George Lazenby

This is to celebrate the 85th birthday a while ago of George Lazenby, who at the time announced his professional retirement. Renowned as the one-off James Bond 007 in On Her Majesty’s Secret Service 1969, many do not realise that because of his performance in that film, he had been offered six further films in the series, but on the advice of his agent turned them down. Although that film in the series is now regarded as one of the best, at that time his career did not really recover, and he spent some time investing in real estate. Born in Goulburn, at 14 moving to Queanbeyan, New South Wales, Australia he moved to London in 1964 after serving in the Australian Army, having been a personal combat instructor for Special Forces in the rank of sergeant in Duntroon, Canberra, and he had won two skiing contests in Australia. Before becoming an actor, he worked as an auto mechanic and used car salesman, then prestige car salesman in Canberra, Australia and later in Park Lane & Finchley, London and a model, in 1966 winning a Top Model award. His only acting experience before Bond was in commercials (was the European Marlboro Man and in Fry’s chocolate bar adverts – Big Fry). Lazenby took many personal steps towards becoming 007, having his hair styled in the same place as Cubby Broccoli and spending what little money he had on a suit from Sean Connery’s tailors. His authenticity in fight scenes was noted at the audition for the role, and because of his proficiency in martial arts, he later became a close friend of Bruce Lee and appeared in his last film Game of Death 1978; he gained black belts in judo, Shotokan-Ryu Karate & Lee’s main skill of Jeet-Kune-Do. He made three martial arts films in Hong Kong with Raymond Chow – The Shrine of Ultimate Bliss 1974, The Man from Hong Kong 1975 and The International Assassin 1976. He also made seven Emmanuelle TV films with Sylvia Kristel. He has 64 screen credits, with 2 yet to be released:- other notables being – Universal Soldier 1971, Saint Jack 1979, The Return of the Man from Uncle - The 15 Years Later Affair 1983, Gettysburg 1993. He made Becoming Bond in 2017 a docudrama, which detailed his life and events leading to his casting as 007. He now owns mansions in Hawaii, Brentwood and Santa Monica, California and Australia and a 600-acre estate/ranch in Valyermo, Los Angeles County, California. In the late 60s he lived in Keith Moon’s famous London Waterhouse, also called Tara House, in Chertsey, Surrey; he dated Jill St John & Barbra Streisand and had three children with Pam Shriver and travelled the world with her for tennis tournaments, albeit his favourite hobby is golf, though he is also a strong chess player taught by his grandfather.