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A Blind Date and a Thrown Punch Led to Lazenby

Born in Australia in 1939, George Lazenby was a high school dropout who followed a woman to London and ended up becoming a successful male model for a string of print and TV ad campaigns. Acting wasn’t on his mind, and certainly not stepping into the role of the world’s greatest spy, when he went on a last-minute blind date with an agent. She called him a few days later and suggested that he might be right for a top-secret part she’d heard about.

When Lazenby found out the role was James Bond, he didn’t concern himself with his thin (or rather, nonexistent) acting resume. He was, however, worried about his look, which featured the long hair and sideburns quite prevalent in Swinging ‘Sixties’60s London. But he didn’t just go to any barber: he went to Sean Connery’s very own barber and got the same cut as the Scottish actor. Then he went to Connery’s tailor, who just happened to have a suit on hand that the former 007 star hadn’t claimed and which fit Lazenby perfectly. It was almost as if it was fate.

Lazenby talked his way into the office of Saltzman, too, and spun some tall tales about his work as an actor in Australia. (Oh, to apply for jobs in a pre-internet world!) Told to come back the next day to meet with director Peter Hunt, Lazenby asked his neighbor, an acting coach, for a quick lesson or two that evening. But when he met with Hunt, he confessed that he had no acting experience. Hunt was still impressed that he managed to fool the tough, no-nonsense Saltzman. “Stick to your story and I’ll make you the next James Bond,” he told the Australian upstart.

The producers screen-tested Lazenby in secret to stop word from getting out that they were looking seriously at a model to take on the role of Bond. They also observed him swimming, riding horses, playing baccarat, and allegedly even having sex—a production assistant was assigned to bring women to Lazenby’s apartment and observe discreetly how he performed to determine that he was not gay.

His final test was a mock fight with a stuntman so that the producers could see whether he would look convincing in hand-to-hand personal combat. But Lazenby, who had no experience in staged fisticuffs but had participated in his share of real-life brawls, punched the stuntman for real, bloodying his nose and sending him to the floor. “That’s when Harry stepped over him, grabbed me, and says, ‘We’re going with you,’” Lazenby recalled for Some Kind of Hero.