Roger Moore, the elegantly carefree lead actor in seven James Bond movies, passed away in Switzerland.
Following a brief illness, the British actor passed away on Tuesday, according to a family statement that was shared on Moore’s official Twitter account. “We know our own love and admiration will be magnified many times over, across the world, by people who knew him for his films, his television shows and his passionate work for UNICEF, which he considered to be his greatest achievement,” added the statement.
Moore’s carefree sense of whimsy, which mainly depended on the arched eyebrow, appeared to be a critique of the fundamental silliness of the Bond films, in which the dapper British secret agent was equally skilled at ordering gourmet meals, bedding gorgeous women, and mixing martinis as he was at taking down evildoers out to take over the globe.
“To me, the Bond situations are so ridiculous, so outrageous,” he once stated. “I mean, everyone knows this dude is a spy even if he’s supposed to be one. He gets shaken, not stirred, martinis from every bartender in the world. What sort of earnest spy is acknowledged everywhere he ventures? It’s absurd. Therefore, you must also handle the humor outrageously.” Moore played secret agent 007 in almost as many films as Sean Connery, but he never quite surpassed Connery as the public’s favorite James Bond. How? By “finding a joke in every situation,” according to movie reviewer Rex Reed.
Though with varying degrees of success, the actor had already enjoyed a lengthy career in films and television before taking on the part in 1973 when Connery grew tired of it. Fans of the iconic American TV series “Maverick” from the 1950s and 1960s recalled him fondly as Beauregarde Maverick, the English cousin of Bret and Bart Maverick, the Maverick brothers of the Wild West. In 1959, he starred in the American television series “The Alaskans.”
