These are the sorts of trivialities that preoccupy a person's mind when he
goes through the bonus features of 20 James Bond movies in the space of
only a week or two.

I began to think about the *ages* of the various actors who have played
Bond, so I went to IMDB and looked up birth dates and production dates --
and here's what I found.

The youngest actor to play Bond was George Lazenby, who was 29 when his
only movie, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, was filmed in 1969.

The oldest actor to play James Bond is easily Roger Moore; he was the
oldest actor to be *hired* for the role (45 when he filmed 1973's Live and
Let -- older than Sean Connery was when he *quit* playing the character,
for the second time, in 1971's Diamonds Are Forever), and he hung in there
until he turned 57 on the set of 1985's A View to a Kill.  (No other actor
has played Bond in his 50s, unless you count Connery's appearance in
1983's Never Say Never Again, which was not an "official" Bond film.)

So here's how it breaks down:

   Sean Connery -- Aug 25 1930
   31 when he was hired for Dr. No (Jan 16 - Mar 30 1962)
   36-37 when he quit after You Only Live Twice (Jul 4 1966 - Feb 1967)
   40-41 when he came back for Diamonds Are Forever (Apr 5 - Sep 7 1971)
   52 when he came back for Never Say Never Again (Sep 27 1982 - 1983)

   George Lazenby -- Sep 5 1939
   29 when he was hired for On Her Majesty's Secret Service (Oct 21 1968 -
      Jun 23 1969)

   Roger Moore -- Oct 14 1927
   45 when he was hired for Live and Let Die (Oct 13 1972 - Mar 15 1973)
   56-57 when he quit after A View to a Kill (Aug 3 1984 - Jan 16 1985)

   Timothy Dalton -- Mar 21 1944
   42 when he was hired for The Living Daylights (Sep 29 1986 - Feb 13
      1987)
   44 when he made his last film Licence to Kill (Jul 19 - Nov 18 1988)

   Pierce Brosnan -- May 16 1953
   41-42 when he was hired for Goldeneye (Jan 16 - Jun 6 1995)
   48-49 when he made his last film Die Another Day (Jan 14 - Jul 2002)

   Daniel Craig -- Mar 2 1968
   37-38 when he was hired for Casino Royale (Jan 30 - Jul 21 2006)

Incidentally, it's bizarre to hear about some of the people who were hired
or considered to play Bond, before other things got in the way -- and it's
bizarre to hear that some of them were American!  E.g., after Lazenby
didn't work out, the producers apparently hired John Gavin, who was then
about to turn 40, to play Bond in Diamonds Are Forever ... but then the
studio bribed Connery to come back at the last minute.  (Gavin is probably
best-known for playing Janet Leigh's boyfriend in 1960's Psycho.)  And in
the early 1980s, when Roger Moore's contract expired, the producers did
three screen tests with James Brolin, who was then about 42 ... but then
they heard that a rival studio was bringing back Connery for Never Say
Never Again, and they realized they couldn't compete by sending a brand
new actor into the fray, so they signed up Moore to stay on board.

They also did a screen test with Kiwi actor Sam Neill in 1985, I think,
when he would have been about 37 or 38.  The part went to Dalton instead
-- and speaking of Dalton, apparently he was approached to play Bond in
the late 1960s or early 1970s, but he turned it down because he was in his
mid-20s and he felt he would have been too young for the part.

And of course, before Dalton got the role, it was offered to Brosnan, who
would have played the character in The Living Daylights if his TV show
hadn't refused to let him go.  Brosnan would have been 33 then.

--- Peter T. Chattaway ------------- http://filmchatblog.blogspot.com/ ---
Nothing tells memories from ordinary moments; only afterwards do they
   claim remembrance, on account of their scars. -- Chris Marker, La Jetee

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