Meet All 19 Actors Who Have Played James Bond — That’s a Lot of 007!

Barry Nelson

Project: A year after its publication in 1953, Ian Fleming’s first James Bond novel, Casino Royale, was adapted into a live CBS television production as a part of the Climax Mystery Theater anthology series. In it, Barry Nelson (My Favorite Husband, The Hunter) played an Americanized version of the character — Card Sharp Jimmy Bond — who goes up against Peter Lorre’s Le Chiffre with Linda Christian as the first Bond Girl, Vesper Lynd.

Barry Nelson Says: “To me,” he admitted in the pages of the book Bond and Beyond, “the Peter Lorre character was far more colorful. I brought it up to management that it caused an imbalance in the show. They had given me too much exposition to handle. Le Chiffre had all the lively scenes. To my surprise, Lorre agreed with me. I thought his support was delightful. Actors rarely rally that way. But in the end, the character was colorless. There were none of those wisecracks that you see in the Bond pictures. It got too talky; there was no action in it.”

Bob Holness

Project: A South African radio production of Ian Fleming’s Moonraker, which may not have been authorized and which was reportedly broadcast sometime in the mid-1950s.

Cultbox.co.uk Says: “Holness’ Moonraker was a 1956 South African radio adaptation of the book (although some sources suggest it was actually broadcast for the first time in 1957), and because it was broadcast live, no known recording of Holness’ performance was ever kept. His take on Bond is forever consigned to a mix of history and the imagination. That said, Holness recalled that his Moonraker ran for under an hour and a half.”

Bob Holness Told the BBC: “It just came up through a hole in the floor. I was doing lots of radio plays at the time, but I wanted to do something a bit different, so when James Bond came up I ventured in and said yes. I’d never heard of the character, but it became an amazing part to play and the response from listeners was terrific.”

Sean Connery

Projects: Daniel Craig is good, but Sean Connery still edges him out as James Bond. He made his debut as the character in Dr. No (1962), which was followed by From Russia With Love (1963), Goldfinger (1964), Thunderball (1965), You Only Live Twice (1967),  Diamonds Are Forever (1971) and Never Say Never Again (1983). He voiced Bond for the 2005 video game version of From Russia with Love.

Sean Connery Told the Sydney Morning Herald in 1963: “The only real difficulty I found in playing Bond was that I had to start from scratch. Nobody knew anything about him, after all. Not even Fleming. Does he have parents? Where does he come from? Nobody knows. But we played it for laughs, and people seem to feel it comes off quite well.

“I don’t suppose I’d really like Bond if I met him,” he added. “He’s a man who makes his own rules. That’s fine so long as you’re not plagued with doubts. But if you are — and most of us are — you’re sunk. That’s why Bond appeals so much to women. By their nature, they are indecisive and a man who is absolutely sure of everything comes as a godsend. I suppose, too, the Walter Mitty in every man makes him admire Bond a little. That’s where writer Ian Fleming is so clever. Fleming told me that he studied psychology in Munich before the war.”

Woody Allen

The Production: Back in 1954, Ian Fleming had not only sold the TV rights to Casino Royale to CBS, but the feature film rights to producer Gregory Ratoff, who attempted to make a serious Bond to compete with the official film series starring Connery. Long story short, those rights ended up in the hands of producer Charles K. Feldman, who, rather than try and compete, decided instead to create a spoof with a variety of actors playing James Bond, five directors, a ridiculous number of screenwriters, and so on. Unfortunately, it’s not a spoof that inspires much in the way of laughter. The film was released in 1967.

Woody Allen: He plays the film’s villain, Dr. Noah, as well as Jimmy Bond and is the head of the enemy organization SMERSH. His ultimate plan is to use biological warfare to make all women beautiful and kill all men over 4’6″ tall, thus leaving him the big man who gets all the girls. Unsurprisingly, Woody is not a fan of the movie.

David Niven

The Production: 1967 version of Casino Royale, the spoof based on Ian Fleming’s novel.

