“The scent and smoke and sweat of a casino are nauseating at three in the morning. The novel opens in a similar way to how the later films based on the soon-to-be iconic character of 007 have, by thrusting the reader right into a tense and dangerous scenario.Įxcept here, it is Fleming’s words, rather than images and sounds, that are used to brilliantly conjure the scene in the mind’s eye: On April 13, 1953, Ian Fleming‘s Casino Royale - the British author’s first novel overall, as well as the first in his James Bond series of spy thrillers - was published in the U.K. Book dealer Jon Gilbert poses with a first edition copy of Ian Fleming's Casino Royale at a 2012 antiquarian book fair in London. In comparison you can see why Bond became an instant legend in the 1960s with the exotic location filming and the sexy and charismatic Sean Connery playing the role with a hard edge. Surviving a murder attempt in the opening scene a policeman refers to it by stating: ' They weren't after your winnings then ? ' ' Yeah ? They weren't after my autograph either ' And that's the closest we get to show stopping one liners as the entire action takes place in a couple of sets shot in a TV studio as Jimmy tries to beat Peter Lorre's villain in a card game On its own this obscure TV drama come thriller would be totally forgotten if it wasn't for the fact that it's the first on screen appearance of someone playing Ian Fleming's James Bond.

Bond played by Nelson wears a tuxedo and smokes too much but that's the only link you'll recognise.

My own fascination watching this was entirely down to the opposite reason - it's Bond as film noir that shares nothing in common with the film series. Worse than that imagine if he was an American character ? I do apologise I didn't mean to make you faint Some people have said this live American TV production deserves some credit for at least sticking to the plot of the original novel which is not something you can say about the films that started going their own way even before the end of the 1960s. Now imagine a James Bond story without any of these icons.

We all know Bond is the most successful film franchise in history and we all recognise the icons, the babes, the exotic locations, the gadgets, the big set piece stunts etc of a franchise featuring a very British fictional hero.

I don't think it was until the internet era that I found out an obscure trivia fact and that was the first media appearance of Ian Fleming's James Bond wasn't Sean Connery in DR NO but Barry Nelson in an American anthology series called CLIMAX which adapted CASINO ROYALE.

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