Posted on 02/10/2024 5:51:47 PM PST by nickcarraway
There are few roles in Hollywood more coveted than 007. Since the character of James Bond was first adapted to film in the 1960s, it has been taken on by six separate actors, each of them donning suits and a smirk to embody the man Ian Fleming created. Each time an actor announces their departure from the role, audiences speculate and actors hope that it might be their turn, but not Michael Caine.
It’s perhaps unsurprising that Caine was once considered for the role. The man is a certified national treasure, the consistency of his Cockney accent and commanding presence on screen endearing him to audiences and critics alike. He’s accepted Academy Awards and a knighthood, but he once rejected the chance to take on the role of the suave spy.
In 1962, Sean Connery became the first actor to take on the weight of the Bond name, starring in Dr. No and four films that followed. He finished up his time with the character in 1967 with You Only Live Twice, at which point the franchise looked to replace him with a similarly formidable leading British actor. And who better than Michael Caine?
Unfortunately for the casting directors and for those who would have enjoyed hearing Caine’s Cockney delivery of the words, “Shaken, not stirred”, the retired actor was not interested in suiting up for the role. He later explained one of his reasons for not considering it, suggesting that he didn’t possess the glitz and glamour required to embody the spy.
“I was always much more ordinary,” he explained, via Express, “Bond was a glamorous, imaginative creation. I’ve always played real people.” Caine himself certainly isn’t ordinary anymore, but his presence on-screen has often tended towards grit rather than glamour, from The Man Who Would Be King to Children of Men.
Caine certainly has the capability to embody more imaginative creations. He took on the role of Batman’s beloved butler, Alfred, in Christopher Nolan’s take on the character and even played a spy Harry Palmer in a series of films released alongside the James Bond franchise. Still, there seems to be a more grounded nature to even these characters, and perhaps the latter had already sated Caine’s taste for on-screen spying.
Between his distaste for glamour, his pre-existing spy role, and his friendship with Connery, Caine never took on the title of 007. Still, it’s fun to imagine what he might have brought to the character had he entertained the idea.
I am Spartacus! He/him.
(It is said North by Northwest movie was the pre-curser to the 007 character.)
What I vaguely remember is that they looked at Carey Grant to first play the role of Bond based on North by Northwest. Ian Fleming I think had a role in choosing the actor.
Perhaps neither did I. The quotes I recall them saying regarding guns and abortion I cannot find. To be clear as actors Connery and Caine are the tops to me.
Carey Grant was not the pre-cursor, it was the movie plot itself. Grant was more comic actor and lacked the swagger of 007 character. He was also good in To Catch a Thief movie by Alfred Hitchcock.
Not sure Michael Caine could have pulled off JB.
Maybe a smidge too intellectual/high brow, not near ruthless.
It would have worked of course,
but not even close to Sean Connery, the James Bond GOAT!
kind of pinhead are you?
He was also very good in Rising Sun. But he absolutely defined the Bond role and everyone since has been measured by Connery’s work.
Title reminded me of the old Fabian song, “Durn Me Loose.”
Caine has never been held back by his accent. His very first movie role was as Lieutenant Gonville Bromhead, who did a very passable “Posh” accent. By then he’d already had a number of stage roles in which he had to bury the sound of the Bells of St Mary’s.
Even Connery had to have a dialect coach to get rid of his Edinburrah (sic) broque. To this day no one apart Connery himself ever figured out what accent it is he was doing but it wasn’t any known form of Lowland Scots.
Great scene.
He was right.
Heck, I have enjoyed him in a lot of roles over the years...The Man Who Would Be King, The Eagle Has Landed, The Cider House Rules, Second Hand Lion (Probably my favorite) and...I just saw this, I never knew-he had a cameo role in Monty Python's "The Meaning of Life"! I had to go look, and I think this might be him!
Peachy would never displace Danny!
“...every move he makes, another chance he takes.....”
Probably true.
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