PM

My grandfather was Cubby's driver. If that counts. He spent a lot of time at Pinewood and in and around nearly 30 years of Bond movie making.

 

Certainly more impressive than my one! 



#4 SecretAgentFan

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Posted 24 February 2014 - 01:40 PM

I... um... uh... boy... I... stood in front of Roger Moore when he signed his "My word is my bond"-book and we looked each other in the eye and he smiled.

 

That´s the best I can do.



#5 Professor Pi

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Posted 02 March 2014 - 05:59 PM

I have yet to meet a Bond actor.  I have met Richard Kiel twice (autographed book and lithograph), Lois Chiles, and David Hedison (got picture.)  As for writers, I've met Raymond Benson, Steven Jay Rubin, and Michael France.  Sat behind Bill Conti at a Lakers game once and heard him speak at the 1994 Bond convention in L.A.



#6 tdalton

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Posted 02 March 2014 - 07:39 PM

I met Jimmy Dean once, a long time ago, but that's pretty much it for me.  Haven't met anyone else associated with the franchise.



#7 The Shark

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Posted 02 March 2014 - 07:40 PM

My dad was in TSWLM as a stuntman. Played the Liparus guard that Sir Rog kicks down the stairs. About a day's filming, and involved a shock absorbent band hidden under the jumpsuit.



#8 5thstreet

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Posted 02 March 2014 - 08:13 PM

Went to Eon once, got a licence to make a bond game/range. Met a lot of people there that worked behind the scenes. Everyone was enormously supportive and friendly, loved the products. Sadly at that time could not find any manufacturer to make the range of products .



#9 Guy Haines

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Posted 03 March 2014 - 12:17 AM

Hmmmm....

 

I have the autograph of Wing Cmdr Ken Wallis. Twice, in fact - how apt. Once on the inside of a box containing a replica of Little Nellie - Wing Cmdr. Wallis was displaying the real thing in one of the hangars at RAF Waddington at the annual air show. The other signature was inside a book I bought last year at Newark Air Museum about his life and times.

 

Regarding Bond, well, Timothy Dalton was brought up some fifteen or so miles from where I live, in the Derbyshire town of Belper. And then we have the curious local "urban legend" that sometime in the 1960s or 70s a certain Roger Moore resided in or near the Nottinghamshire village of Ravenshead - very close to Newstead Abbey, of Lord Byron fame. I've never been able to pin that one down. I know Ravenshead quite well, and it's claimed that Sir Roger used to frequent a pub/restaurant there called "The Hutt", which is opposite the gates of Newstead Abbey. Even "The Times" newspaper published Moore's alleged links with the village - but I have yet to find any locals who can recall him living there. Most odd.

 

Finally, and again a (very) tenuous link to Sir Roger, and Bond - my Dad, when he was in the British Army, was a keen boxer. He once told me that he fought one "Nosher" Powell - who went on to be a stunt man and all purpose TV/film heavy, and appeared with Roger Moore in "The Saint". And correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't his son a Bond movie stunt man?



#10 ggl

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Posted 03 March 2014 - 09:50 AM

I have interchanged tweets with: Roger Moore, Robert Davi, Talisa Soto, David Arnold... B) :P :D

 

Sadly for me, that´s all I can get :sad:



#11 Caesar004

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Posted 05 March 2014 - 12:14 AM

I have every bond actor's autograph. I somehow managed to lose Craig's, so I need to find out how to get a new signed thing ;.;. BRB kicking myself.

 

 

As for family? IDK.



#12 Yellow Pinky

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Posted 05 March 2014 - 03:15 PM

When I was a kid my father was the SE US promotions manager for Warner Bros. Records.  As such, I was often around famous recording artists when I was a little tyke (Dusty Springfield, Peter, Paul, & Mary, Tiny Tim, Sammy Davis, Jr.).  On one occasion in 1966 my whole family got to tag along to dinner with Dionne Warwick (vocals on the unused song "Mr. Kiss Kiss Bang Bang" from Thunderball) at a Japanese restaurant.  I would have been 4 at the time.  I do have memories of it, though.



#13 Colossus

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Posted 06 March 2014 - 01:18 AM

Nope, no personal connection to Bond! lol



#14 Hansen

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Posted 06 March 2014 - 04:53 PM

A close friend of mine is Micheline Roquebrune's (Sean's wife) nephew but we never met him



#15 Walecs

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Posted 06 March 2014 - 05:20 PM

The closest I have is living near some QoS locations, but that's it...



#16 Iceskater101

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Posted 01 April 2014 - 02:06 AM

I have no personal connection to anything Bond related, I am just a huge fan and I am in love with Timothy Dalton.



#17 lazenbyland

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Posted 03 April 2014 - 07:58 PM

Ian Fleming's grandfather, Robert Fleming, married Sarah in 1881 who had the same relatively rare surname as me.

 

Someone told me that going even further back there was a connection but I don't know the details and if you go far enough back, probably half the planet are related!



#18 mccartney007

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Posted 03 April 2014 - 11:54 PM

Judi Dench's niece was my hair stylist for awhile.



#19 Agent 76

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Posted 05 April 2014 - 11:30 AM

I live near some of the locations used for On Her Majesty's Secret Service . (Portugal)



#20 glidrose

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Posted 06 April 2014 - 08:53 PM

Judi Dench's niece was my hair stylist for awhile.

 

 

So?

 

I was Norman (Felix Leiter) Burton's fitness trainer...



#21 Guy Haines

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Posted 06 April 2014 - 11:09 PM

Regarding Dame Judi Dench - she is from the City of York, specifically Heworth. Another native of York was the late John Barry, who was tutored in music by Dr Francis Jackson, the then Master of Music at York Minster.

 

In the late 1990s I was working up in York, and lived in Heworth - within walking distance of the city centre and The Minster. It was around the time that John Barry's album "The Beyondness Of Things" was released, and whenever I listen to that album I'm reminded of my time in that city.



#22 Simon

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Posted 08 April 2014 - 06:47 PM

I met Roger Moore at a book signing, and, separately, my then girlfriend invited him (showing quite amazing amounts of 'if you don't ask, you don't get') to my 40th Birthday at Pinewood when he happend to be in Windsor that same weekend to pick up an award from the Queen.  Needless to say he declined but did send me a signed photo (from LALD) wishing me the best for said birthday.

 

I have also met Peter Lamont when I was trying for a job in his Production Design department at the time of AVTAK.  That also did not work out...

 

Indeed, re-reading the above, that may only signify two near misses and no connection at all.



#23 Major Tallon

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Posted 08 April 2014 - 07:43 PM

I met Andrew Lycett and chatted with Kate Grimond at a conference at the Lilly Library in 2002, plus I've met Raymond Benson a couple of times.



#24 mccartney007

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Posted 11 April 2014 - 08:17 PM

 

Judi Dench's niece was my hair stylist for awhile.

 

 

So?

 

I was Norman (Felix Leiter) Burton's fitness trainer...

 

Yeah? Well I AM Norman Burton.



#25 S K Y F A L L

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Posted 12 April 2014 - 03:39 AM

It's personal.



#26 jmarks4life

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Posted 14 April 2014 - 12:07 AM

Notta one. I wish though.

Edited by jmarks4life, 14 April 2014 - 12:07 AM.


#27 glidrose

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Posted 14 April 2014 - 05:19 PM

 

 

Judi Dench's niece was my hair stylist for awhile.

 

 

So?

 

I was Norman (Felix Leiter) Burton's fitness trainer...

 

Yeah? Well I AM Norman Burton.

 

 

Nah... you're just plain deluded.