James Bond author Charlie Higson on Sean Connery's eyebrows and writing a young and old Bond 

Virgin Radio

13 Jun 2024, 15:18

Actor, comedian and James Bond author Charlie Higson popped into the Virgin Radio studios this Thursday (13th June) to talk all things Bond, James Bond.

Speaking about his latest Bond story - On His Majesty’s Secret Service - with Ryan Tubridy on his mid-mornings show, the Bond and Young Bond writer told an amusing tale about original Bond writer Ian Fleming’s supposed first impression of Sean Connery.

“When they were casting Sean Connery… famously he was a fairly rough, tough, Scottish, working class guy, and he needed to be groomed!” Higson said. “I can’t remember who it was, whether it was the director or Ian Fleming, [but someone] said ‘Just run a lawnmower over those eyebrows and you’ve got a star there!’”

------------------------------------

DON'T MISS:

David Walliams sets the record straight about his and Matt Lucas' rumoured Little Britain reboot

Hairy Bikers star Si King tears up after ‘overwhelming’ response to Dave Myers tribute motorbike ride

Celebrity Race Across the World’s rumoured line-up: who will take on the epic challenge?

------------------------------------

When it came to getting Bond right in his books, Higson opened up about how he started out writing the Young Bond novels. “There was a vetting process,” he revealed. “[The Ian Fleming estate] talked to a lot of people, and they decided to go with me. 

“The great thing about starting with a Young Bond was that it was new, no one had done it… Fleming didn’t write about Bond’s childhood, there’s very little in the books about it, so I could sort of do a new incarnation of Bond that hadn’t been done before.”

However, after writing several Young Bond novels, Higson found himself itching to write an older Bond too. “Having done them, I thought: ‘Actually, I’d really love to have a go at doing the adult Bond,’” he admitted.

“I had absorbed so much about Bond, I’d studied so much, I’d read so much about him and tried to get inside the mind of Ian Fleming… it’s a terrible phrase to use, but the DNA of Bond, I kind of had it in me, so I was just waiting to be given the call.”

That call came in 2023, as the world celebrated the 70th anniversary of Fleming’s Casino Royale being published, and the UK entered a new era with the coronation of King Charles III. From this, On His Majesty’s Secret Service was born.

“The Fleming estate approached me and said ‘Look, we want to do something for the coronation. It’ll be for charity… we’ve got a title… but we don’t really know what the book is,’” Higson revealed.

“They said you know, probably best not to write something about the coronation being disrupted or a plot to assassinate Charles, at which point I said ‘Are you crazy? You’ve just given me the plot'!... And they said ‘Oh all right!’”

On His Majesty’s Secret Service is available now in paperback, with all proceeds going to the National Literacy Trust.