Joan Collins - the day I said no to James Bond

On the centenary of Ian Fleming's birth, Joan Collins offers a lament for the Fleming way of life, and for film roles that weren't meant to be for The Telegraph.

Although Ian Fleming wrote his first 007 novel in 1953, I had not even heard of him or of James Bond until about 10 years later. Early in the 1960s, shortly after Anthony Newley and I became engaged, we were strolling around Harrod's when we heard a familiar Scottish burr hailing us. It was Sean Connery, who'd just been signed up to play the super-agent in Dr No. 'Congratulations,' Tony said. 'You'll be great, and I'm sure this film's going to be wonderful.'

'Oh, it'll be just another job,' Sean shrugged. 'Then I'll be waiting for the phone to ring again as usual.'

The three of us nodded knowingly, since as actors we had all experienced the agony of waiting for the phone to ring, the occasional euphoria when your agent announced that someone actually wanted to hire you, and then sinking into the doldrums waiting for the phone to ring after that job was over. We hadn't the slightest inkling that Dr No would be the first of a film series that was destined to become the most popular of all time and that would catapult Sean Connery to stardom.

Reportedly, Ian Fleming was not that sure that his first Bond was right for the part. 'An overgrown stunt man,' he was quoted as saying on one occasion, and on another thought his white dinner jacket made him look like a head waiter - not the most august of beginnings. But the proof was in the pudding. Sean made five Bond movies before he 'retired' and George Lazenby took over - for one movie - before they fortunately had to bring Sean back, by public demand.

Sean Connery had what's known as 'it'. I can't explain it: it's not just sex appeal, but a certain something about men that makes women go weak at the knees, and a certain something about women that makes men drool, and it's an absolute prerequisite if you're going to go anywhere in this fickle business.

Ian Fleming's original James Bond was much older, wiser and far trickier than any athletic Adonis. Bizarrely, his name was plucked by Fleming from a book: Birds of the West Indies, by the author of the same name. It was alluded to jokingly by Pierce Brosnan in Die Another Day, when he assumes the cover of an ornithologist to access a sinister island off the coast of Cuba. It is reported that David Niven was approached first to play 007, but I've also heard that James Mason was the 'one' Ian had in mind, with Cary Grant as a close second, although frankly I can't imagine charming Cary killing a fly, much less a human being. Besides which, by 1962 he would have been too old.

As each new Bond was cast I, and everyone else, eagerly compared him with the previous one. George Lazenby was so unpopular that when Roger Moore was cast everyone couldn't wait to praise him. Roger called me one day sounding elated and said he had some exciting news, so to 'put the champagne on ice'. He and his then wife, Luisa, arrived at my house and I have seldom seen anyone more exuberant - he was truly thrilled - and we toasted him and wished him well. Roger made seven Bond films: he was laconic and amusing in a devil-may-care way and, while he may not have had Sean's dark saturnine side, he did have a great sense of humour, and a clever eyebrow.

I was sad when his tenure ended but was fascinated by the choice of Timothy Dalton. I had tried to cast Timothy the year before to play my lover in a TV mini-saga called Sins, which I was producing, but was told emphatically by the heads of the studio that he had zero sex appeal. So we cast James Fiorentino instead, and Tim played my brother! How, then, could he have been chosen to play the sexiest man of them all just one year later? I leave you to decide who was right.

I loved the choice of Pierce Brosnan. Pierce was in his early forties when he made his first Bond. While Sean had been perhaps too young (32) and Roger a touch too old (late forties), Pierce was the perfect age, and to me the physical embodiment of the handsome 007. I thought he was simply wonderful and I was shocked when he was fired simply because the production team decided he was too old.

I had my own flirtation with the Bond casting cartel - twice, as a matter of fact. The first time was in Goldfinger, to play the unfortunate babe who dies from having her entire body and face painted gold. Being of a squeamish bent, I didn't fancy lounging around the set all day wearing just a sticky coat of paint, and besides I was too aware of the danger that I could die from it - not eventually, but immediately and in a horribly painful way unless a minimum of a square inch was left unpainted. So I passed and Shirley Eaton did the job, very well I might add. The second time was for the original Casino Royale, which, while being a spoof, was still a spoof featuring 007. I was keen to do this one, produced by the legendary Charles Feldman, one of Hollywood's true movers and shakers. But my doctor informed me I was in fact enceinte, and sliding around on satin sheets in a peignoir would not do the movie or the baby any good. So I had to pass again and Ursula Andress had her second go (after Dr No) at Bond girl-hood.

Ian Fleming was incredibly instrumental in influencing people to travel to new and glamorous places. He placed James Bond in the most exotic settings and described them to a degree that only comes from experiencing a location first hand. Monte Carlo, Jamaica, the Swiss Alps, Istanbul - all were recreated with a deft touch and vividness that made the reader want to be there and experience it. In the movies, thanks to Britain's finest directors of photography and cameramen, it made viewers really want to be there too.

At the time, perhaps I didn't notice the appeal of Ian Fleming's books because I was already living the life that Ian has provided to generations of armchair travellers. For example, I had filmed Island in the Sun in Barbados, site of Thunderball, and I fell in love with the delightful island to such a degree that the production manager literally had to drag me out of the water to put me on the plane after we'd finished filming. Coincidentally it starred, among others, Ian's choice of James Mason who, once again, played my brother!