David Niven: In the early days, Fleming actually thought that the British actor would make the ideal James Bond (though he wasn’t able to convince anyone else that he was right). In this case, Niven got the chance, playing Sir James Bond, who has to come out of retirement to fight SMERSH.

Peter Sellers

The Production: Casino Royale, the 1967 spoof that was inspired by Fleming’s novel of the same name.

Peter Sellers: To us, he will always be best remembered as Inspector Clouseau in the Pink Panther films, but here he tries to play it relatively straight as Evelyn Tremble/James Bond. The actor’s well known eccentricities made working with him on this film something of a nightmare for many of the people involved.

George Lazenby

The Production: Following the completion of filming You Only Live Twice, Sean Connery announced to the producers that he was done playing Bond (he’d come back to the role two more times in the end). A global search for a successor began for what would be the sixth 007 adventure, 1969’s On Her Majesty’s Secret Service. Ultimately Australian model George Lazenby would get the part, though, due to bad advice, he refused to appear in any others, effectively torpedoing his career in a number of ways.

George Lazenby Says: “I felt it was Sean Connery’s gig, you know? I can’t do it better than him, because he created it on his personality, and I had to copy his personality, basically. So it wasn’t me, it was me trying to do the best I could playing Sean Connery playing James Bond. They changed my accent not to a Scottish one, but to an English one, and changed my walk and then let me loose. I just did it the way I did it.

“You know, it never goes away,” he adds. “Of course, if James Bond films had stopped being made 40 years ago, probably no one would be talking to me now, but it’s never gone away in my life. I mean, I’ll be in a bar and some guy will be staring at me and say, ‘Are you George?’ It seems like that happens to me weekly or monthly or whatever. And that’s both a good and a bad thing, I suppose. One, you can’t be incognito too easily. Secondly, people know you and talk to you and help you out and do all that sort of things. You can get things done better than most people, so it does have its upside, too. Everything does. But if I’d stayed a motor mechanic, I’d have had a much simpler life.”

Roger Moore

The Productions: Following On Her Majesty’s Secret Service, Sean Connery was lured back to the role of Bond for 1971’s Diamonds Are Forever. After that, though, he was done (at least until 1983’s Never Say Never Again, made for a rival company) and Roger Moore (best known as Simon Templar on the TV series The Saint) was brought in as the new 007. He starred in Live and Let Die (1973), The Man with the Golden Gun (1974), The Spy Who Loved Me (1977), Moonraker (1979), For Your Eyes Only (1981), Octopussy (1983) and A View to a Kill (1985).

Roger Moore Says: While being interviewed regarding his autobiography Bond on Bond, Roger had described the character as someone who didn’t enjoy killing, but did it professionally, quickly and accurately. “At the beginning of one of the books,” he explained, “it said that bond had just finished a mission in Mexico; he obviously has had to eliminate somebody, although he didn’t like killing. He took pride in doing his job efficiently. It resonated with me, because I am not violent myself. I hate guns, I hate explosions, so i thought it was a good key to this man. His job’s got to be done.” He added that this made his Bond unlike Connery’s: “I always say, Sean was a killer; I was a lover.”

Timothy Dalton

Productions: With Roger Moore leaving the franchise following his seventh and final entry, A View to a Kill, Timothy Dalton was brought in, returning to the roots of Fleming and making 007 a serious (perhaps too serious) killer again. His two films are 1987’s The Living Daylights and 1989’s Licence to Kill.

Timothy Dalton Says: “One is constantly reminded by Fleming, both from Bond himself and through the mouth of other characters, that Bond really is as bad as the bad guys. He is a killer, but he does have a moral sense of what good is. That throws him into conflict, because of his self-knowledge of who he is and what he does. He knows what he does … he’s a killer.

