Desmond L.
Years ago I went to see him do a talk about his role. Salient points:
- as a person, he knew nothing about technology (happy to admit to this).
- the briefcase with hidden knives etc. was in a sorry old state (he produced it)
- quite a lot of the tech., at least in the earlier films, was real
- the ejector seat in the DB5 was an afterthought. He'd done his scenes and then they called him back in to the studio for an extra day's filming to introduce the ejector seat, which meant an extra day's pay
(from which I had to conclude that)
- despite his almost iconic stature within the series, he never got star wages.
Now, I did think that Cleese as Q's successor was an inspired bit of casting, and I'm surprised by this decision - but let's see how it pans out, eh? It seems to me that the Craig era is a long way from EOL. I don't think we'll see the idiocy of Moore's Moonraker or Brosnan's DIAD, at least this time round.