Obituaries

Hilly wrote:

well, worst news still. Geoffrey Palmer has passed

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-54838209

Bond was but one small chink of a great career. I had great affection of his character in As Time Goes By, Lionel, as he had a similar army career to my late grandad and indeed, seemed like him in a way.

Great actor, a grand age and well, yes. Damn

Haven't seen too much of his work, though now remember he was in an episode of Fawlty Towers. Always liked his character in TND.

R.I.P.

Darn...it's going to suck even harder every time this thread gets bumped. RIP.

'Bloody hell! Don't you people keep ANYTHING locked up?'

R.I.P. Mr Palmer.

"Make Chernobyl look like pic-nic!"

CJB if you ever want to check out Palmer's CV as it were, he was the kind of actor to guest in all our TV programmes back in the day. Film-wise he did the film Mrs Brown with Dame Judi.

Have just seen something interesting in his obit on the BBC's site ... in 2000, the BFI polled industry professionals on the best TV programmes ever screened.

Palmer was the only actor who'd appeared in all of the top 3 (Fawlty Towers, Cathy Come Home, Doctor Who).

Hilly wrote:

"Make Chernobyl look like pic-nic!"

CJB if you ever want to check out Palmer's CV as it were, he was the kind of actor to guest in all our TV programmes back in the day. Film-wise he did the film Mrs Brown with Dame Judi.

Thanks, I'll keep an eye out.

Blunt Instrument wrote:

Have just seen something interesting in his obit on the BBC's site ... in 2000, the BFI polled industry professionals on the best TV programmes ever screened.

Palmer was the only actor who'd appeared in all of the top 3 (Fawlty Towers, Cathy Come Home, Doctor Who).

I did see that. Quite the record to hold.

Not quite Bond realm but LeCarre has passed and it just hit me hard.

https://www.bbc.com/news/entertainment-arts-55297558

I'd only read a few novels of his but always meant to read more. Any interview piece he was ever in I hung on every word. What a great individual and to me THE SPY WHO CAME IN FROM THE COLD is just one of the great works period. I was happy to hear him soften on Fleming finally a few years ago.

I must confess I've never read him and found The Spy Who ... just too bleak.

However I did enjoy the big-screen Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy and Our Kind Of Traitor, plus the BBC adaptations of The Night Manager and The Little Drummer Girl.

This has been a shitty year, pardon my French. I've got Tinker, read Smiley's People and a few others. Tailor of Panama is fantastic. Margaret Attwood apparently tweeted he was the antidote to Bond.

Maybe, of course his work was realistic. Bond is different. It's escapism.

Well, here's to Mr Le Carre. Never the like again.

Sadly we've now lost Jeremy Bulloch

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/entertainment-arts-55358301

Knew the name from Star War, but didn't realise he was in OP.

R.I.P.

Me with Jeremy Bulloch at Belfast Comic-Con 2015.

R.I.P. indeed ... Boba Fett is an iconic character.

CJB wrote:

Knew the name from Star War, but didn't realise he was in OP.

R.I.P.

TSWLM as well in the PTS on HMS Ranger. Got in my head he did another besides that and OP.

Smithers is the kind of character that is missed in Bond I think. Could've fitted into a Brosnan film, like in GE.

As a child I knew him more for Summer Holiday.

Nice photo Blunty. The kind of chap that doesn't mind doing those photos unlike your Shatners etc.

R I P Peter lamont died 18th dec aged 91, Lamont was truly one of the Bond family, as production designer and set decorator on eighteen Bond films. He also worked on Titanic,aliens and fiddler on the roof

What sad news. Good grief 2020 has been terrible for the Bond team family. I saw the news about Peter a few hours ago.

hegottheboot wrote:

What sad news. Good grief 2020 has been terrible for the Bond team family. I saw the news about Peter a few hours ago.

Indeed, diden't realise he was so old,but than you don't think about it until it's game over do you.

hegottheboot wrote:

What sad news. Good grief 2020 has been terrible for the Bond team family. I saw the news about Peter a few hours ago.

Seems nobody else did, Peter was a long serving and essential team member....C'mon,show some love guys!

2021 and we've already lost another team member:
https://www.cinemablend.com/news/2560926/bond-girl-tanya-roberts-is-dead-at-65

This is rather surprising and apparently her cause of death is unknown. I've become quite fond of Stacey as a character more and more over the years so this is quite sad.

Just saw this too. Didn't care for her as Stacey Sutton but she shone on That 70s Show.

Sudden indeed. R.I.P.

Imagine Hilly and KKBB in particular will find this saddening.

R.I.P.

Blunt Instrument wrote:

Imagine Hilly and KKBB in particular will find this saddening.

R.I.P.

Quite. This was one I was not expecting to see for at least another decade, especially because of her online presence lately. I - and we - have been quite fortunate that Tanya has interacted with our BAB Facebook and Twitter accounts over the last several months. She has answered some of the questions I put forward as a forum, liked some of the forum tweets, and personally found and liked a post I made on my personal Instagram account that was unrelated to anything she had been a part of - it was an image of food or scenery or something. But when I woke up and saw that 'The Real Tanya Roberts' liked my post I was grinning like a boy on Christmas Day.

Because AVTAK was one of the first Bond films I watched as a kid, and her utter beauty was a huge part in my becoming a Bond fan. I was saddened to read some years later the reputation she has in Bond fandom, and it was all the more baffling as the years went on how and why she was criticised so intensely.

I'm hoping some of the support and love I have for her work in AVTAK reached her. Well, I feel I know it did, given how she interacted with our social media. I posted and retweeted a few times the thread I have here dedicated to her and it did reach her (or her management). And the joy she radiated when talking about her time on AVTAK, when she hosted her live Q/As, seemed to demonstrate no ill-feelings towards Bond fans and others who (unjustly!) criticised her work. And that makes her all the more loveable in my eyes.

I mentioned this in her dedicated appreciation thread, but her life seemed so tragic. Hilly set me straight but given how her life has now ended so prematurely, I wish that she felt a sense of completeness in some capacity. Her personal life was marred with even more tragedy than her professional life. Just as she enjoyed a resurgence in the 90s with That 70s Show, her husband becomes terminally ill and she leaves the show to take care of him. I read her Bronx upbringing equipped her with some survival skills useful for her acting career. She was first married at 15 which led to an annulment. The Razzies-- was she nominated for AVTAK purely for the age gap between her and Moore? Had it been Dalton opposite her would she have had the same criticism levelled at her? My heart breaks for her. I wished to meet her once and tell her how she's my favourite Moore-era Bond girl and has a spot in my top 10 Bond girls ever. To show her some appreciation in person and not from behind a keyboard.

RIP Tanya. You've taken up your place again as an Angel. I'm sure Roger is there showing your around and offering you a drink...but not before cleaning up a few details.

And she's the first main Bond girl from the Moore era to pass. His last. Our first. So unexpected.

Very much a loss for the reasons Fields says above. Just too young an age nowadays and so sudden a loss at that. Whereas the likes of Peter Lamont and Sean Connery had a fantastic inning, it looked like Roberts was just getting going or at least not going anywhere in a hurry.

And though she's not everyone's cup of tea for a Bond girl, she was dynamite in 70s Show for various reasons.

Sir Hilary Bray OBE wrote:

Earl Cameron, who co-starred in Thunderball, has passed at the grand age of 102

https://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/entry/earl-cameron-james-bond-thunderball-dead_uk_5f005811c5b612083c5ca962

Great actor and if no one has, I recommend Pool of London for that very reason. RIP

Bloody hell. 102.