“The first one was a much more complex story. It operated on lots of different levels. Licence to Kill is much more direct and it is a different kind of Bond story. It involves Bond on a mission of personal vengeance and, therefore, he’s probably less objective, less professional, less clear than he would be if he was on a job. It’s personal. It’s a different kind of story, but that’s as it should be. I thought a good step was taken in The Living Daylights away from a certain kind of Bond movie into something that was more involving, exciting, and believable. And I think we went a step further in Licence to Kill.”

Pierce Brosnan

The Productions: In 1986, Pierce Brosnan was signed to play James Bond for what would be The Living Daylights, but at the absolute last minute NBC decided to renew his contract for the recently-canceled TV series Remington Steele, and the actor had to drop out. Flash forward several years, and he served as Timothy Dalton’s replacement in the films GoldenEye (1995), Tomorrow Never Dies (1997), The World is Not Enough (1999) and Die Another Day (2000). He also voiced Bond in the 2oo3 video game James Bond 007: Everything or Nothing.

Pierce Brosnan Says: “I think I was more right for the role as a man of 42 than I was back in ’86. There’s a maturity there as a man and as an actor. I didn’t have the fear that I had back then. I could stand there and just fill the shoes and not feel intimidated by who’s been there before me — Sean, Roger … especially Sean. I didn’t feel I had to conquer that one. Sean did it his way and did it brilliantly.

“When I was signed, they gave me a black leather-bound first edition of Casino Royale. I read the first chapter, and it’s really Bond at the casinos playing, going back to his hotel room, checking to see if the hair he placed in the door was still there and undisturbed. And just as he’s falling asleep, he puts his hand under the pillow for the revolver, and the last sentence is, ‘His face goes into repose. Brutal. Cold.’ It’s good writing. Fleming put things down well; he could turn a phrase. Bond is just the ultimate hero to play, but he’s complex enough to keep it interesting. He has enough demons there that he just sits on the whole time, because he can’t let them out.”

Michael Jayston

Production: A 1990 radio play of Ian Fleming’s You Only Live Twice, which was broadcast on BBC 4, which officially describes the plot as follows: “James Bond’s wife, Tracey, has been murdered by his deadly enemy Blofeld. Agent 007 has gone completely to pieces and is drafting his resignation. But ‘M’ is prepared to give him one last chance to prove himself — on a mission which will lead him to a fatal encounter in a Japanese Garden of Death.”

Michael Jayston: British actor born in 1935, he voiced the character of James Bond in this radio drama. Although he has many film and TV appearances to his credit, he has also recorded a variety of audiobooks, including most of John le Carre’s novels.

Adam Blackwood

Productions: The video games 007 Racing (2000, in which the player takes on the role of James Bond behind the wheel of some of his most famous vehicles);  and Tomorrow Never Dies (1999, third-person shooter).

Adam Blackwell: Although the games above feature the likeness of Pierce Brosnan (who was the Bond at the time), the actor did not provide his voice, thus the British-born Blackwood stepped in to handle vocal duties.

Tim Bentinck

Project: The World is Not Enough (1999, a collection of three different games based on the film).

Tim Bentinck Tells Mi6-hq.com: “I’m a huge Bond fan.  I was brought up on Bond, all the characters are in my blood. I read all the Ian Fleming books at school before the films started being made, so I always compared the movies to the original. I have the greatest respect and I’m thrilled and honored to think that my delivery of ‘The name’s Bond, James Bond’ is heard by millions around the world. It’s humbling.”

Andrew Bicknell

The Production: 007: Agent Under Fire, a 2001 video game.

Andrew Bicknell: The site Revolvy.com details the British actor’s involvement with the project, noting, “He has become known for playing the likeness of James Bond [in the game] as (then current) James Bond actor Pierce Brosnan had not renewed his contract to appear as the Bond likeness. However, Bicknell’s casting as Bond was not heavily publicized or reported at the time. The game’s cover did not even show his face and various PlayStation 2 magazines erroneously reported that Bicknell’s Bond was a generic character invented for the game ‘rather than anyone specific.’ Bicknell’s Bond was due to appear in the following game, but due to Brosnan signing up to Die Another Day, the actor was dropped from the project.”

