It’s interesting that James Bond theme songs are remarkably recognisable as such. They share certain stylistic elements and motifs that clearly signal their association with the famous franchise, and it’s all thanks to the involvement of one son-of-York, John Barry, who was by far the biggest contributor to Bond scores and theme songs. Of all the Bond themes, the first and most famous – and the one then regularly used in subsequent films – is that written for Dr No in 1962. The original score was actually composed by Monty Norman (though this was disputed by John Barry) but most notably arranged and performed by John Barry and his orchestra.
The score was a masterpiece of expressive film music and established a clear template for the quintessential Bond theme: unnerving orchestral chords, raunchy brass, clashing cymbals and of course that zesty surf rock guitar played by Vic Flick. Flick played his famous riff on a 1939 Clifford Essex Paragon Deluxe electric guitar plugged into a Fender Vibrolux amplifier. Its interplay with the orchestral instrumentation produced a thrilling soundtrack that managed to encompass and express the sinister world of the spy, just perfect for the new film. The song ends just as thrillingly on that single Em/maj9 chord so famous it’s known as the “James Bond chord”. If you’re a guitarist, you might find it fun to reproduce this final chord yourself…it’s this:
Barry went on to score ten more Bond films, but this original score is the one that everyone instantly recognises as the Bond theme. Here’s the version recorded for single release by the John Barry Seven, reaching number one on 1st November 1962.
Monotonal cod philosopher Pete and deferential sidekick Dud deliver an archetypal dialogue in the reptile house at the zoo. This is one of the so-called “Dagenham dialogues”, featuring “Pete and Dud”, popularised on the show Not Only…But Also, first aired in 1965.
Coming out of the heady iconoclastic success of the satirical stage revue, Beyond the Fringe, Dudley Moore embarked on what was originally intended to be a solo project, Not Only Dudley Moore, But Also His Guests. However, having invited Peter Cook to appear with him in the pilot, the success of their double act quickly led to Cook joining the show permanently.
The dialogues between the flat-capped comedy creations from Dagenham presented Peter Cook with the opportunity to ad-lib and creatively explore the myriad comic possibilities of his character. His ability to sustain long periods of straight-faced comic ramblings that oftentimes bring Moore to the brink of corpsing hilarity, adds a wonderful comic tension to the dialogues. Ever alert to Moore’s struggle to stay in character, Cook enjoys ramping up the comic surreality in order to crack Dud up.
The duo’s relationship was always a bit edgy, but their partnership fell apart during the marathon tour of their two-man show Behind the Fridge, in the early seventies, and they never worked together on a regular basis again, save for some albums and shows featuring the less-than-edifying “Derek and Clive” characters. A flawed bromance they may have been but it’s preferable to remember the good times, and at times those good times were comedically sublime.
The Hundred Years’ War (1337-1453) was a series of wars between England and France involving England’s claim to the French throne. In the campaign of 1415, England’s Henry V sailed for France and besieged the fortress at Harfleur, capturing it in September. The English army then marched across the French countryside towards Calais, only to be intercepted by the French army near the village of Azincourt. Henry’s troops were exhausted, hungry, sick, demoralised, and pitiably outnumbered (according to some estimates, by some 36000 to 9000 troops).
It didn’t look good. Henry needed to rouse his men for battle like never before, and he gave them a speech which not only roused them, but spurred them to a victory that would resound throughout the ages as the famous Battle of Agincourt. It was the morning of October 25th (St Crispin’s Day).
That Henry’s speech occurred is agreed by historians to be a factual event. However, it was left to the creative imagination of William Shakespeare, two hundred years later, to envisage Henry’s words and compose the über-galvanising “St Crispin’s Day Speech” that has come down to us in his play, Henry V.
