REEL PALI: The Name is Bond, Mate

By JOHN HARLOW | Editor-in-Chief

He was the spy who loved Pacific Palisades, but he only lived here once.

There are many, many bad 007 puns, but only one actor who turned the role of James Bond down after one appearance.

And his name, in case you have forgotten, was Lazenby, George Robert Lazenby.

He was the star of “On Her Majesty’s Secret Service,” a sturdily made Bond from 1969, most memorable for skiing stunts and the sudden brutal end of Bond’s only bride Tracey, played by the always-fabulous Dame Diana Rigg. (She was still killer in “Game of Thrones.”)

And, yes, Lazenby, the former car salesman and male model from Ghoulburn, Australia, lived for many years in the Palisades, up at the high end of Charmel Lane, a familiar figure picking up his kids from a Village school and walking a large Australian dog around town.

At 78, Lazenby still returns every now and again, prompting a twitter of admirers as he strolls high-backed as ever into a coffee shop or two. But he spends most of his time with his family in a quiet spot out near Palmdale.

This is not the 007-like figure we meet in “Becoming Bond,” the fresh documentary on Hulu which is so entertaining it cannot possibly be all true. But sorting out the tall tales from the Bond myths, as remembered by Lazenby himself, a born story-teller, well … why spoil a good lunch?

Not all of the stories—reenacted for our entertainment in Pythonesque style by attractive actors with Australian accents—shine a happy light on this larrikin (cheery roughneck). Blundering into a romance with a posh beaut, only to be afflicted by seemingly terminal erectile dysfunction is something other stars would pay not to have disclosed, even decades later.

He pursues the young lady to London, where, without an acting credit or lesson to his name, he stumbles into auditions to replace Sean Connery as James Bond 007.

With a Rolex and a suit made for Sean Connery, clothing Lazenby is shown purloining from a Saville Row tailor, he bluffs through a series of auditions, largely by quoting the names of filmmaking countries where his imaginary credits cannot be checked: Russia, China, Ukraine.

And, as the film producers said, he looked like the next Connery: masculine, a little cruel, a lot misogynist. They worried as a male model he might be gay, so they sent a nice young lady to his suite and watched, eating fruit, to judge his performance.

He carried it off. He was optioned for six more Bonds, with a $1 million signing bonus offered in cash under the table. Allegedly—producer Harry Saltzman is dead, but it sounds like him.

A star was born and then immediately imploded—maybe because it had come too easy for Lazenby. He thought, arrogantly, something better would follow or maybe, as a frustrated Jeff Garlin roared, he was merely young and dumb.

Like Daniel Craig decades later, Lazenby trash-talked the role, but unlike the dour Brit, he then quit the business to become a hippy, or something equally hairy, instead.

He returned to film, a handful of other roles followed, but he was spent.

It is not much of a career. “Becoming Bond” is far more entertaining than his cameos in no fewer than eight “Emmanuelle” soft-porn, made-for-cable outings.

He came close to self-parody in the 1983 TV movie “Return of the Man from U.N.C.L.E.” where he played a suave stranger only known as JB. Who got to drive an Aston Martin DB5—more glorious than any mere salary.

John Cleese offered him the role of Jesus in “Life of Brian,” but Lazenby’s agent squashed that flat. But at least people would have seen Lazenby perform a miracle—bringing his career back from the dead.

Regrets? Not too many, according to the still-snippy Australian in “Becoming Bond.”

But again, Lazenby is still at heart a car salesman—he charms and, at the end of 90 minutes, you are still not sure what you have bought.