Friday, December 16, 2016

Peter Lorre and Barry Nelson in the first CASINO ROYALE (1954)



Here's "Jimmy" Bond, only a year after the book was published.

5 comments:

Oscar Case said...

I'm going to watch this, but not right now. I never saw this or the latest one. Never had a TV in 1954 and I was bored with 007 by the time the latest rolled around.

Shay said...

If the producers couldn't coax something resembling an English accent out of Barry Nelson, why didn't they spring for an English actor?

Unknown said...

Some things to remember:

- In 1954, James Bond wasn't JAMES BOND yet.
Casino Royale was the only book at that point; a sale to a popular American TV anthology was something of a coup for a then-mainly-unknown British author.

- Changing the Brit hero to a Yank would be part of the deal; it was only a one shot, so who'd really notice (unless they'd read the book, and that would be a fraction of the prime-time audience).

- You'll note that Felix Leiter, an American in Fleming's book, is turned here into a Brit (and played by Australian Michael Pate); again, par for the course.

Shay said...

I couldn't watch it for long, I'm afraid.

Cap'n Bob said...

I saw this years ago and wasn't exactly bowled over. It's historically important, though.