Maxwell Caulfield

Production: The 2002 video game 007: Nightfire, officially described this way: “James Bond is on a mission to investigate a stolen space weapon platform. Raphael Drake, who is an industrialist that takes on a job to disarm nuclear missiles, is suspected to secretly be using them to start a nuclear holocaust.”

Maxwell Caulfield: The British born actor has an extensive career in television, film and on stage. He exploded onto the scene in the film Grease 2. In his personal life, he’s been married to Juliet Mills (Nanny and the Professor) since 1980.

Jason Carter

Production: The 2004 video game GoldenEye: Rogue Agent, in which you join the other side of the law as you play a rogue MI6 agent who becomes involved in a “bitter gang war” between Dr. No and Auric Goldfinger.

Jason Carter: The actor, whose credits include the sci-fi TV series Babylon 5, voiced Bond in the game. The Bond in that game was unable to utilize Pierce Brosnan’s likeness due to the fact at that point the actor had left the role, and this was before Daniel Craig was cast.

Daniel Craig

Productions: After prolonged contract negotiations failed, the Bond producers let Pierce Brosnan go at about the same time they obtained the rights for Casino Royale. Going back to the beginning, they more or less rebooted the series and cast Daniel Craig in the role. That film was released in 2006, followed by Quantum of Solace (2008), Skyfall (2012), Spectre (2015) and Bond 25, which will be released in April 2020. He also voiced Bond in the games Quantum of Solace (2008), James Bond 007: Bloodstone (2010), GoldenEye 007 (2010), and World of Espionage (2015).

Daniel Craig Says: “In Casino Royale, James Bond is a darker character, which is how Ian Fleming originally wrote him. We start right at the beginning of Bond’s career, when he has a lot of rough edges, and he doesn’t like to get involved with people. As the movie goes on, though, he becomes more refined.
“I didn’t go out of my way to make Bond likable in Casino Royale. I didn’t go out saying, ‘Please like him.’ I wanted to show someone who changed. I did not want him to be the same person at the beginning of the movie that he was at the end, and I wasn’t thinking beyond this movie at the time. But I was thinking that if we ever did another movie, we needed to have somewhere to go. I wanted to see a fallible human being, someone who made mistakes, and someone who an audience watches and goes, ‘This might turn out good. This might turn out really bad.’ And sometimes it did. But I wanted him to be fallible, because, dramatically, it’s much more interesting.”

Toby Stephens

The Productions: BBC radio dramas based on Ian Fleming’s Dr. No (2008), Goldfinger (2010), From Russia with Love (2012), On Her Majesty’s Secret Service (2014), Diamonds Are Forever (2015), Thunderball (2016) and Moonraker (2018).

Toby Stephens Says: “I grew up with the franchise,” related the actor, who played Bond villain Gustav Graves in Die Another Day, to hometheaterforum. “What was fun for me was playing a villain in one of them, which is one aspect, in a film version of it, but then going back to doing the radio dramatizations, which were much more true to the books. They were much more faithful to the books, literally direct line dramatizations from the books. The films are very different, and certainly now they are very different from the original conception of Bond. Obviously they have to change with the times and I kind of feel that when I had the ability to do Die Another Day I was at the end of something. I think they had gone as far as they could with that style of Bond. Then they reinvented him with Daniel Craig, although they used one of the original novels as the template. They had to reconfigure it. I think with the Bond films the old way of doing things became slightly obsolete. It will be interesting to see where it goes from here.”

Timothy Watson

The Production: 007 Legends video game from 2012, which suggests that you “play as Bond in this first person shooter adventure. You will encounter the most memorable nemesis of 007 spanning from Goldfinger to Skyfall.”

Timothy Watson: For what was the franchise’s 50th Anniversary game, the actor voices not only James Bond, but Auric Goldfinger as well. Prior to that he had voiced other characters in the games GoldenEye 007 and Blood Stone.