I have to say that James would have been an odd choice for Bond, but he certainly fit the bill on the 'glamorous yet sinister' front. When I first met him, his villainous image shrouded him like an aura, but I soon found out he was only human. The company had to travel one day from Trinidad to Barbados on a small rickety plane, going through turbulence that threatened our breakfast to a repeat appearance. While Steven Boyd and I slung down copious rum punches, getting plastered to kill our fear, I noticed James Mason calmly reading his Times.

'James,' I said. 'Aren't you terrified? It's so bumpy we could crash!' Without even glancing up, James replied in his mellifluously reassuring voice, 'Oh, no my dear, I'm never frightened in planes. I fly so much, what is there to be anxious about? They're perfectly safe,' and he continued reading his paper. That's when I noticed his paper was upside down.

Steven and I collapsed in giggles and had to move away, but I observed that James didn't turn a page the entire trip, his hands clutching it so tightly that his knuckles were ivory white. That would have been a human side to James Bond we haven't yet seen.

Then I spent the entire Cuban missile crisis holed up in Jamaica, of Dr No fame. I was oblivious to the fact that the world around me was about to come to an end in perhaps the most realistic James Bond-ian plot in history. Leslie Bricusse (the songwriter), along with his wife, Evie, and I had travelled there on holiday and I kept wondering why Leslie looked so worried while Evie and I frolicked in the glamorous turquoise sea and sunbathed on the golden sand (yes, it is!). He only told me after it was all over that they had been listening closely to unfolding events to find out if any of us even had a home to go back to in New York.

The last time I went to Fleming's Jamaican idyll, in the winter of 2001, the weather was so frightful that our plane made four aborted attempts to land in Montego Bay and finally had to change course and land in Kingston. The charming little airport had turned into a massive market where intimidating locals eyed us suspiciously as we climbed onto the bus to the relative safety of the Hilton. The next day we hired a car for the endless journey to Montego Bay, bumping along on unpaved roads with daunting drops at either side as we climbed the mountains to get to the bay. All that was missing were the livestock on the roof. Decidedly not James Bond at all. I was filming a documentary about the beauty of Jamaica but it rained so relentlessly the whole time that they had to re-shoot most of it after I'd returned to London.

I had also been to Vegas, where Diamonds are Forever was shot, to see the Rat Pack on stage and also a comedian who was teamed with Dean Martin. I had been sat at a ringside table right next to the stage, which was about eight inches above the floor, sporting my usual vampy look and low-cut dress, thoroughly enjoying the show and with my feet up on the edge of the stage. Suddenly Jerry Lewis turned to me and shouted, 'Hey, lady! You in the show?'

'N-n-n-no!' I managed to stammer.

'Then get your feet off the stage!'

I have to say, however, that he was charming and funny when I went to visit backstage, and we've always had a fond rapport when we see each other.

My first glimpse of Las Vegas airport was in the early 1960s, when I'd gone to see Sammy Davis at the Sands hotel. The airport was so tiny and primitive that the Las Vegas sign was made with twigs, and there were only two runways and one terminal. The 'strip' was just a two-lane highway, which had a few two or three-storey hotels - El Rancho, the Sands, the Flamingo and a few others. But the star contingent of performers was fantastically represented, and every name in showbiz competed for their neon place in the sun. No woman would be caught dead after 6pm unless they wore a silk, satin or chiffon cocktail dress over which was slung a mink stole. The men were equally groomed, all tanned, brilliantined and snappily dressed. James Bond was right at home in this environment.

I could hardly believe the transformation recently when I went to visit my friend Judy Bryer. The glamour of Ian Fleming's Vegas is far, far away from the reality of today, and I can't picture James Bond trying to pursue the nefarious Blofeld while stuck in a traffic jam on the strip or trying to chase him on foot among the morbidly obese tourists jostling for space on the sidewalk, battling massive swathes of fat wrapped in Lycra.

Ian Fleming was a species almost extinct today - an aspirational writer. Men wanted to be James Bond, and women wanted to be the glamour-puss that James Bond would be attracted to. Nowadays, we seem to be spurning the very thought of being smooth, suave and sophisticated, and seem to prefer the dull reality of T-shirts and Doc Marten's. You can see the decay of aspiration from the Promenade des Anglais to the Sunset Strip: shirtless louts and mini-skirted slags drunk and vociferous, behaving badly because they know no better and have no one to look up to.

I must admit that even Casino Royale seemed slightly anachronistic to me. I haven't seen so many dinner jackets and gowns for a normal night out in years, and I'm willing to bet that people milling around the Hotel Splendide on any evening aren't nearly so well dressed. That's why I felt it was almost impossible to replicate the allure of James Bond today, although I do think that Daniel Craig, with his craggy lived-in face and tough modern way of wearing clothes, hit the perfect note for the 007 of 2008. It would have certainly been a shame to see James Bond relegated to preventing an invasion of asylum seekers masterminded by Red Ken to control the second preference vote while M rode a bicycle into MI6 to avoid the congestion charge.

No, Ian Fleming's books belong to a bygone era, when we were innocent and naive, and spooks and baddies hid in the shadows of our imagination.

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