Movies - TV
The James Bond Crew Wasn’t Happy With Christopher Lee’s Scaramanga Casting
By JOE ROBERTS
While “The Man with the Golden Gun” isn’t the most beloved James Bond film, the film wasn’t without its charms. Christopher Lee delivered a memorable performance as the villain.
Lee envisioned Francisco Scaramanga as a villainous equal to Bond. Despite being one of the film’s greatest strengths, his casting was controversial.
In an interview with Empire, Lee revealed that the producers wanted Jack Palance for the role of Francisco Scaramanga, but the veteran star turned it down.
Director Guy Hamilton then met with Lee and offered him the role, but writers Richard Maibaum and Tom Mankiewicz hesitated to work with the actor.
In the book “Nobody Does it Better,” Mankiewicz shared, “I actually begged and pleaded and banged the table to have Jack Palance play Scaramanga.”
Maibaum wanted the film to be closer to Ian Fleming’s original novel and didn’t think Lee was “properly cast as Scaramanga.”
The co-writer said, “I thought the character should be what he was in the book, which was a South American assassin who came from a circus background.”
He continued, “But Christopher Lee got in his head, and they agreed with him, that Scaramanga should be just like James Bond, except that he veered over to crime.”
While some agreed with Maibaum, like “The Predator” co-writer Fred Dekkar, Lee’s Scaramanga offered an interesting take on the character and remains one the best Bond villains.