Veteran British character actor Victor Spinnetti has just brought out an autobiography, in which he tells lots of anecdotes  of when he worked with famous actors/actresses.

A newspaper recently reviewed the book, and printed excerpts, but one segment made me wonder?

Victor tells how one day he was with Sean Connery in his hotel suite, and the phone rang. Sean listened for a while to the caller and said "No way, I wouldn't dream of it" and hung up. He explained to Victor that the caller, some executive from the Bond movies, was prepared to have Sean back as James Bond, would pay off Roger Moore, scrap the footage shot so far, millions of pounds worth, and start again. I gathered from later on in the article Roger was filming "Octopussy" and Sean, "Never Say Never Again." Do you think this is true?  :smt017

i was under the impression that broccolli tried to persuade moore to stay longer as bond. it was rogers decision to leave. connery and broccolli were not on good terms when connery left. why would he want to scrap the footage and dump roger in favor of sean makes no sense. connery was making never say never and was going through one litigation after another with broccolli, and was barely allowed to use the name james bond in never say never which was a lousy film all around. i d say the article is not telling us  everything.

Not to mention that Connery, despite being younger in age than Roger, looked older, and that has always been this one issue with Bond actors that everyone has been making a big deal about. Connery had to wear a toupe for NSNA. Roger was already popular as Bond by 1983, and had made the franchise a lot of money, so why get rid of him to bring back an actor with whom they couldn't get along to begin with?

Not to say anything derogatory about Sean (he was indeed a good Bond and a good actor in general!!!), but knowing what he's like off screen, I wouldn't be surprised if this was something he came up with to stroke his own ego.

I was watching The Saint episode "The Romantic Matron" and Victor Spinnetti had a small part in it.  That's him on the right wearing the hat.  

I don't doubt the conversation Sean Connery had with Victor regarding Roger. All the same, it was a pretty cruel thing to say, and I don't think it should have been included in his book.


I'm inclined to agree with you Sunny and Some1. No way would they have been wanting to get rid of Roger and have Sean back again.

I was under the impression that Sir Roger got on better with Broccoli than Connery did, so I find this hard to fathom. If it is true what Victor Spinetti and Connery are supposed to have said, they should be ashamed of themselves and Spinetti should not have added this in his book.