What a speech! If anything could get you up and off to face the French, it’s surely inspirational words such as these:
We few, we happy few, we band of brothers; For he today who sheds his blood with me Shall be my brother… …gentlemen in England now a-bed Shall think themselves accurs’d they were not here And hold their manhoods cheap…
Laurence Olivier famously delivered this call to arms in the 1944 film of the play, made as a morale-booster for the war effort. However, for me there is no better delivery than this mesmerising performance by Kenneth Branagh in the 1989 version. Watch this, and allow yourself to be fired up, but please resist the temptation to hit a Frenchman!
PS almost certainly apocryphal, but a great story nonetheless, is the claim that, in the real life speech, Henry V told his men that the French had boasted that they would cut off two fingers from the right hand of every archer, so that he could never draw a longbow again. After the battle, English archers were showing French captives those fingers as if saying “See – my fingers are still here”. This is now known as the “V” for victory gesture!
G K Chesterton is best known for his series of quirky stories about amateur sleuth and Roman Catholic priest, Father Brown. However, it is his 1908 novel The Man Who Was Thursday which is for me his abiding masterpiece, a piece of literature I have returned to perhaps five or six times in order to recapture its delicious prose and otherworldliness. I even put this old and wonderfully designed book cover onto a T-shirt!
At first glance, The Man Who Was Thursday is a suspenseful mystery story, a thriller, but it soon becomes apparent that this is no mere detective story; little is as it seems in this mystery, and we find ourselves in deeper waters than expected. The novel’s subtitle offers us a clue to this: A Nightmare.
Gabriel Syme is a poet and a police detective; Lucien Gregory, a poet and bomb-throwing anarchist. At the beginning of the novel, Syme infiltrates a secret meeting of anarchists and gets himself elected to it as “Thursday,” one of the seven members of the Central Anarchist Council, in the sudden full knowledge of a hamstrung and petrified Gregory.
Syme soon learns, however, that he is not the only one in disguise, and even as the masks come off, the biggest question – for both the reader and the characters – is who is Sunday? What is the true identity of the larger than life character who is the supreme head of the anarchists? The story unfolds thrillingly, and throughout it all we are treated to Chesterton’s exuberant prose, clever dialogue and gripping style. His wit shines through every scene.
Let’s read an example of this style, and how Chesterton constructs a creeping sense of jeopardy. Syme, the detective who is disguised as a poet, has engaged the anarchist Gregory and, on condition of having sworn himself to absolute secrecy, is taken to meet the highly dangerous anarchist council. Just prior to the arrival of the rest of the anarchists, Syme lets Gregory into his own secret…
“Gregory, I gave you a promise before I came into this place. That promise I would keep under red-hot pincers. Would you give me, for my own safety, a little promise of the same kind?”
“A promise?” asked Gregory, wondering.
“Yes,” said Syme, very seriously, “a promise. I swore before God that I would not tell your secret to the police. Will you swear by Humanity, or whatever beastly thing you believe in, that you will not tell my secret to the anarchists?”
“Your secret?” asked the staring Gregory. “Have you got a secret?”
“Yes,” said Syme, “I have a secret.” Then after a pause, “Will you swear?”
Gregory glared at him gravely for a few moments, and then said abruptly—
“You must have bewitched me, but I feel a furious curiosity about you. Yes, I will swear not to tell the anarchists anything you tell me. But look sharp, for they will be here in a couple of minutes.”
Syme rose slowly to his feet and thrust his long, white hands into his long, grey trousers’ pockets. Almost as he did so there came five knocks on the outer grating, proclaiming the arrival of the first of the conspirators.
“Well,” said Syme slowly, “I don’t know how to tell you the truth more shortly than by saying that your expedient of dressing up as an aimless poet is not confined to you or your President. We have known the dodge for some time at Scotland Yard.”
Gregory tried to spring up straight, but he swayed thrice.
“What do you say?” he asked in an inhuman voice.
“Yes,” said Syme simply, “I am a police detective. But I think I hear your friends coming.”
G K Chesterton
Commentaries on excellence in art, music, film, and literature
