Lift List

The question of "who is the best James Bond?" is one that will never be answered.  There's enough difference between each of the six* actors to play the part to make comparisons irrelevant.  Daniel Craig lacks the lightness of touch to make Octopussy a success; the bored, overweight Connery of You Only Live Twice would have ruined On Her Majesty's Secret Service; acting novice George Lazenby would have been flummoxed by the rigours of Casino Royale.  They are very different men in very different films.

I am here to judge them on a very different criteria.  I have boarded a lift to the top of a very tall building, and a James Bond actor has got on the lift with me.  Halfway up, the elevator becomes stuck, and we realise that we are trapped there for several hours until help arrives.  Which James Bond actors would make this time fly, and which ones would make me lever open the doors and risk leaping down the shaft?  It is, in short, a judgement on the public personas of the actors, built up over my three decades of Bond fandom.  It's very personal, it might be completely wrong, but here are how I'd rate the 007s, from worst to best:

6.  George Lazenby

I genuinely believe that Lazenby regrets a lot of his arrogant behaviour on the set of OHMSS, and age and maturity will have certainly mellowed him over the decades.  He still seems like a bit of a self-centred arse though - ask Pam Shriver - and he'd almost inevitably want to talk about his real estate empire in our elevator prison rather than, say, sharing filthy anecdotes about Telly Savalas.

5.  Pierce Brosnan

I have long had the impression that no-one, in any room, is as interesting to Pierce Brosnan as Pierce Brosnan himself.  Our hours together would almost inevitably be spent discussing Brosnan's paintings, his charity work, his acting training, his devotion to his craft, his house in Malibu, his cooking skills... If he did mention Bond, it'd be the fascinating story about how Goldfinger was the first film he ever saw.  Again.  I'd probably be asleep when the fire crews arrived.

4.  Sean Connery

This one's on a knife edge, because it very much depends what mood Sean's in when we get trapped together.  If it's the funny, rollicking Sean, the one that laughs and jokes and twinkles mischievously, then you could have a really good time.  However, as he's aged, the other Sean seems to be more common, the grouchy one who bangs on about taxation and Scottish independence and how awful everyone on The League of Extraordinary Gentleman was.  That would be absolute hell.  (There is a third option, where you get the Sean Connery who talks about golf, and in many ways that would be the worst Sean Connery of all).

3.  Daniel Craig

I have long maintained that Daniel Craig has a very sly, very dark sense of humour.  I bet he's a really good laugh after a few pints of beer, and he certainly seems to be well-respected by his peers which points to a good personality.  However, in the enclosed, airless environment of a trapped lift, jet black jokes about us plummeting to our deaths would quickly wear thin.

2.  Roger Moore

Obviously, Sir Rog is an absolute doll.  No-one who has ever spent more than five minutes with him has a bad word to say; indeed, if people don't get along with him, you judge them.  The problem is that lovely as he is, he has perfected a certain shtick, particularly in the last twenty years, which he will almost certainly wheel out.  Imagine the social awkwardness of maintaining a fixed grin as Moore wheels out the Jimmy Tarbuck/Pussy Galore "well, we don't go looking for it!" anecdote again.

1.  Timothy Dalton

Another actor who is, by all reports, an absolute sweetheart, Dalton has the advantage over Moore of a certain quiet shyness.  Time in the trapped lift would Tim would be less of a rollicking laugh fest, but would be more interesting, and his jokes and anecdotes would be unexpected and appreciated.  He also has a calmness that would mean you wouldn't get stressed or panicky.  The fact that the boy from Colwyn Bay is also my favourite 007 is pure coincidence.

*If forced to include the unofficial Bonds, David Niven would slot in between Daniel Craig, because that effervescent wit is never unwelcome, while Barry Nelson would go at the bottom of the list because, bless him, once you've asked about Peter Lorre and Stanley Kubrick, what else would you talk about?

Every James Bond's Tenure

FILM ONE: Everyone tries their hardest to really launch the guy in style.  The script and casting all get that little bit more effort applied to them; the action is a bit grander; the jokes are a bit funnier.  Everyone wants this to succeed.

Dr No, On Her Majesty's Secret Service, Live and Let Die, The Living Daylights, GoldenEye, Casino Royale.

FILM TWO:  They try to make the first film again, but something stops it from working properly.  There's a writer's strike that stops development of the script, or it's rushed into production too quickly to meet some arbitrary factor like a stock issue.  It comes out a little bit unsatisfactory in many ways, with some of the polish of the previous film absent, and you feel the script could have done with another couple of passes.

The Man With The Golden Gun, Licence To Kill, Tomorrow Never Dies, Quantum of Solace.

Exception that proves the rule: From Russia With Love.

FILM THREE: Everyone's firing on all cylinders.  They've worked out what their lead actor can do and is comfortable with, and allowed him to have script input to make it more to his voice.  A new director comes in and brings a freshness to the series.  It all just works, and in subsequent years, the film is seen as a high point of the entire series.

Goldfinger, The Spy Who Loved Me, The World Is Not Enough, Skyfall.

FILM FOUR:  They try to make the third film again, only BIGGER.  Everything that happened in the previous film is repeated only blown up by a thousand percent.  The result is a film that wobbles and collapses and doesn't work anywhere near as well as its predecessor.  These films have their supporters, but are mainly seen as pale shadows of the one before.

Thunderball, Moonraker, Die Another Day. 

Currently pending but all the signs are there: Spectre.

FILM FIVE:  After the relative artistic (but not financial) failure of the previous films, there's a comprehensive change in personnel.  A new director comes in and he makes different decisions to his somewhat jaded predecessor.  It doesn't do as well at the box office but it's largely seen as the superior film over the one before.

You Only Live Twice, For Your Eyes Only.

FILM SIX: Everyone is just pissing about now.  The set is a load of fun, the actor is so relaxed he's practically asleep, and silliness seeps into every part of the script.  The Bond family are having a party.

Diamonds Are Forever, Octopussy.

FILM SEVEN: You're getting too old for this shit.

Never Say Never Again, A View To A Kill.